Team Red Ants' Tierra Viva race report

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Tuesday, 08 March 2011 11:28

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Spectacular scenery, friendly people and a dog

by Brian Gardner

Imagine a place where crystal clear turquoise lakes give way to dense montane forests and steep rugged mountains. Imagine a place where the light of billions of stars light up the high mountain peaks around you and where rolling wilderness extents further than the eye can see… Imagine Argentine Patagonia, and imagine doing a 500km Expedition Adventure Race through this magical place!

When one thinks of the ultimate AR destination, this place must be near the top! Team Red Ants were privileged to be able to participate at the Tierra Viva AR, which took place in and around the town of Villa La Angostura in Argentine Patagonia, only a few kilometres from the Chilean boarder. Around every corner a picture postcard vista awaits you, but your legs certainly know that it isn’t all that flat either!

After deciding months ago that South America was the AR destination of choice, and top of the list of places we wanted to do an adventure race, we went on the hunt for an expedition style race. Tierra Viva jumped out at us, as it contained all the hallmarks of what could be an epic race, and the scenery and High Mountains in Argentina Patagonia were a huge drawcard! Committing to a race of this nature is the hard part; from then on in it’s a case of slogging out the details! After weeks of preparation, packing, buying equipment (like a neoprene vest!), we were off to Argentina in a bubble of huge excitement.

Team Red Ants consisted of Alex Wagner, Tim Deane, Nicky Booyens and myself, and we were the only non-South American Team at this years Tierra Viva AR. Our interest was drawn to the Wegner Patagonia Expedition race in the weeks leading up to Tierra Viva, as we watched the extreme weather take a hold of that race, with our only comfort being that we were racing 2000km further north than the Wegner race. We could only hope that keeping dry and warm would not become the major factor of Tierra Viva…

Having had a day to kill in Buenos Aires, any notions that we would be going into the race under-trained were quickly dispelled when Alex (and his Lonely Planet) led us on an 8 hour sight-seeing tour of Buenos Aires, on foot. We literally walked the length and breath of the city, and didn’t heed any warning to stay clear of the neighbourhood’s around the Boca Juniors Stadium, where we actually encountered plenty of post-FIFA world cup goodwill!

A massive downpour on the morning we left Buenos Aires for Bariloche made getting taxis to the airport a mission, and we all ended up soaking wet, in 3 separate taxis, pretty stressed out and hoping that we would all make it to the airport. What a crazy few hours, but at least we didn’t miss our flight! Urban Adventure Race: Check.

After a short 2 hour flight from Buenos, we arrived at Bariloche airport, greeted by Sacha and Luis from the race organisation, who shuttled us the 60 odd km’s to a festive and warm Villa La Angostura (VLA). We got to know Sacha well, which proved really helpful, as his parents owned an outdoor rental shop in VLA, he had a car, lived across the road from where we were staying in VLA, and was always offering to help! What a bonus! Thanks for all the help Sacha! Unbeknownst to us, the next 3 days in VLA was the annual fiesta! What a great experience to arrive in a Patagonian mountain village at fiesta time! Literally hundreds of Lamb on the spit, Quilmes beer, chimichurri salsa, emplanadas and churros! What a pleasure, carbo and protein loading like never before… J

With all our bikes surviving the aeroplane trip over, we wasted no time in assembled them, only to find that Nicky, Alex and I had issues with our tubeless tires, which meant a hike-a-bike to the garage to get some compressed air… Only then were we able to take a spin around VLA! We went north to Lake Correntoso to check out where central camp would be, and where we would return to the next day to set up our central camp transition and do all the registration necessities.