Getting prepared

As a rookie in the X-Alps I’m up against athletes with a lot more experience of this race than I have.  Our approach is to learn as much as we can from those who have done this before and to ensure our team is as well prepared as possible.  I wrote a while ago in this post about equipment selection.  I’ll give an update on flying equipment soon, but this post is about everything else.

Firstly, to compete in the X-Alps you need a camper van, or at least a support vehicle of some sort which you can sleep in.  We don’t own one.  So I’m very happy to say that we have been successful in getting sponsorship for team GBR2 from Pringles Xtreme (appropriate for the world’s most extreme race!).  Pringles have arranged hire of a Mercedes Benz camper van not only for the event but also for the training in June.  What wonderful people they are!  I’ll post more details when we pick it up.

Whilst I’ve been focussing on flying and learning the route my dad has been putting his efforts into ensuring we are well equipped.  He wrote about the support from High 5 a few posts go – they are supplying us with all the high performance nutrition we could need for the race, which is a great help.  He’s also thinking through everything we need for the van (I had an email from him just the other day about Gas!!). 

We’ve even got the kitchen sink! (Actually it is a very clever little collapsible bowl to wash feet in).

I wouldn’t say we’ve thought of everything, yet, but I would say we are in very good shape given it is only April and the trial run in June along the course with the van should allow us to check out all the kit and make any last minute additions or get rid of stuff we won’t need.