Adventure racing is a combination of two or more endurance disciplines, including orienteering (if an orienteering map is used) and/or navigation (when non-orienteering maps are used), cross-country running, mountain biking, paddling and climbing and related rope skills. An expedition event can span ten days or more while sprints can be completed in a matter of hours. There is typically no dark period during races, irrespective of length; competitors must choose if or when to rest.
Adventure racing historically required teams to be of a specified size and to include both men and women, but many races no longer restrict team size and include single-sex divisions. Some also include age-based categories.
The vast majority of adventure races include trail running, mountain biking and (ideally) a paddling event. Navigation and rope work are also featured in all but the shortest races, but this is only the beginning. Part of the appeal of adventure racing is expecting the unexpected. Race directors pride themselves at challenging racers with unexpected or unusual tasks.
Races often feature:
Paddling: kayaks, canoes, out-riggers, rafts and tubing;
Traveling on wheels: Mountain Bikes, kick-scooters, in-line skates, roller skates;
Beasts of Burden: Horses and camels;
Catching Air: Paragliding, hang-gliding;
Covering Terrain: Orienteering, mountaineering, coasteering, swimming, canyoneering, riverboarding;
Learning the Ropes: Ascending; rappelling, traversing (including via zip-line).
So, I'm afraid this is completely, crazy, COOL! It opens up an amazingly rich and complicated thought process about how to train for such events. But, because of the demands of the events it is not possible to get fixated and abstract with the training, rather, everything has to be efficient and relevant. Moreover, it is as much a mental game, both sharpness of skills, navigation and orienteering for example, but, managing fatigue in order to respond to the high skill demands of the activities.
The Canadian Association has this tremendous resource: Adventure Racing 101
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3 comments:
So....does this mean your thinking of racing, cause Im totally in..:)
I'm having lot of thoughts. Am I ready to commit? I'm not sure... I'm not sure. The endurance doesn't scare me. The knowledge needs doesn't scare me. The cost is a little intimidating. The time commitment is huge.
I personally believe when training for any physical event you should train 3 days a week, every other day, and take one day off such as sunday. So monday to saturday and start again the next week. The reason why athletes fatigue, especially as they age, is that they overwork their central nervous system. It takes 48 hours for the central nervous system to completely recover. So other than light activity I would space out strenous activities every 48 hours. I'm interested in hearing your input.
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