Wildfire Raid 2020 Adventure Race - Lake Manchester (Nav Trek, Bike, Kayak)

YouTube video of our race: https://youtu.be/UjM8Unlb8ds

Our very first adventure race. A 6 hour orienteering adventure race involving "Rogaining" - that is, collecting electronic checkpoints along the way. Teams of two, and there were about 90 teams all up. You get a map 1.5hrs prior to the race start, strategize your routes to maximise your points, and then off you go and hope you don't get lost or killed by Goannas or Kangaroos.

This is all manual navigation - no digital aids or maps allowed or you get shamed!

First time for Jacob and I and it was simply awesome - even though extremely exhausting and demanding upon the body. Lots of ultra-fit persons competing - many take this thing seriously as there were some pros there.

Venue: Lake Manchester off Kholo Rd. We did a total of 41kms and out of 1290 points, we collected 650 points for our first time event. We were pretty stoked about that but determined to do better next time.

These were our movements:
First segment: Trekking (that is running, hiking, walking)
Second segment: Biking (all around the lake, this was extremely taxing and it's all hills everywhere, and I'm talking big, big hills - some beautiful scenery and ridgelines we were riding)
Third segment: Trekking (this was mainly all firetrails however some bushbashing through speargrass required here and there to get to some checkpoints)
Fourth segment: Tandem Kayaking
Fifth segment: Biking back to finish

Some check points simply could not be located, no matter how hard we tried which was frustrating (this was even with some other competitors searching also). This meant lost time and wasted energy.

But at least we have the gist of this style of Adventure Racing now, and looking forward to doing the next one. Absolutely knackered at the end of the day though.