By James Wong

An all-Singaporean team will toe the start-line at the 2011 Adventure Racing World Championships to be held in the Australian state of Tasmania. The event, running from 31 October to 11 November, incorporates the XPD expedition adventure race, Australia’s longest and most challenging non-stop, multi-day, multi-disciplinary team endurance competition. An all-Singaporean team, the first-ever fielded at this level of competition, is currently training and preparing for this adventure of a lifetime.

While the picturesque and mountainous Tasmania — situated off the southern coast of mainland Australia — is often regarded as a prime holiday destination for tourists, the attraction this island state holds for these few intrepid Singaporeans, who call themselves Team SART, will come in the form of a grueling competition against oneself and the raw elements of nature.

SART members Chris Yeo, Ng Chee Koon, Caroline Tan, and Wilson Low will not be the first Singaporean adventurers to race in the outdoor playground that is Tasmania. Two teams of four raced in the 2006 edition of XPD in Tasmania and three Singaporeans also competed in the prestigious Mark Webber Challenge charity AR event held there in 2007.

XPD participants are required to traverse a vast and rugged race course using only self-propelled forms of transport for a distance of over 700 kilometres within a time limit of 10 days.

Female team member Tan, who up till recently worked as a UN volunteer, regards this race as “the one big thing” she would do for 2011, choosing this over participation in an Ironman race in Europe. The scale of the ARWC dwarfs Ironman events, which last just 17 hours of a single day.

The physical demands of such a race as the ARWC are mind-boggling: teams of four are to remain within 100 metres of each other at all times; they resupply only at designated manned checkpoints or ‘transitions’, they are responsible for their own health and hygiene, packing and preparation of food, repairs and spares for equipment; they are limited to what they can pack in just a handful of plastic and cardboard crates, duffel bags, and the backpacks they carry at all times. They essentially live out of boxes for the entire duration of the race, often for more than a week.

SART will be competing with 90 other international teams on a course that incorporates the disciplines of hiking, mountain biking, whitewater rafting and kayaking in an ‘around-the-clock, day-and-night’ format. A single stage — consisting of just one discipline — may take more than 24 hours to complete.

Already burdened with a list of mandatory ‘safety gear’, teams have to do their utmost to pack lightly in order to move fast. Route-finding will be wholly reliant on map and compass. Communication will be limited to an emergency mobile phone and a GPS beacon, the activation of either indicating a serious emergency situation and almost certain disqualification. Sleep will be optional and good teamwork, essential.

“For ARWC, I have to be in the best physical shape, ever,” enthuses Yeo. A former naval diver and life-long distance-running specialist, he, like his fellow teammates, has embarked on a regime of physical conditioning and skills training to ensure versatility and fitness across all the required event disciplines.

Consistency, not outright speed, is of the essence in expedition-length races.

“We will be walking fast most of the time, seldom running, if at all,” explains Ng, an SCDF officer, referring to the hiking sections of the race where, due to the demanding nature of the course and the loads on competitors’ backs, those teams that enjoy the most success are ones that can dictate a maintainable pace with minimal stopping, constant nutrition, diligent maintenance of health and hygiene, and accurate navigation.

Spring time in Tasmania also means huge variability in local temperature and weather due to its proximity to Antarctica and its volatile weather systems. Tasmania’s highest peaks will likely still be snow-shrouded; warm spells can be swiftly followed by fast-moving storm fronts with high winds, cold rain, perhaps even hail or more snow. Competitors have little choice but to keep moving, as the race clock does not stop except perhaps for the very worst weather conditions. With such challenges abound, to simply finish such a race is often regarded as a victory in itself.

“It does not get much bigger than this,” says team captain Low, who served as a commando during National Service and now works as a sports coach. “Some of the world’s best teams have qualified through other races for the right to start in Tasmania; and each one of these qualifying races is a big undertaking in itself.”

Low should know. He raced as part of an Australian team in last year’s XPD (then a qualifying event for ARWC) that was held in Cairns, Queensland. That team, The Wild Prawns, took 15th place after an epic journey that took more than nine days to complete. 15th placing out of a field of 47 starting teams is perhaps best put into perspective when one also realizes that a mere 21 teams finished the full course intact; the rest succumbed when they lost team mates to injury, illness or fatigue.

The ARWC will showcase the best of Tasmania’s harsh wilderness, a fact not lost on organizing company Geocentric Outdoors, which manage the AR World Series. The World Series consists of a dozen or so expedition-length qualifying races — much like XPD — held around the year in different countries, with the World Championships rotating annually amongst these events.

This year, it is Australia’s turn to give it a good go at hosting the Championships. So too are the Singaporeans of SART as they line up against the competition in this grueling endurance test.

Stay tuned to Red Sports for continuing coverage of SART’s journey to the start line of the Adventure Racing World Championships over the next few months.

Team SART Profile
“Being from a tiny island-nation is no excuse for not embracing the spirit of AR”
SART (Singapore Amphi Racing Team) is, first and foremost, a band of friends who enjoy sharing epic and memorable experiences together in the great outdoors. This team of Singaporean adventure athletes aims to raise the awareness, participation, and proliferation of longer-duration adventure and ultra-endurance races/events in Singapore and the South-East Asian region by taking on the ARWC in Tasmania 2011.

Wilson Low, Chris Yeo, Ng Chee Koon and Caroline Tan make up the SART line-up for XPD Tasmania in November 2011. Between them, they have extensive local and international race experience. Some of the highlights include team captain Wilson Low’s 2010 XPD race which qualified Team SART for this ARWC, and Chris Yeo being the first Singaporean to complete 125 km in 16 hours in the recently concluded Twilight Ultra Challenge Race held at East Coast Park in March 2011.

Here are some of the races that each team member has taken part in over the years:
• Ironman Western Australia (Australia)
• M. Kinabalu Climbathon (Malaysia)
• Keen Adventure Race (Australia)
• Ace Adventure Challenge (Singapore)
• Action Asia Challenge Series (Hong Kong, Taiwan, Macau, Singapore)
• Abu Dhabi Adventure Challenge (Abu Dhabi)
• Raid The North Extreme (Canada)

Name: Low Wei Cheng Wilson (Team Captain)
Age: 28
Occupation: Director and Coach of Edge Adventure Sports

Name: Caroline Tan
Age: 35
Occupation: Student

Name: Ng Chee Koon
Age: 33
Occupation: Singapore Civil Defence Force Senior Officer

Name: Yeo Jun Kiat Chris
Age: 38
Occupation: Marine Operations Manager

2010 XPD
http://www.xpd.com.au/