Ice Ultra Race Report 2017 - Stage Four

The Medic and Sami teams have been on top of their game today as the longest trail of the tour and the never-ending snow took their toll on the tired runners...

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Ice 2017 and Race Reports

Stage Four

The Medic and Sami teams have been on top of their game today as the longest trail of the tour and the never-ending snow take their toll on the tired runners.

A cut-off has been imposed at checkpoint 5 where runners who took longer than 12 hrs to reach it were ferried to the finish by road.  3 runners have been short coursed at this point.  6 more either didn’t start or have been taken off the course by the medics today.  The teams have been unbelievably fast throughout the day and everyone in their care is recovering well.  The medics are on top of their games and the Sami team know how to get top speed out of a snow-mobile!

Everybody crossing the line has looked totally spent.  Cruelly the hardest part of the trail comes after the 50th kilometre when the runners find themselves in deeper softer snow just at a time when the accumulated calorie deficit is at it’s worst and the temperature is plummeting around them.  The cruellest twist though lays in the last 500m.  The runners emerge from woodland and can see the lights at the finish line on the other side of a lake which looks like little more than a paddling pool compared to the expanses of water they’ve gotten used to.

However, this lake is dotted with half frozen surface water.  A thick layer of slush hiding under a few inches of powdery snow.  If your foot goes through into that soup, when you lift it out again you’ll find that it freezes solid and hangs on your snowshoes like concrete.  From the finish we can see their head torches out on the lake and it’s taking them an age to get to us.

It’s worth remembering at this point that the 2015 race had patches like this on almost every lake crossing!

We have a large heated tepee waiting for them and the medics are using the sauna to warm people back up when they reach the finish.  Luxury!

Vicente finished the stage in daylight.  His performance has been incredible.  Karl Heinz Reigl, Takao Kitada and Taco Jongman are still all fighting hard despite an injury to Taco and illness causing Karl to struggle to get food in.

It’s going to be a long lonely night for some of the runners but they’ll arrive here with only 15km left to go tomorrow.

The weather tomorrow is clear and wind free again and we’ll have some treats waiting at the finish line!

Stage Results

NameRace NoStartFinishTime
1Vicente Garcia13006:45:0016:01:0009:16:00
2Karl Reigl12906:45:0018:19:0011:34:00
3Taco Jongman10906:45:0019:28:0012:43:00
4Takao Kitada11106:45:0019:49:0013:04:00
5Maritz Theron12206:45:0020:40:0013:55:00
5Will Roberts12006:45:0020:40:0013:55:00
6Ewan Dryburgh10606:45:0022:01:0015:16:00
6Joey Patrolia11706:45:0022:01:0015:16:00
7Paul Bowker10306:45:0022:03:0015:18:00
8Carolin Botterill10206:45:0022:21:0015:36:00
9Emma Zadrozny12506:45:0022:43:0015:58:00
10Matt Zadzrozny12606:45:0022:49:0016:04:00
11Eric Chan10506:45:0023:35:0016:50:00
12Ann Marie Larkin11206:45:0023:38:0016:53:00
13Paul Chan10406:45:0023:39:0016:54:00
14Phil Snowden12106:45:0002:30:0019:45:00
Andrew Barber10106:45:00Short
James Mowbray11606:45:00Short
Kari Mcdonald11506:45:00Short
Aaron Trindall12406:45:00DNF
Jane Lightfoot11406:45:00DNF
Andrew Wicking12806:45:00DNF
David Harris10806:45:00DNF
Saul Treherne12306:45:00DNF
Andreas Lledo12706:45:00DNF
Jon Richardson11906:45:00DNF


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Will Roberts

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