Team Finland's Eero Jappinen's is steaming. Literally. Vapor rises from his hunched back as his sweat-drenched shirt meets the cleaner, colder air. Team Finland arrives at checkpoint 3 in 1st place. Behind it, the American team Peak.com and France's PlaneteAventure.com battle it out for 2nd place. Samurai Spirits, in 4th, took an early lead on the mountain bike leg, but it was short-lived. Partway up Misery Hill came the realization the team had missed a checkpoint. That kind of mistake could spell disqualification. Every other team climbed Misery Hill once. Samurai Spirits climbed it twice, as local snowmobilers zoomed by at 10 times the speed. Misery, indeed.
CP3 is also a transition area, where teams leave the mountain bike leg and hit the cross-country ski trail. They also rendezvous with their gear bags, which contain fresh food supplies, skis, boots and poles and, most importantly, dry clothes. It is just past 5pm and the sun disappeared almost an hour ago. With the sun goes the temperature, dropping almost 10°C in a matter of hours.
"When we saw the sunshine today, we knew we were in for a cold night," says Finland's Ingrid Stengard as she fills up on hot Gatorade.
Stengard is right. Tonight the temperature will drop well below the daytime high, perhaps as low as -25 or -35°C.
PlaneteAventure.com and Peak.com arrive at the CP3 neck and neck, with the Americans scooting in a scant 30 seconds ahead of the French. The three teams crowd into the equipment tent, but unspoken cooperation and race spirit means the first arrivals shift to accommodate the others. Outside the tent, Adrian Crane and Jean-Baptiste Calais help each fill water bottles with hot water, as they jockey to be the first to leave the checkpoint.
The first team to enter is also the first to leave. Barely an hour after entering CP3, the Finns snap on their skis and push off. Their headlamps poke small pinholes in the absolute darkness of the snowmobile trails ahead. They will not rest for many hours, and only then because they must. Checkpoint 5 includes a mandatory four-hour rest stop.
With hot water, hot chocolate and a warm tent, CP3 is an alluring stop along the course. Some teams will stay awhile, others will push off as quickly as possible. Samurai Spirits is in and out within 53 minutes.
The 5th place team, Quebec's Yeti, is an hour or more behind the lead teams, but full of energy and spirit. The rookie team, which only came together two weeks ago, surprised everybody by winning the first leg of the race, the ice canoeing. For at least a few hours, Yeti was at the top of the leader board. That win gave members an unexpected feeling of victory, and also helped them relax.
"I guess I realize now the other teams are not superhuman," says Yeti's Vidar Dons Lindpuren. "They are just as human as us, so that makes me feel a lot better."
A mistake early in the day put Quebec's Salomon Durand Sports XTSM at the back of the pack, behind compatriots Yeti and EnduranceAventure. One wrong turn — or, more precisely, the absence of a right turn — delayed its arrival at the transition area.
Just hours after the start, and Salomon Durand's Dominique Paquet stands by the side of the road, waiting for his teammates to join him. In fact, he must wait for them to come back to him. They must double back and climb a hill they only just descended. That's because Paquet holds the map, and the knowledge that they were supposed to turn right, and not go straight.
"They were only a few meters ahead of me," he says in frustration. "I tried yelling at them, but there was so much noise they could not here me."
Benoit Leveille did eventually hear Paquet's call. He raced ahead to alert the others. One small error means precious minutes are lost, and even more precious energy expended.
Expedition racing, however, is all about stamina. Salomon Durand picked up the pace, and has caught up to the 6th place team, EnduranceAventure.
All seven teams were off the mountain bike course by 8pm. At the end of the first day of the first-ever Ukatak Raid International, the teams are separated only by a matter of hours.
– Susan McKenzie, Ukatak Raid International Correspondent
