- by Ray Bernard
A bungee challenge in SA
09 April 2003: “I’d always said that I’d never do a bungee jump,” said the UK’s Tim Pickering. “But if I don’t, we’ll lose the points.” The Brit smiled, took three steps forward and on the shout of “bungee”, dived headfirst off a 65-metre bridge to an awaiting boat.
This event, the Gouritz Bridge Hunter, was the undoubted highlight of today’s action in the Land Rover G4 Challenge and it was completed by five of the eight teams.
The adventure at Gouritz Bridge encapsulated the qualities that make this event so special. Having driven off-road to the start point, the teams had to prepare their own equipment and run to the base of the bridge. Once in position, they had to attach their jumar equipment to a rope, before starting the 65-metre ascent. Jumar is a strange technique, which requires the competitor to “walk up” the rope, while sliding the handgrips or ‘jumars.’ It’s as technically difficult as it sounds, and an exhausting test of leg and forearm strength.
The USA’s Nancy Olson was visibly shaking when she reached the top. “It took me ten minutes to jumar up here and now you’re asking me to descend again in half a second,” she said with feigned exasperation. Local spectators could only watch in admiration. “I think they’re made of different stuff to me,” said one bemused gentleman.
Arabia’s Chris Perry simply described the experience as “absolutely awesome.” He’s a veteran of several jumps but his teammate, Sergey Polyansky, was new to the experience. The Russian was visibly nervous and as he stepped forward to jump, he said to the crowd, “please remember me as a jolly person.” With an epitaph like that, how could anyone do otherwise? Needless to say, he’s still in one piece and grinning broadly.
For Perry, the jump came near the beginning of what he later claimed was “an extremely difficult day.” The distances between many of the Hunters were longer than in previous days and many were in isolated locations, requiring long sections of off-road driving before they could be reached. Indeed, by the end of the day, the only thing that had worked harder than the competitors were their Defenders.
Poor weather conditions also took their toll. Chester Foster of South Africa arrived at the Gysmanhoekpas Hunter to find that the drizzle had reduced visibility to just a few feet. What’s more, the water had made the rock-strewn ascent perilous. “Just keeping your balance was really difficult on the rocks,” said the local boy. “If we’d slipped, it would have been a really nasty fall.”
But Foster was revelling in the water later in the day. Having scrambled up a cliff face, he was required to abseil around 100 metres into water. “The view was amazing”, said a clearly elated Foster, “it was the most fantastic feeling.” Both Foster and the Netherlands/Japan team of Erik den Oudendammer and Shinichi Yoshimoto completed this tricky but exciting challenge.
For the past three days, Foster has been competing alongside a stand-in teammate from the Land Rover G4 Challenge Event Team. This followed the injury that forced the withdrawal of Canada’s Jim Kuhn. Kuhn’s replacement, Kitt Stringer arrived in camp this evening and quickly reacquainted himself with his new teammate. “I’ve spent the last 25 hours catching a bunch of different flights,” said Stringer. Jokingly he added: “I’m exhausted but looking at the rest of the competitors, I’m in good company.”
Most contenders will be hoping that the sun returns tomorrow, but Australia’s Guy Andrews seems to be revelling in the tricky conditions. He and Belgian teammate Rudi Thoelen managed to paddle their kayaks past two other competing teams in the first Hunter of the morning. The performance was made more remarkable when it was revealed that Andrews had been towing Thoelen using a rope attached to his kayak. “We’ve been pushing hard today,” said the Aussie as he returned to camp, “but there’s still a long way to go.”
©2003 irishcar.com