Vetting team recommendations.

On July 18th our vetting team Brian and Monika tested the EXPERT course of the Calleva Race 2010!
Here are some of their recommendations. All these recommendation, except of the river swim are good for the SPORT category racers.

Brain, team SOG:

• Pants are not needed. The only times we ran into significant nettles were when we were in the wrong place.
• On land navigation isn’t too tricky. I made a few route choices but don’t think they affected our time much. I mostly tried to avoid going up and down hills and was able to do so successfully many times. You can choose your routes to suit your preferences and maybe the ease of navigating.
• On water, navigation was tricky. Should definitely be interesting with lots of people paddling up and down the river.
• Water stops are dispersed well throughout the course. 3L water carrying capacity recommended (3L bladder or 2L bladder plus bottles).
• Make sure to fill up AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE before leaving the last water stop. If you clear the end of the course you will need all the water you can carry to make it back if you are staying hydrated.
• Be sure to fuel up (eat extra food) before you go on river swim unless you plan on stopping during the swim to eat something. It will take more than an hour which is a long time to go without eating if you haven’t just eaten.
• Knee pads are recommended but not necessary on the river swim. Also recommended to have flippers with covered toes or where some sort of shoes in flippers in your fins.
• Bring a large backpack. PFD’s and bike helmets are hard to squeeze into a small backpack. You can bring multiple sizes to the race to test out when you get there but plan on using a 25+L. 30L recommended.
• River Swim navigation is a little tricky.
• Be sure to allocate enough time to finish the course. The end of the course does not allow for much shortcutting (optional points) so you may have to skip some optional points earlier than expected to make sure and finish on time. (SPORT category have more optional points at the end of the race)
• I enjoyed land navigation. Nothing too tricky just challenging enough. There was more terrain than in past years to help navigate instead of having to rely on bearings and land markings as in past years.

Monika, team Trakkers:

• Bring a backpack big enough to fit your helmet and PFD
• Our pre-race day was really hot and I drank three full bladders for the entire race and I ran out of water the last hour
• I hit my knees several times on the rocks swimming in the river, maybe you want to take some knee protectors with you
• It's a fun course, enjoy it. Definitely some navigation in it!

More photos from the pre-run are on the Calleva Race Facebook page.
The next race bulletin will be out 1 week before the race