The Race Gets Underway in Viborg
Rob Howard / 16.08.2018
After a short bus ride to the historic city of Viborg the Masters teams arrived in the courtyard of the Cathedral and piled into a small cafe for the final race briefing, before gathering outside the main door.
They were waiting for the maps to arrive, and seemed to be looking to the heavens, which was appropriate as the prologue maps were dropped in by a priest from the cathedral who abseiled down off the main tower!
He was very enthusiastic and at one point disappeared through an open window arch, but both cleric and maps made it down safely. The Race Director pulled the maps out of the shoulder bag they were carried in, and was promptly rushed by teams who quickly set off in various directions.
The map showed 6 points, to be reached in any order, and these included two in a park on the lakeside and one in the crypt of the Cathedral , where helmets to protect from low pipes might have been handy. The hardest was a run up 13 flights of stairs at the hospital – the tallest building in town.
In little over 20 minutes the leaders were back to the Cathedral and grabbed their skates and rucksacks to set off on stage one. As the surrounding area is all cobbles and steep steps they ran down to the nearest tarmac before skating off, some proficiently, and others with a lot of nervous hesitation.
The will head south out of Viborg and have to undertake a short swim during the skating stage, before reaching the first transition area as darkness falls.