Raid in France
Stop, Start and Enjoy in the Ardeche Gorge
Press Release / 07.06.2017
One of the highlights of Raid in France this year is the Ardeche Gorge, which the lead 6 teams passed through yesterday. The stage includes a caving and rappell section and has a dark zone meaning teams who were in the gorge overnight had to stop and bivouac.
Lozere Sport Nature took the lead on this stage yesterday, but after they received a penalty 400 Team Naturex returned to the lead on day 3. These two teams are having a very close race at the front.
Here is the race summary for the morning of day 3.
"Key facts of last night ahead of the race: Lozère Sport Nature (15) was forced to stop due to the 56 minutes penalty because they cut a no entry road. There are still three teams at the top of Raid in France: 400 Team Naturex (4), Lozère Sport Nature (15) and Gravelines Tri-DSN 74 Scott Hoka (25) who sleeped during the night and are currently in the kayak session between Pradons and Vogüe villages.
At the rear of the race, the teams have all passed the mouth of the Rhône with the Ardèche river. Three teams remain on the Ardèche river in the direction of AT5/CP12 located at Sauze village: Plein Ouest Raid Aventure (10), Baragnas Raid 2 – Julbo (17) and Freemind Italy (34).
In the middle of the race, the night was dedicated to handle the bans of night progression in the Nature reserve of Ardèche gorges. Only six teams crossed between AT5/CP12 and AT6/CP17 by day: 400 Team Naturex (4), Lozère Sport Nature (15), Gravelines Tri-DSN 74 Scott Hoka (25), Ertips (23), R’adys (29) and Endurancelife Aventure Absolu Raid (21). Indeed, the organisation was asked to put in place some bans at CP15 and CP16. In the roadbook it is written that the departure from CP15 is allowed from 4:30 am to 7:30 pm for the teams who had validated CP14 and from 6:30 am to 7:30 pm for the others. To sum up, the ones who leaved CP15 from 4:30 am are: Issy Aventure Absolu Raid 1 (2), CLJ Aventure – Life Expérience (1), Baragnas Raid 1 (7), Canada AR (13) and Intersport Lyon DSN 74 (27). The ones who leaved CP15 from 6:30 am are: Ligeraid (19), Tuc Triathlon (11) and Griffons Cycles Plein (5). The teams’ departure occurred every 5 minutes in the same ranking as the arrival at the CP.
The first teams have 3 hours in advance on the organisation’s forecast. It seems that the last teams are catching up with the lateness of the last days. Today, the wonderful Ardèche gorges will be highlighted because many teams are going to step into them and to abseil on Autridge rock."
SleepMonsters
