A front pack of competitors are racing hard and fast into the first night of the Discovery Channel Adventure race-A Southern Traverse partnership.
Ahead of expected times lead teams Propeller-heads from New Zealand, Steve Gurney, Nathan Fa'avae, Kathy Lynch and Jeff Mitchell are setting a burning pace, with Nokia of Finland, Petri Forsman, Jukka Pinola, Mikko Vehmas and Nicola Davies chasing hard and The Science Team from USA and Australia, Ian Adamson, Robyn Benincasa, Mike Kloser and John Jacoby right on their tails.
Team Cromwell and Team inthepacific.com both from New Zealand are also in the lead pack which have slashed at least 4 hours of the estimated fastest time for the first leg over the Craigieburn mountain range . Heading into the first night of racing the front teams will have to sleep over at Lake Coleridge before starting the first kayak leg on the lake at 6am in the morning.
At 8.30pm a member of the Boundary Quest Team from USA/New Zealand became the first casualty and was air lifted off the course from the top of the abseil on team request after suffering flu like systems and mild hyperthermia. Danny Suter was flown to Lake Catherine transition where the Southern Traverse medical crew and the teams support crew were waiting for him. The rest of the team will continue unranked with 3 members.
Tail end charlies currently are the Argentinean team who had not made it to checkpoint 2 by 9pm. All other teams had moved through.
– Southern Traverse Ltd
