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New adventures, new challenges

BEVAN FRANK dons his outdoor gear and tries to keep up with the new challenges offered by extreme, trail and adventure races. The stock demands of these races crosses the barrier between outdoor and sport

Worldwide, trail running is growing in popularity as well as participants. Last year, three times more trail races were organised internationally than in 2000 and 44% more runners participated in events.

"Participation in trail running events is definitely growing in SA as well, as it is a safe alternative to road running and cycling," says Katharine Tromp, promotions manager for New Balance, who is involved with organising various trail events. "It attracts participants as it incorporates a sense of adventure and can include the whole family. And it makes for a more scenic workout."

On South African shores trail runners are not only gaining on road runners in numbers, but ever-bigger challenges are spread before them, enticing them to run along the spectacular slopes of Table Mountain, over rocks along the shipwreck coastline, through barren desert or through lush Cape Winelands … even among the elephants in Addo.

Off-road runners now have a multitude of choices: from the informal get-togethers organised by clubs, schools and corporate companies to a multitude of organised events.

The latter vary from midweek events like the Summer Trail Series or New Balance and Mr Price Celtic Trail runs, the shorter weekend trail runs like the Table Mountain Challenge, Old Fisherman’s Trail Challenge, the night runs, like the Petzl Adventure Nights, to more challenging races like the 90km Puffer across Table Mountain or 100km through the Addo Elephant Park, to multi-sport events like the TotalSports Challenge and DueSouth Xterra sponsored by New Balance, and then the most challenging, the gruelling extreme adventure races demanding endurance and a multitude of skills like the Bull of Africa or Swazi Extreme.

Bridging the gap between trail running and adventure racing is the extreme trail run.

Extreme trail

The home of trail running is the Western Cape, says Harald Zumpt, supplier of Polar monitors, a sponsor of the Cape Odyssey. "This is due to the events and partially due to the environment. Brands need to create the events to grow the sport in other parts of the country to ultimately grow trail running as a sport nationally."

The Western Cape plays host to both the Cape Odyssey and the RAW Africa multiday stage races. The inaugural Cape Odyssey, a team trail race run in stages, was held in October last year along the Cape Coast and Winelands. In this five-day trail extravaganza of 211km, the runners participated in teams of two, following a concept perfected by the Cape Epic cycle stage race.

In the RAW Africa, adventurous runners start in Cape Infanta and run across 250km of tough coastal terrain around the Southern most tip of Africa. The five-day event, held in April, is part of a world series and is described as "the most extreme foot series in the world".

This year, the ninth Augrabies marathon will be run over 7 days in October through 550km of the Kalahari desert and is considered by many to be the ultimate in extreme trail runs.

The next Cape Epic?

Bennie Botes, brand manager of Salomon SA, sponsor of the Cape Odyssey, is excited about the future of these extreme events. "Look what the Cape Epic did for mountain biking," he says. "The Cape Odyssey has the same organisers with the same winning recipe, format and venues.

"In future, it will attract a combination of road runners — those that have done the Comrades and Two Oceans, and are looking for a new challenge — as well as your hard core adventure racers that will find this right up their alley, as well as experienced trail runners that will see this event as the highlight of the trail running calendar."

Ian Little, marketing manager of Capestorm and one of the winners of the mixed category of the Cape Odyssey, is more cautious. According to him, running for 5 days is much more demanding than, for example, cycling for several days.

"Therefore, although I can see this type of event growing, that growth might not be as significant as seen in the mountainbike world. The wear and tear on your legs and feet over five days running off-road will be a considerable factor for those considering these multi-day events."

The team and multi-day running concept of the Odyssey adds a completely new dimension to the competition, says Leonard Rust, sales manager of Adventure Inc., distributor of Montrail footwear. The Odyssey combines elements of the Marathon des Sables, run in the Sahara desert where individual runners carry all their own equipment, adventure racing and fully catered for events, to maximise spectator value, he says.

The demands of the race is therefore not likely to appeal to your average runner.

Multi-sport and adventure races

On the other hand, the challenges offered by a tough competition like the Cape Odyssey is attracting multi-sport athletes who find the Epic hard to get into and costly, says Dawid Visser of Asics, well-known as a triathlete.

"Adventure racing as well as extreme trail running is a growing area in the sports market as runners are especially looking for new challenges in going off-road,"he says. "Getting down and dirty makes running so much more interesting and you have so many different options in areas to go explore than your usual concrete jungle training route."

Conversely, the increased interest in extreme trail running could increase interest in adventure racing, which requires participants to navigate and use various forms of locomotion (i.e. feet, bike, ropes, etc.) — demands that could be off-putting to the novice adventure racers, says Little.

"However, for the extreme trail runner, who can see the advantages of running in beautiful, but very demanding conditions, it is a smaller step to make the jump from extreme trail running to adventure racing."

The interest in the revived Bull of Africa, a 12-day 550km adventure race over rugged Eastern Cape mountains, through mangrove swamps and along the Transkei coastline planned for August this year, and the Swazi Extreme (in May), which requires participants to navigate a route across high mountains and through forests by running, cycling and abseiling, attest to this.

"These events demand a huge amount from competitors, are well organised and draw the best adventure racers from around the world," says Little.

According to Rust the Swazi Extreme has a long history of being one of the best and hardest races in the country. "The Bull of Africa is South Africa’s only true international event, and will probably again take the mantle as South Africa’s premier race."

Botes says that the Bull (also sponsored by Salomon) will be the adventure race of 2008. It forms part of the international Adventure Racing Circuit and has already attracted more than 60, mostly international, teams of four.