Waiting for teams to come in.
A classic Brisbane summer storm sweeping through the CBD last Friday evening wasn’t enough to deter over 150 competitors from taking on the Urban Rogue. A 3hr metrogaine under the Friday night city lights, the Urban Rogue represents the last chance for rogainers to test their navigation and legs on the 2014 calendar. It was great to see a mix of families and novice teams (many taking on the options opened by the “On Wheels” category) in amongst some of our faster teams.
On to the results. At last year’s Urban Rogue, the fight for top spot was a closely run affair between the On Wheels vs On Foot categories, with the pairing of team “NFI” taking honours on a set of roller blades. This year the guys opted for the safer option of racing on foot in the wet conditions and came home early in 9th place. However, the battle between the foot and wheeled categories was taken up by “Wheely Not a Good Idea” racing with a single skateboard shared between the two of them, but were ultimately edged out by the “Rochedale Runners” who took out top spot with a score of 2270 (that is, 38 out of the 62 available check points). Third overall was also our first mixed and veterans team, the experienced pairing of team “No Bruce”. “Kats Panda Balls” came in as our first women’s, tied on score with our first novice team “Evolution” who finished in a respectable 13th place overall, while the “Five Wallises” won the family division.
Winners route choice.
One positive from the night was that it was great to see most teams stay out for the full time limit – perhaps the clearing of the rain not long after the race start helped with this. It was also great to see CP100, which required a photo of the team with the Brisbane Ferris Wheel, was visited by almost every team as well. Safe to say that the photo CP will remain a fixture of the Urban Rogue.
A shout out must go to Globe Trekker for the provision of prizes and cross promotion – make sure to check them out online here or visit their store at West End. It sounds like they are keen to support rogaining moving forward, which is fantastic for the sport. It was great to see Brett from Globe Trekker getting out on the course as one of our competitors – I’m sure many of you would have seen his car as one of our check points. Finally a big thank you to all the volunteers who helped with the race – Alan Ferris for vetting the course and helping out at HQ, Sally Staton and Derek McKinnon for assisting with the million small jobs at HQ and Paul Guard for administering last minute entries. To all novice teams that entered, I’d encourage you to get dirty and take on a bush event next year – there are plenty of great races on the QRA calendar, including a training day and mini-rogaine in March.
Check point 100 photos.
From my end, it is now time to turn attention to the Rogue Adventuregaine. I just had a very encouraging meeting with the ranger for D’Aguillar National Park, where conversation quickly turned from the race set for next year to all the other multisport possibilities throughout SEQ. Suffice to say I’m brimming with enough exciting potential courses to keep the adventuregaine format rolling on for years to come. After the 60 team places for the 2014 Rogue24 sold out in four weeks, I’ve decided to extend the race to include both an 8hr and 24hr option for 2015, bringing capacity to 100 teams. This represents a significant increase in the amount of man power required, so I’d encourage anyone looking for a chance to get out in the bush to hang a few CPs whilst practicing their navigation, or who want to be involved with the race from a more leisurely perspective on the sideline to consider volunteering (even if it is for another QRA event). Entries for the Rogue24 will open in early January with a prior announcement made on Facebook and from feedback are still expected to sell out.
Once again, thanks to all the competitors who made Friday night’s race such a fantastic event. We had plenty of fun running it from the sidelines. The Urban Rogue will make a return with a similar format on December 4th, 2015. See you on the trails soon,
Liam
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