Ten year Grand Traverse record smashed |
| Drakensberg - Grand Traverse | ||||
| Sunday, 21 December 2008 17:30 | ||||
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The 10 year old Grand Traverse record was finally smashed on December 20 with a time of 3 days 9 hours and 53 minutes! Attempts on the record intensified this year with several teams making a go of it. Finally, on 17 December, Stijn Laenen and Andrew Hagen set out from Sentinel Car Park at 9:00am, to finish in record time on the 20th. Some 24 hours were cut off the previous record of 4 days 9 hours 39 minutes, set by Lawrie and Gaven Raubenheimer in 1999. Further details may be found on this blog. At Vertical Endeavour the challenge of the Grand Traverse lies close to our hearts and we extend our congratulations and respect to the new record holders!
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Yep, I was meaning ground support. 
It's a really nice thing to have, especially if someone needs to pull out somewhere along the route. The ground crew can at least verify that you started and ended at a particular time (but can't verify that you did all the checkpoints). Really nice to have someone waiting for you at the end too. I've even had some bottles of champagne lying in the stream just before the border post gates, waiting for our arrival. Nice touch!
@gollum: rather go for locals that are not questionable.
It's a really nice thing to have, especially if someone needs to pull out somewhere along the route. The ground crew can at least verify that you started and ended at a particular time (but can't verify that you did all the checkpoints). Really nice to have someone waiting for you at the end too. I've even had some bottles of champagne lying in the stream just before the border post gates, waiting for our arrival. Nice touch!
@gollum: rather go for locals that are not questionable.
Just to avoid any misunderstanding - when Intrepid mentions a support crew, I take it he means somebody to pick you up at Bushman's Nek at the end! 
The record is entirely unsupported, so no meeting of support crews or any food/gear dumps along the way...
The record is entirely unsupported, so no meeting of support crews or any food/gear dumps along the way...
The record attempts are a pure sporting event, and it's pretty neat that it functions on honesty within a small group of interested people as Stijn mentioned.
I'm getting an increasing volume of queries relating to the GT and the record attempts...interesting.
@lizetteo: If you do want to have some sort of documentation of your attempt you could take pictures of yourself at the various check points (and switch on the date/time stamping feature of your camera). If you have a GPS, it's also neat to save the entire trip in your active track log since this time stamps each plot (this requires a lot of memory for the data and you'd need to find the best interval setting for your GPS). More and more real-time GPS tracking is also becoming available, but not totally necessary for these attempts. Your support crew (if you have them) can also verify times.
I'm getting an increasing volume of queries relating to the GT and the record attempts...interesting.
@lizetteo: If you do want to have some sort of documentation of your attempt you could take pictures of yourself at the various check points (and switch on the date/time stamping feature of your camera). If you have a GPS, it's also neat to save the entire trip in your active track log since this time stamps each plot (this requires a lot of memory for the data and you'd need to find the best interval setting for your GPS). More and more real-time GPS tracking is also becoming available, but not totally necessary for these attempts. Your support crew (if you have them) can also verify times.
All the best to those trying to better the time set already.... I know I was at some stage keen to better the original record but the current record is possibly out of my league as things currently stand. So, I can therefore legitimately stand at the sidelines and cheer on those who want to go for the record and better it!
Head over to www.drakensberg.ning.com - that's where all the recent record attempts have been discussed. There's no "official" timing and no need to bring down aluminium tags, etc. We rely on an honesty system and since the community of interested parties is pretty small, this works fine for now.
What is quite fun is if you send live blog updates via SMS from the berg - this keeps those of us who are desk-bound in on the action.
The daylight hours are lengthening and silly season is approaching... I know of at least 3 parties aiming to beat our record this summer - go for it!
What is quite fun is if you send live blog updates via SMS from the berg - this keeps those of us who are desk-bound in on the action.
The daylight hours are lengthening and silly season is approaching... I know of at least 3 parties aiming to beat our record this summer - go for it!
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