Kicking off our War Stories presented by Devil’s Peak Beer Company, we hear from Jo Le Grange from Team Fast Festive Furious Fun. The Team consisted of AR Vetrans Donovan Sims (Formerly Merrell Adventure Addicts) and Garth Pienke (Former Team Castle Lite), Michelle Schlebusch who has completed all 6 Merrell Transkei Tuffs, and brand new to the sport Jo-Marie Le Grange who competed in her first AR this year.
Written By: Jo-Mari le Grange
Two weeks before the Merrell Transkei Tuff, I got a call from Don (Sims) saying let’s join Michelle (Schlebusch) and Garth (Pienke). At first, I said no… but Don did not stop, and I ended up with these three incredible humans in the Transkei doing the best and biggest race that I have ever done!
Friday morning arrives and these crazy people arrive at my door, fighting about who is going to give me a welcome to the team hug first! We started our journey with a bakkie full of bags, bikes, a boat, and! and! and!. The padkos was the most important as you know we must fuel these bodies 😃
After a four hour drive of nonstop laughing and chatting, we arrived in Coffee Bay. Registration time, dropping bikes, taking pics at Hole-in-the-Wall. This was just paradise!
Saturday morning, it’s 03:00 and our alarms go off, up we get! Michelle is ready to rumble, Don is making sure has his reading glasses, and well Garth still lying on the bed half asleep giving big yawns, and me, well I was ready to go and do crazy stuff!
04:00 We start racing to the bonfire, lit a candle, and of we went! (Merrell Transkei Tuff traditionally starts their race with a task that needs to be completed in order for the teams to begin their race)
Leg 1 – 9km Trek
It was pretty beautiful, but it was pitch dark and the only time we could see was when the lighting was flashing over the ocean that was crashing below us. It was spectacular! After about an hour and half, we got to our bikes! Now the fun starts!
Leg 2 – 60km MTB
We are now on our bikes in the dark, going up some serious hills and over some serious rocks, I’m holding on for dear life and my amazing team was just there every step of the way! A wrong turn made us end up hiking our bikes up this massive mountain, in great spirits we all just kept pushing!
Some more big hills and some even bigger hills and when we look again, we find ourselves surrounded by thick bush and overgrown paths! Don tells Garth to find a path and “get us down there”! Through sharp Wag n Bietjie bush (A bush covered with thorns), down a massive mountain, ducking and diving trees, but our magic pathfinder got us to the bridge!
Finally, 2km to go, BUT another 2 hills! A little sense of humor failure and a few nasty words flying!
At the Transition Area (Anchorage Hotel) we change, fill up our bags and off we went along the beach to TA3
Leg 3 – 10km Kayak Leg
Into the boats we go! I was trying hard to have a conversation with Don, him answering me the whole time only to find out afterward he couldn’t always hear me, so he just said “Ja”!
We end of the most beautiful 10km paddle on the Mthatha River.
We’re Back onto our feet, Yeeehaaa , wohoooo! Cold and wet from the paddle we get dressed warm and dry only to discover that 2km later we are going to have to swim across a river! Racing Kit off into dry bags, into the cold river, and my leg starts cramping halfway across and I looked like a one-legged frog swimming to get to the other side! Back into our dry kit and off we carry on.
Climbing and crawling over and under fences! Checkpoint 11 was a blikskottel, after a long search we eventually found it! But in between all this, Garth tried to help us across some water, Michelle leaps over like a beautiful giraffe with those long legs! I tried the same, but it did not work for me, half falling into the water and almost pulling Garth in with me, I managed to get across!
Let’s keep moving, but more water! Long story short, Michelle, Garth, and Don all had a bit of a special meeting with the water!
We got to the abseil just to hear we can’t do it as big swells arrived, making it very dangerous. It was very upsetting as I psyched myself up for it, so we kept going! Last Check Point (14), all I am gonna say is, who puts a dam on top of a hill?
Eventually, we found it and now we must get around the scary point; waves crashing against the cliff face, but again Garth and Don knew exactly how to keep us all safe!
In the end, we got lots of scratches and bruises, BUT what a day out! Happy hearts and lots of smiles!
Without saying we were on such a high that we only got to bed at 12:45 am (after pranking the Race Directors!!) that next morning, laughing, chatting, and looking back on our awesome day out!
To round it off, we were the team with the most amazing, beautiful bright pineapple kit, thanks Pinegold!😃 🍍
We already have booked 2023 Merrell TT as a team!
