Bike and Run Adventure Racing on a Budget

Gerald Fusil is a guy who puts his thoughts into action and others follow. The founder of the Raid Gauloises, The worlds first expedition race is constantly on the lookout. The expense of competing in adventure racing has gotten to a level that few teams are now able to manage. Organisers and adventure racers are confronted with insurance expenses and high travel. One method to draw a living can be made by top teams, but what about the ordinary racer, and racers is to offer large sums in prize cash.

Last Year, During the Reunion DAventures race, Gerard Fusil added a bike and run discipline which demanded the four person team to share two mountain bicycles through a few legs of their race. Since teams were forced to think to finish the legs the trial was a victory. Some teams awakened on the back sections, others stayed, although the more successful set up a relay system with the rider moving a set distance prior to leaving the bike at the border of the trail to get their team mate, who would get on and then leapfrog them.

Gerard Fusil saw a chance to return to the basis of Expedition Adventure Racing. Supplying teams interface with race and the local people in locations with out the need to transport considerable quantities equipment. Gerard Fusil announced his ideas at the Reunion DAventures prize and the world waited with bated breadth.

September 2005 saw Run Concept into the Planet and Gerard Fusil Launch the Bike . Details were brief, two person teams. The race could be run in a number of stages including a night stage and teams needed to be prepared to camp in the wild. Time was short so Gerard Fusil used the course notes from the 1992 Raid Gauloises to get regions of the program.

By pre-announcing the crosses of each stay and the names of these camps, gerald Fusil created another death from the standard. The race was to take place in Oman’s East Coast some of those location names were known to the natives.

December 2005. A barmy evening found Gerard Fusil briefing the teams from Oman, France, UK, Runion, Austria, Holland and Australia. Teams had arrived during the morning had little time to prepare. 2 teams shared support vehicles, so competitions spent packing equipment by torchlight into the vehicles and poring over maps.

This day at dawn a convoy of vehicles transported the group to the start line in a Wadi. The first day comprised a section of running just along goat paths and this was shown to be decisive since one Omani team and also the Australian got lost permitting a group to construct an unassailable lead.

Later in the week Gerard Fusil had mapped out the path with a twisting rise in the sea into 1500 metres as well as a section of canyoning with a variety of swims.

Gerard Fusil had arranged swimming or bivouacs together with the stages starting in the morning most teams could finish around afternoon, in a number of locations.

The terrain in Oman is diverse from lush oasis to harsh rocky hillsides and naturally seas of sandiness. Gerard Fusil held that the trophy giving in Muscat the champions. Second place went to the Australians and also a neighborhood Omani staff came in third.

Teams came from unique backgrounds, including Adventure racers, tri-athletes, marathon runners, mountain bikers.

Virtually all teams adopted the general tactic of leap frogging, nevertheless there were at least a few episodes when crews missed the bike, including one on the lengthy climb for an all female group which demanded an extra 4k to be covered to collect the bike!

The Inaugural race was shown to be a victory and Gerald Fusil has announced the next race of this series that will return at the end of November into a different area of Oman.
.