Wenger Czech Adventure Race 2020
The Czech Adventure Race – A Race Against Covid For Racers From Around Europe
Rob Howard / 24.08.2020
The Czech Adventure Race is one of the few long adventure races taking place in Europe since the outbreak of Covid 19, and it was a brave decision for the organisers to commit to going ahead in such uncertain times. They’ve been rewarded with a strong entry, including some good international teams looking for a race to do, some of those coming in after the cancellation of NORCHA in Portugal.
So far so good, but as things stand there is still some uncertainty around the race and who will be there, despite the first teams arriving about now ready for the race start on Thursday morning. Covid cases are rising again in Czechia, which is cause to be nervous.
World Series Race Directors Ana Rumiha and Igor Dorotic (Adventure Race Croatia) are on the start list for the shorter mini race but have told SleepMonsters it was too difficult to cross the Slovenian border so they will not make it. British racer Maria Leijerstam has tried to take some of the uncertainty out of the equation by driving from the UK via Munich, to join her team mates in the OMM-Nordisk Germany team. They all took part in the Patagonian Expedition Race together in 2013, and Maria will be carrying an extra tracker – which you can follow here.
There should be a very strong Dutch entry too, with the Dutch Adventure Race Team (DART), Team Dutch Direction and Team Sans-onlin.nl AR team all on the start list, along with two of Team Dutchables (Guido de Jong and Marijn Edelenbosch). They have given permission to race the long course as a pair, as have father and daughter team, Marco and Anna Celia Ponteri from Italy. The Italian pair are driving and tell us they have to cross 4 international borders.
There is a Danish entry too with the strong Delta Denmark team racing, and Lars Bukkehave having found a place on Team Fenix Multisport. (That came about after his entry in the Corsica Raid fell through with US and Canadian racers in his team unable to travel.) France is represented by team Lige2mollets and team Chifoumi, Estonian team Metsapeatus are on the start list, and so are 5 Polish teams making them the strongest international contingent.
All in all it’s a strong entry to compete with the home teams, who include Black Hill/EPO, Salomon Suunto CZAR and Fenix Multisport. Three of the Czech team who were 9th at Eco-Challenge are racing with Pavel Paloncy and Jan Obuskevio on the Fennix Multisport team and Tereza Rudolfova with Black Hill/EPO. Salomon Suunto CZAR were 2nd last year so will be hoping to go one better and Metsapeatus were 5th in 2019.
So the countdown is on until the start at 09.00 Thursday. Let’s just hope all those teams make it to the start line!
SleepMonsters
