Packing up my gear and driving up to Auckland, boarding a plane to Australia and then onto Malaysia, I should have known I was in for an interesting adventure week. Before boarding the plane in Australia my team mate Andrea Peebles said I would need to catch a train from the Singapore Airport to meet her in Bugis. She was off training and would see how she would go for time to meet me. Get some sleep on the plane, people want to go for a run when I get into Singapore and then mountain bike the next day.
Yea ha, I had better hit the ground running, literally.
A full on couple of days with running sightseeing and a mountain biking; before I knew it we were packing up our bags and heading to Johor where we would be picked up by the Kluang Adventure Challenge race organiser. Originally we were to be picked up in Singapore, but that changed to being at the border. The option of a bus direct from Singapore to Kluang would have been a great idea the day before the race. Things didn’t quite work out like that or it was not enough of an adventure so it was local bus to the border, unpack bikes and talk nicely to the border police to let us bike/walk across the connection in 30 plus degrees heat. Once pushing our bikes across the borders we discovered that the foot path does not exist at the Johor end so onto the road and into the motorcycle lane we go. Literally dodging motorcycles, ha.
Have I mentioned it’s hot in Malaysia? Well its hot, really hot. The sweat was literally just running off me pushing the bikes with bags and this is the day before the race (not ideal race preparation). Finally we arrived at the Malaysian border where we walked through the motorcycle border control. So funny, the woman at the counter didn’t even flinch as these weird people pushing bikes with loaded bike bags came into the lanes.
Finally I thought, “yes, we’ll be picked up soon, a nice air-conditioned ride to the hotel for race briefing and something to drink.” The adventure had not finished yet, some communication issues with what taxi stand we were at meant another 2 hours before being picked up.
At 5:00pm the night before the race we arrived at the hotel, time to check in, sign in, unpack bags and grab some food for tomorrow’s race, dinner and briefing at 7:00.
One of the competitors and an idea of the types of courses that was served.
Throughout dinner (nice 7 courses in total) I was drinking cup after cup of orange juice and was still not hydrated.
The course was explained, high ropes section and kayaking had been cancelled, so it’s a running navigation around the streets of Kluang – followed by a marked mountain bike course – mystery event – mountain bike – mountain run on a marked course.
After briefing it was up to the room to finish preparing the bikes and gear for tomorrow’s race. Around midnight and we were ready. Alarm set for 6:30am at 5 am the town became alive with loud music being played over the speakers system of the local temple. A great start to the day ☺
I was happy to see some rain was falling; it may be a little cooler for me off the start line?
Over the radio at the start the race organiser was telling everyone because it was cold they needed to warm up properly. Cold? It’s 30 degrees!
Cool enough for the navigation section, a small error saw us lose about 5 minutes on the top male team and head onto the mountain bikes in fourth place. We quickly passed the third team as we entered the plantations. On the second hill climb I was starting to feel the heat as my heart rate climbed to over 200 beats a minute. I thought it was weird for my rate to not come down while descending and by the time we were an hour into the ride I was starting to feel cold as the sun was coming out.
We came upon the mystery event which was to carry cans of energy drinks around a lake then swap them with your team mate who carried them the rest of the way. Copious amounts of water over my head, I was starting to think I may be suffering from the heat. On the next quick mountain bike leg I hooked a tow rope onto Andrea as the heat was not bothering her in the slightest (she had been in Asia training for a while).
We were being directed by police around the streets to the mountain run section when the police directed us down a road and the markings stopped. We missed a turn and ended up being passed by the third placed men’s team. It was then that I saw some green paint on the road. Ok, so the red directional arrows had gone, classic. Hope we don’t get lost.
Into the mountain run and I was really heating up. Some more bottles of water over the head at the check point and into the hill climb. The red arrows were replaced by white and red tape tied to tree branches; I was slowing so I hooked up a tow onto Andrea who was charging along fine again. At the false flat summit, I thought we made it when we saw it went up again. Strange I thought there would be a check point there. Climbing up further to the summit there was the check point and yes some more water. By now my legs were feeling like they needed some oxygen, my body was cold despite climbing in the heat. Getting a little dizzy (mmmm some signs of heat exhaustion best keep the body in check) but we were on the way down now – yes, feeling better from the water. I was thinking it strange that there was not two check points, guess we’ll need to climb again, I can do this.
By now there were no markings on the track just a rope to assist the descent. We then came to a junction and with no actual race map and were at a loss as to what direction the course should go. There about 20 locals were there cheering us on, they pointed to the left for us, we asked is there more races that way pointing to our bibs, yes yes they down there. Off we went in chase of the two lead male teams.
It doesn’t feel right Andrea said and I agreed. She asked another couple of locals on their way up. I said it looks like this track goes all the way down. At this point we saw some more red and white tape – ok, we’re on the right track – and we continued chasing. Andrea was feeling good, I was still struggling in the heat but we were still making really good fast progress and the forest was beautiful.
We came through the mountain check point and onto the bikes. The final leg to the finish, a big push to see if we can catch the leaders. The police escorted us back into town where we crossed the finish line. Well done Kiwis said the race organiser!!! I was looking around for the other teams, where are the others I asked? Everyone was shaking our hands, I knew something was wrong I couldn’t see any other bikes and knew there were tyre marks on the road in-front of us and four bikes at the check point before the mountain run. I asked again, they said we won, we were first, I looked at Andrea and said that’s not right we can’t have won, it’s a marked course we should have passed them on the course.
When the first males came in I talked with them and figured out we missed a check point on the mountain. We went over and checked with the race organiser; sure enough we had missed a check point. We were about to head back to get it and the organiser said not to worry, there will be a time penalty, they will look at other competitor’s times and he will talk with the race director.
30 minutes later the next mixed team arrived. We were asked to speak on the local radio and be interviewed and despite missing the check point still treated as winners, which is credit to the race organiser Shamsuri.
Just before prize giving we were informed we had been disqualified for missing the check point, we were the only team to miss it. You get that in adventure racing, I see in the rules the race director can give a penalty, DQ, DNF or out of the race at his discretion. Close to the check point 500 meters, oh so close.
Following the race, one of the event sponsors Shamsul took us around to the local Kopi house (coffee), the street art and to meet his family this was great!
He had some of his staff drive us to Kuala Lumpur were I would fly out from back to New Zealand for the Rotorua 3D national champs the following weekend.
Thanks Torpedo7 for your ongoing support and to the Malaysiaarsport.com team. I look forward to the next event in Malaysia and recommend it as a great adventure destination; the food was fantastic as were the people.
