ExpAfrica: Castle Lite’s report

It is only once we surpass what we believe to be achievable, and function in that surreal world where time, feelings and emotions become one continuous blur that we realise our true potential to live beyond boundaries. To live beyond our limitations is where we are exposed to our true beings stripped down of all pretences. Many cultures talk about a dream state and in this sport we function in a dream-like state.

LIVING BEYOND OUR LIMITATIONS

There are few other sports or adventures like expedition adventure racing that can take us to this special place, a place where day and night become one, where a sound state of mind and a mental mess are only seconds apart, where unspoken voices and hallucinations are par for the course; where despite extreme fatigue you are in touch with the rhythm and vibrations of the Universe. Expedition Africa 2014 was a race that pushed us deep into the abyss where at times we were unsure of emerging out the other side and were tested beyond our limits only to find that we could overcome, that we could push the boundaries and that the human spirit and mind can overcome pretty much anything.

PRE RACE DRAMAS
With 2013 being a really tough year the usual enthusiasm for events including Expedition Africa 2014 took a back seat. Although the team was finalized there was not much communication pre race and we pretty much trained on our own not doing a short event in preparation for the “Big” one as in previous years.

As the time got closer and a couple of weeks before the start we had to find a replacement team member as one of our usual team mates pulled out of the event. This was not ideal but luckily with the help of Don “Tiny” Simms we were put onto Liam “Chaos” Victor who despite not having any adventure racing experience and not knowing what he was allowing himself in for grabbed the opportunity with both hands.

THE FIELD
The field of teams that Stephan and Heidi from Kineticgear attracted for this year’s event was absolutely amazing. To be able to line up with the greats of the sport like the legendary Nathan Fa’ave from Seagate (a team who I used to idolize watching their exploits over and over again on the Eco Challenge videos that I sourced) to lining up next to South African legends like the Collins brothers and world top ranked teams like Haglofs Silva, Tecnu Racing and our own Merrell Adventure Addicts and Cyanosis all with a lot of international experience elevated the prestige of this event and we truly felt like we were part of the Adventure Racing World Series with 16 international teams on the starting line.

THE ROUTE
The beauty and uniqueness of Adventure Racing is that you are fed limited information so you never know exactly what you are facing or where you are going. This information is given to you as the race progresses.

We knew that this adventure would consist of a 11km sea and estuary paddle, 12km trail run, 5km paddle, 80km trek, 10km canyoning (kloofing), 120km Mountain bike, 67km paddle, 40km trek and finishing of with a 230km mountain bike.

What we didn’t know is where these disciplines would take us and what terrain we would be covering.

After completing all the admin required and the competency checks we were handed our maps for the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Legs but this only compromised 27km of our journey so we would have to wait and see what Stephan had in store for us as the race progressed.

EXPEDITION STYLE RACING
The concept of expedition type racing is that the organization transports all your required gear to the transitions that you need them at. You also have to pack resupply boxes that will be dropped on the route to access for clothing changes and to resupply your race food. Bikes need to be boxed and sealed for transport and paddle bags need to be packed for transportation.

All of this adds a different dimension as strategy and planning when packing these resupply boxes and bike boxes are vital and can have a huge effect on your race.

Other than this you have to support yourself and no outside assistance is allowed.

LET THE GAMES BEGIN

DAY 1

Early to rise after a nerve filled night; get our gear and stuff sorted and make our way down to the beach with our kayaks for the surf entry and kayak up to the Wild Coast Sun.

Standing on the pre dawn beach watching the wild surf break we shifted our kayaks about 4 times to get the right line because every time we thought we were good a HUGE SET of dumpers would lift up and take the wind out of our sails.

With 80 boats heading out we were extremely nervous of the carnage that could occur being caught by capsized kayaks and athletes on the way out. I would be lying if I said we were calm and collected. We were “shyting” ourselves. Even our two salted sea paddlers looked nervous scouting the shore break.

Stephan started the countdown and a Lemans style race start saw our team separated with myself and Liam fighting our own fight to get to the backline and Craig and Laura doing their thing to avoid the carnage and punch through the surf. We would regroup at the backline.

The Sea Gods were with us and we got through the surf with the front bunch of teams. Craig and Laura were in the front group of boats with Liam and I trying hard to catch up to no avail. We could just see them in the distance. How lekker was it to look around and see that this Vrystaat Boytjie was paddling among some of the world’s top racers and my paddle training consisted of sitting on the rowing machine at gym hehehehehe.

Getting out to the back line was tough enough but having to come back to the shore is a MUCH scarier task with 6 foot swells and huge waves crashing in front of us. My reaction was “VAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAK”. Again carnage as we got slammed by a huge wave and had to swim our way to shore before portaging and getting to the CP. Amazingly Team castle Lite with two “Non-Paddlers” got to CP 1 in the top 5 with Craig and Laura being the 4th boat to hit the beach. BOOM!!!!! Race on.

We paddled hard to Transition 2 and the start of the run with the sharp end of the field and started a tough technical 12km trail run. After collecting the first 2 CP’s on the route we descended into the gorge to collect the next 2 CP’s before getting to our kayaks. We were running with the “Big Dogs” so a little mix of ego, adrenalin and just poor map work saw me overshoot the next CP. Not wanting to believe I made a mistake and still running with a Swedish team we pushed on only to discover the next CP and had to turn around and run back to our missed CP with loads of teams passing us. Needless to say our spirits were deflated but luckily it was still early days.

We reached T 3 having lost about and hour due to my nav error and were determined to make up time paddling hard into T4.
At T4 we received our new maps and CP’s for the MONSTER 90km trek and kloofing section. One way of dealing with monster legs like this is to focus on the shorter distances from CP to CP step by step we would overcome the journey.

We set of at pace and got onto the beach collecting the 1st CP and shortly afterwards spotted Pennypinchers AR team in the distance. These okes are our buddies and we started a brisk run to catch up to them. It was great having the company of the Pennypinchers Crew for the majority of this hike.

We got to the abseil and had a bit of drama here with Liam – a novice to abseiling – being quit a “maer gat” he seemed to have lost more weight and we had to modify his harness with a spare prussic so that he wouldn’t fall out much to the surprise of the ropes marshall. Myself and Craig descended first to guide the other two down if necessary and on the way down I realized that this was no straight forward abseil. The rope had to be managed and maneuvered past tree and cliffs to get down safely. When Craig and myself were down we watched the drama unfold as the rest of team Castle Lite came unstuck on the abseil. Liam getting his rope stuck midway down so that the loose end ended up wedged in a overhanging rock and he was below the wedged rope getting caught up in mid air. Laura taking a huge fall at the start of the abseil smashing her face against the cliff face and getting stuck in one of the trees that obstructed the abseil route cutting her lip quite badly, and knocking her two front teeth loose.

With both our teams mates stuck on a 100m cliff face Craig was sitting on a rock screaming to them how well they were doing, how great they look and to keep going. I was like “FFS Craig they are stuck; they are going no-where stop lying to them this is serious”, but he kept on telling them how great they were. After quite a while both Liam and Laura managed to get to the bottom of the abseil, Liam as white as a ghost and Laura with her face covered in blood. Like the true soldier she is we cleaned Laura’s wounds and moved on chasing the last rays of sun before darkness set in.

We were still in the company of the Pennypinchers and James Steward was leading us on a perfect route to collect the CP’s. I took a bit of a back seat on this section just following James’ spot on navigation on my map in case the teams separating so that I know at all times exactly where we were.

DAY 2 and DAY 3
Sunrise and we were still on the monster trek. We were moving like zombies, some of our feet were trashed from the wet start and sand stretches and I had a severe case of chafe around the “GABA” area. “GABA” is a word invented on this leg it’s the area between a guys Gat (A-hole) and “Ballas” to be quite frank! Needless to say a variety of lube was used to try easing the discomfort but I will be honest I was feeling pretty sorry for myself. In hindsight when I saw the injuries my team mates were carrying I feel like a wimp for moaning. I was in everyone’s back packs including Garth from Pennypinchers looking for the best lube for the job.

We soldiered on through the whole of day 2 on this trek reaching the highly anticipated kloofing section at sunset. While other teams decided to sleep on top of the gorge and tackle it in the daylight we decided to push on try get this mammoth stage over and get into transition for some R&R.

What an epic, we descended into the kloof on a steep single track and were met by unforgiving and slippery boulders. With our teams trashed feet (Laura and Liam were walking on blisters that covered their entire balls of the feet and toes) progress was slow; at stages we were moving at 500m per hour.

As the night wore on the sleep monsters started their games and my team started to drift into that unreal world of reality and fantasy that affects all of us at some stage during a race. It was especially amusing to witness Liam’s fall into this world of hallucination. The amount of mambo jumbo coming from his mouth was ridiculous. What scared me the most is that halfway through the gorge he saw a minivan (claiming it to be the media van) and table and chairs and this was confirmed by both Craig and Laura. I was surrounded by crazies hehehe. Later on he was convinced Craig had the check point and was waving it up and down. This was all an illusion.

It started to get dangerous to proceed in our sleep deprived state and after I had stuffed my knee and elbow up on a few falls that could have turned out much worse than they did I made the call and we bedded down in the kloof to sleep until sunrise. As night turned to day we got going again eventually collecting the CP and exiting the kloof; 13 hours after we had entered into this hidden trap of rock, bush and water. It was great seeing the friendly faces of some of the media crew at the exit which lifted our spirits and we ran into the transition at Mboytie with renewed energy.

This stage took us just under 48 hours to complete.

We transitioned in Mboytie had a hot meal and set up our bikes for the 120km Mountain Bike leg with a huge amount of vertical ascent. We proceeded to collect the CP’s one at a time still just focusing on the next CP and not concentrating on anything beyond.

I took a huge fall of the bike when on a fast downhill my front wheel got caught in a grass covered rut and flung me to the ground like a rag doll. I was unconscious for a few seconds only to wake up to the concern of my team mates and the laughter of some of the locals who thought this was quite a spectacle. Gathering myself we rode through the night having a 90 minute power sleep at around 03h30 allowing us to wake up close to daybreak fooling our minds into believing that we have had sufficient sleep. We Cycled on into:

DAY 4

Our cycle continued and we eventually hooked up with the legends Team Antimatter. Ugene and lofty are like the Lone Ranger and Tonto and we spent a lot of time in each other’s company. About 15km from the next transition we stopped to discuss route options. I had one option and Ugene and Lofty had another so we took a bet to see who would get to the transition first. They sped of with us following. My route choice turned out to be less inviting so I made a call to rather use Antimatters route option. We “klapped” it expecting them to be ahead of us but somehow they deviated from their own route and got into the transition over an hour behind us. Lofty you still owe me beer china!

We made a quick transition and portaged our kayaks 1km down to the river and smashed the paddle getting into transition at Port St John just as the sun set and before the cold got hold of us.

New maps and checkpoints dictated our journey further on the 40km trek. We had to collect a tricky CP just outside transition that was taking teams an unusual long time to find. I looked at the maps and saw that an ideal situation would be to collect the CP and come down and proceed around on the jeep track to Poenskop, a road that I have driven in my fishing days. Stephan was in transition and we enquired if we could check out collect the CP then come back and sleep a while before continuing. This was allowed according to the rules and that is what we did. It took us around 2h30 minutes to get to the CP and get back to transition where we slept for around 3hours and started our trek to the next CP. Our tactic definitely paid off as we leapfrogged a few teams that were struggling to get through the bush tiger lining from the CP to the Poenskop CP.

At the CP we passed Antimatter and Pennypinchers and a host of other teams as the sun rose into day 5.

DAY 5

We continued on our trek and I started feeling feverish and my body started swelling up at an alarming rate. A couple of years ago in another race I had to withdraw from the event with cellulites a serious medical condition and the symptoms were similar. I had cut myself quite badly on my previous fall of the bike and was worried that infection had set in. We found a hut and asked if we could rest in the hut out of the heat of the day. The “MAMA” of the home invited us in without hesitation, they refused to let us sleep on the floor offering us their beds, when we refused they brought out reed mats and lay them down for us. We slept a deep sleep for me try and recover and get on with this race. When we woke the inhabitants of the hut we used had a bucket full of sweet oranges that they went and picked in the valleys while we slept. This was the true spirit of “UBUNTU” that we South Africans hear about so often. What a privilege to experience it firsthand.

On a tricky nav section working on compass bearings we met up with the team from Argentina and sang our way into transition back at Mboytie, my fever having broken and feeling much better.

We ate and slept before plotting our route for the final 230km Mountain bike stage which was a Killer Stage.

Leaving Mboytie at around 04h00 we hit the beach on our bikes to collect the first CP approximately 4 km away. This took us 4 hours of hike a bike, crossing rivers and carrying our bikes up a rocky hill.

Craig who had been a power house throughout the whole race carrying all the compulsory gear and Laura’s pack, collecting the CP’s and being the path finder had put his body on the line and his small toes had paid the price. They were not blistered they were TRASHED MANGLED a bloody blob of flesh. This hike a bike done on seriously stuffed feet made the going for my team extremely slow and flippen frustrating a few screams of profanity were released to the Universe. The CP was collected the letter was “R” we name it the “R” you F’ing kidding me CP.

Moving from the CP to the road above I was slightly ahead of the team when I heard screaming and shouting only to turn around and see a bull charging my team mates. Scary moment. I released my anger and frustration on the bull threatening its life and the life of all its descendants I don’t know if this worked but it stopped its bad behavior and we got past without a gorging.

At the first Spaza shop we found we regained energy with a Coke and a smile being hosted by an adorable Grandma sitting with us sipping her tea not saying a word but being part of our conversation. The Grandma brought my frustrated mind back to ease through her tranquil aura. We had a tough bike leg, our bodies a bit slaughtered but our spirits were lifted when we started bumping into other teams especially Antimatter who sort of became our surrogate team mates on this leg.

We had another hike a bike section through a gorge and out the other side with a river crossing at the bottom. Craig’s strapping came off the mangled toe and I had to re-strap it. I almost puked. I could see what looked like his toe bone sticking out on the inside of his toe. I don’t know how he managed to keep moving in that world of pain but he did.

Back on the bikes and on to CP 28 description Road Junction. Here I decided to take a route that seems we were the only team to use. Instead of taking the left junction we took the right junction much to the concern of my team mates as due to the lack of bike tracks we were the only ones going that way. I was however confident in my route choice and it played out perfectly as we picked up a tar road at the top and flew towards the next CP the river crossing at the bottom of a Gorge that was the old border crossing between the then Transkei and South Africa. One thing we soon realized that there were no free kilometers on this race if we flew down a pass for five kilometers you could bet your life that we would be climbing out of it for five plus kilometers.

Again we bumped into Antimatter and had great company as we attacked the climb. Our teams at a stage decided to have a power nap and as we were in a dodgy area on a Friday night we pushed on to a remote part climbed a bank on the side of the road and made ready to have a power nap. Lofty laid his bike down and a snake proceeded to slither over his wheel. We were so wasted that no one even thought of moving; we slept right there snake and all. Liam woke with his face covered by red ants but he got his shut eye.

We continued our journey collecting the CP’s and just before collecting the final CP we met up with the reduced team of Pennypinchers this again was fitting as we had spent so much time with this crew in the beginning of the race. It’s amazing how hooking up with other teams lifts the spirits.

We collected the final CP and had a few choice words for Stephan on the climb out to the tar road, but all was soon forgotten when we started our descent into Port Edward to finish this journey we started 6 days 5 hours and 58 minutes before.

Crossing the finish line as a complete team and not being short coursed filled use with a huge sense of achievement, we had overcome and conquered a brutal yet beautiful course that tested each of us beyond our limits.

HIGHLIGHTS
Without a shadow of a doubt the highlight of this race was the interaction with the local communities that we encountered on the route. Something that we would never get to experience as mere tourists. I finally learnt the true meaning of the term “UBUNTU” and as a South African felt immense pride and honor. The locals treated us as their own, nurturing us, guiding us, feeding us, and supplying us with scarce water to hydrate us even going so far as to protect us from harm.

The spirit among teams was special and uplifting.

The pristine beaches and perfect waves calmed and powered our spirits.

The resilience and toughness of my team whose bodies were battered and bruised yet they kept on moving without moaning or groaning with one common; was humbling and inspirational.

The passion and drive of Stephan and Heidi was contagious.

The brotherhood of Adventure Racers who are in reality the only ones who can truly comprehend what the others have gone through because no stories, photo’s, videos or descriptions can do justice to the experience unless you were in the arena your face marred with blood sweat mud and tears.

Until next year stay safe and may peace fill your world.

TEAM CASTLE LITE – Adrian “The Saffinator” Saffy; Laura “The Law” De Haast; Craig “Snakey” Powel and Liam “Chaos” Victor.

RACE REPORT – ADRIAN SAFFY

SPONSORED BY –  CASTLE LITE

SUPPORTED BY – SALOMON SA, BIOGEN, RACEFOOD