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Team oobe
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This team brings much-needed experience on the water to this year's playing field.
By Buddy Levy, Quokka Sports |
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A mixture of youthful vigor and sage maturity describes Team oobe. Captain Louise Cooper-Lovelace has only missed one Eco-Challenge, and also has two Raid Gauloises on her resume as well as seven Hawaii Ironman triathlons and an astounding 56 marathons. Cooper-Lovelace is an elementary school teacher living in West Hills, California. She is also a breast cancer survivor.
Rebecca Rusch captained her Team Rubicon to a 4th place finish in the 1999 Eco-Challenge in Argentina - by far the highest place ever for a predominantly woman's team, and they led the race part of the way. Of Team oobe, the muscular Rusch joked, "This is the lightest team I've ever been on-if we hit the scales I think I'd be the heaviest of the four."
"This is the lightest team I've ever been on-if we hit the scales I think I'd be the heaviest of the four."
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Navigator Patrick Harper of Ketchum, Idaho is relatively new to adventure racing, but in his short career he has established himself as a fine navigator. At the 2000 Raid Gauloises in Nepal, Harper guided Tactel Inspira (which included Rusch) to a 7th place finish. 32 year-old Harper has worked as an outfitter, flyfishing and river guide in Idaho and Alaska for the last decade, and is an experienced river kayaker with several first descents on rivers throughout Idaho, Washington, and California.
31 year-old Tony Molina of Santa Monica, California is one of just four athletes in the field to have competed in every Eco-Challenge since 1995, having finished with an impressive 4th place in the 1998 Eco-Challenge in Morocco.
Team oobe has incredibly strong paddling skills, which should help them immensely in this water-based race. After last year's Eco-Challenge, Rusch competed in Chile in the World Whitewater Rafting Championships. Harper spoke about the boat sections, "These aren't sea kayaks, they are native craft and I think that will level the playing field somewhat." He added that as far as navigation is concerned, "The maps we looked over at registration seemed quite good, which is useful." Molina pointed out, "One thing that will be tricky is estimating the distance covered - that will be hard and distances will be deceiving."
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