The route for the Tour de France 2009

Indiana ladies triumph in collegiate division of air race

Indiana State University pilots Jessica Campbell and Victoria Dunbar returned to campus victorious after capturing top collegiate honors in the annual Air Race Classic, a transcontinental air race for women.

The pair of pilots competed against 34 teams, winning first place in the collegiate category and finishing second overall. The race across the mid-section of the U.S. covered 2,715 miles, starting June 23 at Centennial Airport near Denver and ending June 26 in Atlantic, Iowa. The ISU aviators flew in a Diamond DA40 plane, owned by Dixie Chopper Air based at Putnam County Airport.

“Our goal going into this was to take home the collegiate trophy, so to win second place is just icing on the cake,” Campbell said.

Strategy was a major factor throughout the race. Each plane was assigned a handicap speed, with the goal to have the actual ground speed as far over the handicap speed as possible. That meant judging weather patterns, wind speeds and other elements in order to make the most of each day’s flight.

Two students in Purdue University’s Department of Aviation Technology also competed in the 33rd annual all-female Air Race Classic. Juliana Lindner, a senior from Hanover Park, Ill., was captain of the team, and Lauren Steele, a junior from Lapel, Ind., was co-pilot.  Purdue University presented this video of their hopes and aspirations.

It was without doubt a great race presenting many different challenges to all the competitors.

“The biggest challenge was figuring out when to fly and when not to fly,” Dunbar said, ”The altitude starting out in Denver was different from anything I was used to,” she said. “That’s something they teach you in class, but something I have a lot more respect for now that I’ve experienced it.”

Women’s air racing starting in 1929 with the first Women’s Air Derby. Since then the race has served as a way to for women in the aviation industry to connect with one another and expand their skill sets.

There is no doubt that all the participants learnt a great deal from their experience.

Below: Jessica Campbell (left) and Victoria Dunbar stand next to the Diamond DA40 airplane with their trophy after winning top honors in the collegiate division of the Air Race Classic

Extreme manufacturing from VW in Germany

This extraordinary video from CristianS75 was brought to our attention by a friend – now we understand this is not excactly an extreme sport but the technology, robotics and concept for the VW car manufacturing plant in Dresden, Germany certainly is extreme and we think it will have you catching flies as your jaw drops open with amazement.

What to do today … extreme kayaking perhaps?

It was this picture that set me off…

Isn’t it fantastically extreme?  WOW – what more can you say…

Extreme kayaking seems to be all about making the biggest drop and beating your compatriots to finding the next big drop.

Ben Stookesberry, a 30-year old professional kayaker,  seeks out big drops all over the world. He has made 51 first descents in 11 countries so far.

Pedro Oliva and Tyler Bradt have both set world record drops this year. Oliva first made headlines when he went over a 127 foot water fall in Brazil, and just weeks later Bradt shattered that record by dropping 186 feet over Palouse Falls in Washington State.

It is these sort of antics that has brought extreme kayaking to our attention.

Technology continues to evolve, offering better, more stable, boats, paddles, and other gear, which is allowing the top kayakers to challenge some impressive runs, such as the Rio Santo Domingo in Chiapas in Mexico, which drops 480 feet in just an eighth of a mile and has two waterfalls of 90 feet or more. It is just one of several extreme runs that Stookesberry is hoping to conquer in the months ahead.

Interesting little video this one from solesupfront :

And here’s Tyler Bradt’s record breaking drop (Fauxlaf ).

Bradt, Stookesberry and Oliva are one of about half a dozen professional kayakers who tackle waterfalls above 100 feet.

A little over a decade ago, a 50- or 60-foot waterfall was thought to be the biggest drop a kayaker could survive. But sturdier boats and new techniques have allowed daredevils to push the outer limits of the sport.

It’s not all about being the one to do the biggest drop, it also allows the extreme kayakers to venture into unexplored river gorges and uncharted rapids that were previously deemed out of reach, sealed off by fortress-like waterfalls where portaging is impossible.

They are becoming the equivalent of 19th century explorers risking their lives to claim a “first descent” of a waterfall or a long, treacherous stretch of river!

The most extreme kayakers have also developed new techniques to control their descents over massive falls. Boaters tuck forward like high divers, laying flat across the bow and angling their boats nose first, which reduces the surface area hitting the water and softens the impact. Some even attach fins to the back of the boats so that they drop straight down, like a dart. The most common injury, kayakers say, is a broken nose.

“Approaching the lip, there’s this feeling of being completely out of control, completely in the hands of the river,” Ben Stookesberry says. “You lose all that fear and all that anticipation, because there’s no turning back.”

Rather them than me, tho’ I have to admire their courage.

WOW – extreme surfing

This is taking extreme sports to the limits – surfing a tsunami wave! What a wave, thanks to pads316 for posting it:

and since it’s Saturday and I don’t have much time… I couldn’t resist posting this video from mobscene1003 of other strange occurrences following a tsunami. Bare with the German write-up (unless of course you understand German in which case I apologise!), the fish are worth having a look at.

Your help is needed now – the extreme condition of our oceans

You might have noticed something new on our sidebar. SocialVibe has created a way of helping good causes and charities, and we have chosen to support a project that is close to our hearts – the protection of our oceans.

The Surfrider Foundation is a non-profit, grassroots, environmental organisation dedicated to protection and enjoyment of our oceans, waves and beaches. Founded in 1984 by a handful of surfers in Malibu, California, the organisation has grown exponentially.

So you see, surfers are not just beachbums!

Apart from being avid followers of the surfing life, why choose this particular project?

Well, this is something we’ve ranted about before – but did you know that there is a plastic soup in the middle of the Pacific Ocean -  known as the dead zone? Here’s a depressing, but important short video from StrangeDaysAction spelling out a few facts for us:

Marine scientist Captain Charles Moore of the Agalita Marine Research Foundation describes a dead zone, an oceanic desert, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean which he calls: Plastic Soup. This trashbin is a huge – I mean seriously HUGE – deep churning cesspool of plastic bits definitely bigger than the state of Texas, and, some say, even bigger, possibly, than AFRICA ! These plastic bits are ingested daily by marine life. And guess what? Who eats marine life? We do.

Scary stuff hmmm?

Captain Moore has measured 6 pounds of plastic for every 1 pound of plankton. He predicts that, unless we do something, in 30 years there will be 60 pounds of plastic particles for every pound of plankton.

And what eats plankton? Plankton is literally the food of life. It is vitally important in the food chain of all marine life.

And lest you are a bit casual about this topic and shrug your shoulders and say, “well, it’s only the Pacific. It’s not our problem, someone will be able to sort it out in due course…” Don’t be misled – there is a similar cesspool in the Atlantic.

Here’s a photograph from National Geographic of an open-air garbage dump which tarnishes the sapphire coast of Barrow, Alaska. Disgusting, isn’t it.

And why should we get personally involved? Well, if you windsurf, kitesurf, scuba dive, snorkel, surf, sail, kayak, freedive, deep water solo to name but a few – you should be concerned. It concerns you directly.

This problem is very nearly out of control. We seriously need to do something about it. And we need to do something NOW.

So click on the sidebar please!

Thank you.

And I’ll leave you on an equally miserable note. Here’s a video from seareport01 on the problem in the Pacific…

So come on guys, let’s do our bit to save our oceans…

Extreme Dreams, extreme people, extreme challenge – what else could we be talking about but Ben Fogle and the Mongol Derby

Ben Fogle is atypical of our site. He challenges every aspect of life and seems to have a lot of fun doing it. As far as extreme sports go – he pretty well does them all…

So who exactly is he? He is a Presenter, Writer and Adventurer. His achievements include racing 160 miles across the Sahara desert in the notorious Marathon Des Sables. He has rowed the Atlantic Ocean in 49 days and crossed Antarctica in a foot race to the South Pole. That’s just for starters…

He has presented numerous television programmes including Extreme Dreams and as well as writing regularly for the Sunday Telegraph and The Independent, he has written four best-selling books.

He is also an ambassador for WWF, Medecins Sans Frontier and Tusk. He’s a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and the President of the Campaign for National Park’s.

And he’s only 35 years old…

His next testing task is going to be the Mongol Derby – the longest, toughest horse race on earth. He’ll ride 1,000 kms accompanied by 25 horses, for which he will be personally responsible. “It’s already giving me sleepless nights,” he says with a grin, “but if I didn’t do what I do, I’d be like a caged animal.”

So, what exactly is the Mongol Derby?

It’s “a race so big it would make Roman Emperors go weak at the knees.”

Great description that isn’t it. But I’ll give you more… including one of the rider’s introductory video on the Derby – Charles van Wyk (CvWMD ):

The idea for “the race” comes from Genghis Khan’s  incredible postal system – and we’re talking many many years ago, somewhere around the turn of the 12th century.

When he ‘ruled the world’ he realised the importance of being in touch, and knowing exactly what was happening and where. So he took the existing ancient and rather small network of horse messengers and supercharged it, creating a mind-bendingly efficient relay system of horse-stations that enabled his messengers to go faster than the speed of light itself. With horses stationed every 30 to 40 km it’s said he could get a message from Mongolia to Eastern Europe in just fourteen days. That would probably beat today’s postal system!

This year, 2009, some bold adventurists have decided to emulate this great but forgotten postal service,  resurrect the horse-stations and gather 800 horses to create the mother of all races.

The Mongol Derby will tackle the challenge of semi-wild horses and surviving alone in the wild steppes of Mongolia. There’s no carefully marked course, no catering tent and no support; this is horse racing on a whole new scale. You will change steed every 40 km so the horses will be fresh.

The nature of the Mongol Derby means it is the rider under stress not the horse. Traditional Mongolian horses are an extremely tough breed that has changed little since the Mongol Hordes swept across Asia on their backs in the early thirteenth century. They range in size from 12 to 14 hands high and roam the vast Mongolian steppe all year round. As the Mongol Derby will be run across wild terrain, not roads, the horses will be unshod as they always are.

Humans are not so tough. Bleeding kidneys, broken limbs, open sores, sun stroke, moon stroke and a list of dangers longer than your arm stand between the you and victory!

Now, for some of you who might be yearning to take part in this race, when does it happen?

The warm up Pre-race Meeting, UK Date and location to be confirmed Afternoon tea and talk with a renowned explorer. Pre-race Training, Mongolia 20 & 21 August 2009 Two-day training extravaganza with former champion jockey Richard Dunwoody. Launch Party 21 August 2009 Mighty send-off from Kharkhorin, the ancient capital of the Mongol Empire. Feasting, dancing, fermented mare’s milk and Mongolian merry-making galore.

The race Race Start 22 August 2009 Riders gallop forth into the wilderness. Midway Party 29 August 2009 Catch up with your fellow racers and spin yarns of wrestles with wolves. Closing Ceremonies 5 September 2009 Bathe in the glory of completing the world’s longest and toughest horse race. Riders will be lauded as pioneers and their names etched in adventuring history.

It costs  US$4,550 in total. However, don’t despair – you could always try for sponsorship and raise money for your favourite charity at the same time.

Additional costs will be the airfare to Mongolia, a single-entry Mongolian visa, and hotel costs before and after the race.

As the race approaches you will be able to track the riders live through an interactive map. The route starts in the Khentii Aimag, at Delgerhaan and ends at Kharkhorin, Chinggis Khaan’s capital, 1000km later.

The organisers of The Mongol Derby, in partnership wtih Tengri, have issued the following warning:

WARNING WARNING WARNING

Before you even consider applying for this race we want to point out how dangerous the Mongol Derby is, and how dangerous the sport of horse riding is.

And when we talk about horse riding, we don’t just mean getting on a horse you are familiar with at home. We mean riding a series of unfamiliar horses across wild Mongolian terrain. By taking part in this race you are greatly increasing your risk of severe physical damage. You could break limbs, suffer internal injuries, become paralysed or even die. Please do not underestimate the extreme nature of the Mongol Derby.

I am afraid that, having given you details of costs etc, entrance to this race is now closed for 2009. However, just around the corner is 2010 and with some planning you could be one of the handful of riders in the next race…

Watch this space – I’ll keep you updated on this fantastic and extreme endurance race.

Weekend entertainment – bungee jumping at its best!

The Kiwis know all about extreme sport having pretty well invented it, and if not exactly ‘invented’ it – they have certainly spent a lot of time and energy perfecting it.

Here’s a great video to give you a bit of a chuckle this bright and sunny Sunday. Thanks to Woodger for posting it.

Hiking the Haute Route traverse between Chamonix and Zermatt

Are you looking for the perfect holiday where you can combine your love of extreme sport with adventure? Well then, the Haute Route is for you. Although not exactly an ‘extreme sport’ being a hike rather than a mountain climb, the fact that it takes 12+ days and is a combination of difficult to very difficult trails, we think makes it fit neatly into our catagory.

You might remember that I did an article on the Haute Route several months ago – right in the middle of our winter and therefore a possible area of interest to any skier or snowboarder.

But now with summer upon us, this route is also available to hikers and climbers. It was, after all, first charted as a summer mountaineering route in the mid-19th century by the Alpine Club (UK). It was first successfully traversed on skies in 1911.

Since the ‘Haute Route’ has become a bit of a generic expression for high level, multi-day, hut-to-hut tours, this route is now known as the “Chamonix-Zermatt Haute Route”.

If you are thinking of walking the Haute Route this summer, you will need to know that it is a 180 km (108 mi) hike and is normally done in 15 stages, or 12+ days – this is very flexible.

This is not just a route that you can stroll along admiring the magnificent scenery (although of course you will be doing plenty of that). It is a serious mountain hike involving 3 different standards of hiking:

• gradual ascents or descents along well defined paths or tracks. Suitable for novice walkers.
• considerable ascents and descents over moderate fell type terrain
• and strenuous sometimes exposed routes requiring map reading and navigational skills

You start your hike at Chamonix at 1037m, at the lowest level you will descend to 717m  and the highest ascent will be to 2965m – with many  days of ups and downs inbetween!

The Haute Route has what is thought to be the greatest collection of four thousand metre peaks in the Alps, it culminates at the foot of the Matterhorn in Zermatt. Mont Blanc will remain in view for much of the hike, but you will also become familiar with other equally impressive peaks such as the Grand Combin, Mont Blanc de Cheilon, Pigne d’Arolla, Dent Blanche, and the Weisshorn.

It is a spectacular walk, but strenuous – crossing eleven passes, many over 2,700 m (9000 feet). While some days will be extremely hard work, there will also be leisurely days where you can bathe in and enjoy the beauty surrounding you. However, you must be very fit and well-prepared for this walk as there are a few very long days over difficult rugged, open terrain.

The hiking trails are generally well graded and well defined which makes for great hiking. There are, however, sections that include mud, snow, loose rock, and scree. There may be a section that includes a 70 foot ladder.

Good luck and enjoy. It will be worth it.

The most extreme cycle race in the world – the Tour de France

I wonder how many of you are avid followers of the Tour de France? and how many of you know this year’s route? and how many of you know anything about it’s history???

Well, sit back and enjoy. I am going to fill you in on all of it… or a lot of it anyway.

This year the Tour is going to go right passed our back door which is going to be fun. It will be the second time since we’ve lived here that we will be able to watch some of it. Though the last time they passed in such a flash and a blur that I did have to wonder what all the hype was about!

That’s the route for this year (2009) and it includes:

• 10 flat stages,
• 7 mountain stages,
• 1 medium mountain stage,
• 2 individual time-trial stages,
• 1 team time-trial stage.

It runs  from Saturday July 4^th to Sunday July 26^th 2009. It is the 96^th Tour de France  and will be made up of 21 stages. It will cover a total distance of 3,500 kilometres.

The starting point is that gem of a principality – Monaco.

So what exactly is it then?

The Tour de France is a world renowned annual bicycle race that covers somewhere between 3,000 to 4,000 kms (1,800 to 2,500 miles)  throughout France and a bordering country. This year it is ducking into both Switzerland and Spain. The shortest Tour was in 1904 at 2,420 km, the longest in 1926 at 5,745 km.

The event usually lasts 23 days and attracts cyclists from around the world. The race is broken down into day-long segments, called stages. Individual times to finish each stage are totaled to determine the overall winner for the race. The three weeks usually include two rest days, sometimes used to transport riders between stages.

The race alternates between clockwise and counter-clockwise circuits of France. The rider with the least elapsed time each day wears a yellow jersey. The course changes every year but it has always finished in Paris. Since 1975 the finish has been on the Champs Elysées.

The 2004 Tour rides the Champs Élysées.

The combination of endurance and strength needed led the New York Times in 2006, to say that the “Tour de France is arguably the most physiologically demanding of athletic events.” The effort was compared to “running a marathon several days a week for nearly three weeks”, while the total elevation of the climbs was compared to “climbing three Everests.”

The History:

The first daily sports newspaper in France at the end of the 19th century was Le Vélo. It sold 80,000 copies a day.

At this time in France the country was split over the story of a soldier, Alfred Dreyfus, who had been found guilty of selling secrets to the Germans. Le Vélo stood for Dreyfus’s innocence while some of its biggest advertisers, notably Albert de Dion, owner of the De Dion-Bouton car works, believed him guilty. Angry scenes followed between the advertisers and the editor, Pierre Giffard, and so the advertisers started a rival paper – called L’Auto.

Giffard, of Le Vélo, had organised and promoted the ‘Paris-Brest et Retour’ race, and so L’Auto, in its turn, came up with the idea of the  ‘Le Tour de France’ race and promoted that.

The idea for a round-France race actually came from L’Auto’s chief cycling journalist, 26-year-old Géo Lefèvre. He and the editor, Henri Desgrange discussed it after lunch on 20th November 1902. Desgrange was bold enough to believe in the project and threw his backing behind it. Le Tour was finally  announced in L’Auto on 19th January 1903. The plan was a five-week race from 31st May to 5th July. However, this proved too be far too daunting and only 15 riders entered.

Not prepared to be defeated in his new project, Desgrange cut the length to 19 days, changed the race dates to 1st July to 19th July, and offered a daily allowance. He attracted 60 entrants, not just professionals but amateurs, some unemployed, some simply adventurous. Only 21 cyclists acompleted this first gruelling race.

Le Tour soon won over the sporting public and the roadside crowds swelled. The French people took to their hearts this unusual event which placed their towns, their countryside and, since 1910, even their mountains, in the spotlight.

What is the story behind the YELLOW jersey and others?

The aim of riders is to win overall but there are three further competitions: points, mountains and for the best young rider. The leaders of the competitions wear a distinctive jersey, awarded after each stage. When a single rider is entitled to more than one jersey, he wears the most prestigious and the second rider in the other classification wears the jersey. The overall and points competitions may be led by the same rider: the fastest on time will wear the yellow jersey and the rider second in the points competition will wear the green jersey.

The first rider to wear the yellow jersey from start to finish was Ottavio Bottecchia of Italy in 1924. The greatest number of riders to wear the yellow jersey in a day is three: Nicolas Frantz, André Leducq and Victor Fontan who shared equal time for one day in 1929 and there was no rule to split them.

The green jersey is awarded for sprint points and the polka-dot jersey (white jersey with red spots) is given for the ‘King of the Mountains’.

The white jersey is awarded to the best best rider under 25 on January 1 that year and the ‘prix de la combativité’ goes to the rider who most animates the day, usually by trying to break clear of the field. The most combative rider wears a number printed white-on-red instead of black-on-white next day.

The Tour as an entertainment sport:

The Tour is important for fans in Europe. Millions line the route, some having camped a week to get the best view. A carnival atmosphere prevails before the riders pass. Any cyclist is free to attempt the course in the morning, after which a cavalcade of advertising vehicles passes, blaring music and tossing hats, souvenirs, sweets and samples. As word passes that the riders are approaching, fans sometimes encroach on the road until they are an arm’s length from riders.

The clever thing about the Tour de France is how it has always modernised itself, moving with the times, and allowing social changes to impact on the race.

Like France as a whole, it benefited from the introduction of paid holidays from 1936; it survived the 2nd World War, and then savoured the “trente glorieuses” period of economic prosperity; it has opened itself up to foreign countries with the onset of globalisation, and now finds itself at the forefront of the debate on the malaise afflicting world sport in general – doping…

Le Tour has had its fair share of doping scandels. As far back as its inception (1903) early riders used alcohol and ether to dull the pain.

Spectators’ banner during the Tour de France 2006.

In 1924, Henri Pélissier and his brother Charles told the journalist Albert Londres they used strychnine, cocaine, chloroform, aspirin, “horse ointment” and other drugs.

In 1967, British cyclist Tom Simpson died climbing Mont Ventoux after taking amphetamine. Mont Ventoux, you might be interested to know, is often claimed to be the hardest in the Tour because of the harsh conditions.

1998 was known as ‘The Tour of Shame’. Willy Voet, an assistant for the Festina team, was arrested with erythropoietin (EPO), growth hormones, testosterone and amphetamine.The team was at the center of the doping scandal which became known as the ‘Festina Affair’. In reaction to this, the cycling team reorganized itself and Festina set up the Fondation d’Entreprise Festina whose mission was to promote the fight against doping. However, chaos reigned during this Tour. There were police raids and the riders went on strike. Eventually after mediation, police limited their tactics and riders continued, but some riders had already abandoned the race and only 96 finished.

The 2002 and 2004 Tours had their fare share of controversy and even Lance Armstrong, that famous winner of 7 jerseys has been accused of using EPO, but he has never been penalised.

In 2008, 5 riders tested positive for various performance enhancing drugs.

There have been 4 fatal accidents to cyclists in the history of the race.

One of the amazing and most enduring things about this great race is the code of conduct that the cyclists adhere to. Rider number 13 is allowed to wear one of his numbers upside down.  It is considered unsporting to attack a leading rider delayed by misfortune. Attacking in the feed zone is also seen as unsporting. Not sticking to customs can lead to animosity. Unless the gap between the top two is close, riders generally do not attack on the final stage, leaving the leader to his glory.

It is nice to see that even in the heat of competition, riders temper their competitiveness to this unwritten code of conduct.

However and in despite of everything, over a hundred years after its inception, le Tour continues to gain strength from its experience. It is the supreme  endurance race and brings bicycle racing up into the extreme sports catagory. Thank you to Kraftwerk and fascistbaby for this introductory video to Le Tour de France.