Justin and WEDALI are currently in 27th place out of 49, in large part because they’ve survived so long—plenty of teams have had to drop out and/or be retrieved from the desert because they simply couldn’t keep moving. Here’s the description of today’s section according to the race’s website:
The Ruib al Kahli is no picnic on the beach. In fact, on any normal day, you wouldn’t expect to come here and do anything but lie in the shade, if you could find any… So trekking 116 km though the emptiest desert on the planet, after having completed an early morning biking section of 94km over a treacherous and unforgiving track, in daytime temperatures way above the seasonal norm while going “against the grain” of the dunes is no less than Odyssean.
In layman’s terms, the weather and racing conditions would make you sweat your balls off if you could retain any fluids in your body to produce sweat. The description continued through interviews from various racers:
Many of the teams thought so: “That’s the hardest trek we have ever done here,” said TRI-ADVENTURE (GBR). “Last year we at least had the advantage of getting a good night’s sleep before undertaking the desert stage…” they groaned. Jari KIRKLAND of NET COMPETENCE who managed 7th fastest time over the stage and are now in 5th position overall, sat pondering her own sanity: “That stage H was heinous, horrible, horrific, horrendous, hell…” pausing in her exhausted tirade only to gulp down some much needed water. Susanna SKYLV SORENSEN of Salomon Santiveri looked stunned by the measure of her accomplishment in finishing the course: “I died out there – about one kilometre from the end everything stopped…” “We ran out of water at H6+,” confessed team SILVA-GERBER, “and wondered if we would ever make it to the finish.” Salient words considering that many did not…
If anyone out there was wondering why I’ve deemed Justin “crazy” because of what he’s accomplished with his teammates… I can’t imagine myself even trying anything like that, let alone finishing. And finishing well, too. Under the circumstances, it’s approaching -10 degrees with lots of frozen moisture outside and I’m okay where I am.
So good luck and kick ass, WEDALI. Keep surviving out there.
