For a while now we have been working hard in the background to come up with something new for 2011. Kicking off this weekend, at the Totalsports Challenge, we will be seeing the launch of an entirely new thought process when it comes to racing. Have you ever thought of the carbon footprint you are leaving my travelling to races, drinking all that bottled water, flying to races, etc?

In November I sat with Fairbairn Private Bank for a big strategy session and it was on both our minds. The environment we play in is very important to us all, but what can we do to make a difference. We partnered with Pure Planet, a local Cape Town company inspired by young people who aim to raise awareness, like we want to, to the impact we have on our immediate environment. It snowballed from there and as a result, we have Pure Planet Racing.

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Corporate sponsors Fairbairn Private Bank and BoE Private Clients are proud to announce the sponsorship of a new multisport team for 2011 to be known as Pure Planet Racing.

Pure Planet Racing is a small group of elite multisport athletes who are creating a synergy between sporting excellence and social conscience. Pure Planet is a start-up initiative by some inspired young people that aim to raise awareness around environmental impact and reduce the carbon footprint of every person on the earth. As a partner, Pure Planet Racing will become one of the first sporting teams to have a zero carbon impact, essentially racing around the world and raising awareness for their cause without leaving a carbon footprint.

Pure Planet Racing will participate in a range of multisport events, including single-day mountain biking races, multi-day cycling and running stage-races, triathlon (from standard to Ironman distance, and Xterra off-road format), and extreme adventure races. These events take place throughout our home-base of South Africa, as well as all over the world.

Fairbairn Private Bank and BoE Private Clients, who both fall within the Nedbank Wealth stable, will be co-title sponsors of Pure Planet Racing. In addition, Garmin South Africa and Axis House have joined as supporting sponsors of this sporting initiative. The media partner is one of South Africa’s top sports blogs… this blog.

As Pure Planet Racing traverses the world, we aim to achieve sporting excellence whilst raising awareness for the important social issues surrounding environmental impact and social upliftment.

Look out for us at races, out training and keep an eye on the website for events happening in your city where we will be teaching you how to make a difference to your environment.

Our website is currently under construction and should be live in a week or two. The team will be blogging from there and documenting the process of leaving no footprint. For more information please click the contact page on this website and get in touch with me directly.

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I am extremely proud to be a part of this concept. The environment is extremely important to me. I want to make a difference to your world and as such, have been lucky enough to be associated with this concept where we can truly make a difference.

I hope you will share in my excitement as this is project is not duplicated anywhere in the world. Not just a South African first, but a world first. You can help us to achieve our goals by spreading the news and attending functions and events in the Pure Planet Calendar as well.

regards

Raoul

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So much awesomeness, this new toy of mine, my 310XT. I have never been able to review any race as thoroughly as this. Here follows swim, bike, run as well as transitions.

Swim:

I clearly swam about double the distance. I was told to swim with it in my cap for a better reading, but this comes out pretty good. 1500m swim with a 100m beach run, more or less. Thanks to Conrad for the suit to swim in, after somehow forgetting my RS1 at home. I misread the rules and understood that like Ironman, where I swam in my Perform suit, we would not be allowed these speed suits in Maui.

You can see I was completely focused on the race at this point…

Transition 1:

T1 takes a while in Maui. It’s a run out the water, over the beach, through the golf course and into T1. Put on socks, mountain bike shoes & gloves, helmet and off you go up the hill to the exit.

Bike:

There are some ugly numbers in there up some of those climbs. I was digging SO deep and not really managing to get anywhere. Nice to see how to course runs with the mapping feature and the overlaying land.

Transition 2:

Short & Fast…

Run:

Spot the areas where I walked! hahaha. I was a broken man, surviving with a grimace and a shuffle by this point…

In the end, it was all purely to get to this point…

Again, a biggest thank you to Fairbairn Private Bank, Garmin, Puma, New Media Labs, Morewood, Orca, Biosport, Rockets, Whasp and the never ending support from everyone who reads this blog.

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Day 7:

It goes without saying that the day had gloom written all over it, from the get go. We woke up to a cold and threatening-to-be-raining Elgin. The sun was threatening but we heard it was 4 degrees up on the mountain with some rain and yes, loads of wind.

Amazeballs.

I get cold in general, so today I donned warm gear as I knew the pack would hammer it out, killing themselves within 30min and we would again be stronger than the day before.

Indeed, it all began to plan. Riding tempo up the first climbs we were again ahead of schedule, so we had a bit of time to take it a bit easier. The legs felt great after about 15min. After the first 5km which are all virtually uphill we descended into the valley.

Coming around a winding corner on some loose gravel I felt the tell-tale signs of my back end sliding out. I am not the absolute best descending machine so this is normal, I corrected myself (which I was becoming increasingly good at), held the line and was about to unclip my left foot for a bit of extra turn when the corner of my handlebar, firmly attached to the bar-end, managed to tangle itself in a branch, which in turn, was attached to a rather large bush.

Not a problem going 15km/h.

By all estimations we were going about 40-50km/h at that point. I was ahead of Brett but I remember being able to look him in the eye before making contact with Mother Nature. This means a full 180 degree flick of me and the bike. Brett was quick to comment a little later that it was quite an impressive maneuver. Avoidable, but impressive.

Crashes are quick and unceremonious and this was no different. Tuck, hold, and hurt.

I was sore, all over, and not quite sure which hurt most until the throb started in my hand. Looked at the right glove to see it had a big gash in the palm where the throb was emanating from. Not good. Remove the glove. Blood is flowing, profusely, dread crept in.

This was going to be a long day.

The only words that I could come up with were “Duct Tape”. I had a 4cm gash deeper than I could see on the spot where I rest my hands on the bike. The skin around it was kaput. My heart rate monitor was missing, my head hurt and my right bum cheek was beginning to hurt too.

Brett taped me up (thanks bra!), helped ease the glove back on and we got under way again, slowly. I was pretty shell shocked and at first it was slow going. We got to a medic about 10km later and he removed the tape and got some bandage on me, shortly after washing the wound out with some alcohol. In my mind, I punched him so hard I decapitated him, it hurt so much.

Moving on. Stitches were going to be needed for sure, so best to suck it up, get some painkillers in, and get to the finish quick as possible.

Some of the crazy obstacles we encountered on the day, after hitting water point 1 in 180th men’s team (prob about 230th overall team) were:

1. Freakish headwinds.
2. A wall of sand about 500m long. I. Kid. You. Not.
3. Climbs so steep I had to get off and walk.
4. My chain lodged itself in between the wheel spokes and the back of the cassette.

Slogged it out I tell you. Brett was machine on the day. Kept me motivated all day. The myprodols may have helped a little as well, but just enough to take the edge off. We pushed and pushed and pushed until my body gave in with about 8km to go and I had to coast in. We had no idea we had ridden ourselves back into 65th men’s team. Had we known, I am sure I could have found one last gear, but I was emotionally done by 92km.

The sight of my dad surprising me in the medical tent will long live down as a great moment. Family are so important and having them there on the day solidified my loss and gave me a bit of extra strength for the day. We even broke out the wine and had some great laughs in the afternoon.

By the time the anesthetic wore off the infection kicked in. It hurt far more than the crash. I was starting to get cold sweats by the time I went to bed and hoped it would work itself out by morning, going through 4 wet t-shirts through the night. I was almost sure it would be gone by morning.

Almost.

Day 8

It was not to be. I woke up with a fire in my throat and in a cold sweat at 6am. Every bone in my body was sore, like I had flu. I knew there was trouble as we had 75km to pedal over a huge, rocky mountain.

My hand throbbed as I ate my breakfast and I was contemplating how I was going to hold the handlebars as I was barely able to hold my cup in my hand.

Getting on the bike and pedaling to the start has to be one of the hardest things I have ever done. I was cold and hot, sore and had no power in the legs. Crisis. The end was supposed to be a victorious day.

To say that we struggled on the day is an understatement. You want to race the last day, blazing glory, all guns firing in a splendor of hail Mary’s, French Bulldogs raining from the sky and 30 Seconds to Mars – Kings & Queens raging on a volume so high even Mick Jagger would ask for it to be turned down.

I could however, only soft pedal. My hand, well that felt like someone was stabbing me in it every time I rode over a rock and the downhills were total murder. I walked/crawled/swore my way up the big climb in the mass of riders, a space we were totally unused to. It took forever. I felt useless. I was beaten down.

On the downhill I had to stop halfway down to recoup, my pain was unmanageable by that point and I was going to slow I was in danger of falling off all the time. I had a choice to make as I could see Brett was frustrated as well. He had been so good all day. Patient. Quiet. Calm.

I had to either walk the hill, or ride and become one with the pain. I chose the latter. Screaming and yes, crying my way down the hill all in what must have been a huge cause of concern for those around me, I went as fast as I could, hanging on for dear life itself, balling my eyes out screaming the pain out for the remainder of the downhill.

Thankfully, that was it in terms of the rocky stuff. I was spent.

The release seemed to perk me up somehow once we got through the aid station and we started picking off some guys on the smoother road. My legs were still nowhere, and wouldn’t come back all day.

The walk down Gamtoos Pass was amazing, quiet, finding the peace that we were almost home. The neutral zone was frustrating as we got stuck in a group. The last 7km was in fact, 4km and in the end, we sat up and let the group go. We wanted to finish alone in the shoot. It has been a huge adventure and the realization that it was about to be over in less than a minute sucked, for just a second, before the crowds cheered us over the finish line.

Family, friends, they were all there. The way they look at you is incredible. Yes, we sucked on the day, but somehow, they still saw us as heroes. We were 44th team overall across the 8 days. We worked our way back from 98th including 3 hours lost over the week.

We were tired, but happy. Very happy.

Epilogue

To paragraph the experience is just never going to cut it I am afraid. First off, as is tradition, I need to thank everyone who made the journey possible.

Fairbairn Private Bank, Morewood, Sludge, Sport-X, Whasp, Biosport, Puma, Jack Black Beer, Rok Media, Rockets, Suunto, Legacy Cycles, ATC Multisport. You make us look great and we hope to do our best for you in return.

To Brett, my partner, I need to give out a personal 1min bear hug. The guy is amazing. I have known him for years but our week together was without a doubt, the best we had ever done. Generally we are trying to kill each other out on race courses (the occasional tequila competition may also have happened) but for this entire week, we were a team. We remained calm in all situations and we sucked the best out of each other when the going got tough. Mad love.

To the Epic, thank you for taking us over amazing landscapes and providing unique challenges each day. We salute you. It really is the greatest adventure.

The finish line was never enough and never will be. Already, we have Ironman in 2 ½ weeks time to keep our minds busy. After that I know I am intending to learn to surf ski and keep growing my MTB skill set.

This part of my journey was amazing, so amazing I had to split it into 4 posts. I urge you to find an adventure of any magnitude that involves physically challenging yourself. I am not saying go and do the Epic. We come from years of physical challenges. Build up. Start small. But make sure each one is a challenge.

Your life will never be the same.

See the light…

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So as of tomorrow, I am racing in a brand new jones. a brand new vibe. a brand new connection.

After the big hunt for a connection to spark the RokThis revolution, something bigger emerged and I am over the moon to be a part of something that focuses on my key skills, and leaves the big results to the whipper snappers. Not that the old racing snake hasn’t got some lead left in the pencil, but this is an amazing balance for me.

In 2009 Fairbairn Private Bank had a cycling team, and this year, with a bigger vision and some amazing new partners (more in future posts), we are going bigger and better. The team has a shared focus of results as well as development of young talent into professional athletes. Nobody on the team is a full time pro, but after a few months of being involved indirectly with the team with mentorship and a bit of vooma, we now have a youngster riding pro in 2010 on another team with a huge budget.

Success!

My involvement comes from the Urban Ninja side and giving the brand some exposure at the crazy schedule we have for RokThis from this weekend through the stage race MTB series, through Ironman, and until the end of the year. As the old guy in the team, I also help with mental preparation and some mentorship for the young guys. They are racing all the mountain bike races around SA and its my job to race triathlons, multisport races and make sure we get into the magazines, blogs, etc

Thank you Fairbairn Private Bank for the vision, and the belief, that we can give you the exposure you want. Fairbairn Private Bank is a private bank based out of the Isle of Man, and a division of Old Mutual.

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