Competition heats up amongst Traverse leaders

The heat was turned up at the front of the field in the second stage of the Fairydown Southern Traverse in Hanmer today [Friday] with Powered by Velvet crossing the finish line just seven minutes ahead of Icebreaker R & R Sport after a gruelling 35km trek.

The cut off for the day’s racing is at 9.00pm and the second day start is scheduled for midnight at Windy Point, launching the toughest section of the race. Icebreaker R & R Sport was ahead by a few minutes at the first transition this morning but Powered by Velvet was able to sneak into the second transition just ahead of them at 5.35pm and had already left for the 6km bike ride to the finish before Icebreaker arrived at 5.42pm.

Powered by Velvet crossed the finish at 5.59pm with Icebreaker R & R Sport putting the hammer down to go across the line at 6.06pm.

Race Director Geoff Hunt was pleased with how the 35 km trekking stage in the Maukuratawhai panned out with teams moving in a range of different directions through the checkpoints.

“Teams didn’t know if their decision making about which route to take was correct or not. But it adds excitement because if you stay together then you race together and that’s no fun.”

The teams agreed.

“We didn’t know where anyone else was, “says Powered by Velvet’s Chris Morrissey. “ It was tough out there but if we had raced together all day that would have been stressful and we would have been shattered. It was strange not knowing where the others were but it was quite good to have it that way.”

Mark Williams of Icebreaker R & R Sport says the terrain was awesome.

“Beautiful ridgelines, lovely beech forest, great views back down the valley. It definitely made it much more interesting with everyone going different ways.”

Several teams, who have crossed the finish line, have incurred penalties for missing a checkpoint which will be assessed in the overall results.

Teams have several hours rest before heading to Windy Point for the midnight start for the 24 hour section of the race which includes kayaking, mountain biking and mountain trekking.