More pics from the team kicking butt in Malaysia at the 2009 Perak Eco Adventure..

Race re-cap final stage 4 en route to the podium in Malaysia

Day 4 - Final Stage

Kyle and I knew what had to be done for the final day of racing. We were currently in 4th place and less than 3 minutes behind a spot on the podium which was held by Team Salomon TLDM from Malaysia. The day began with a long 48 mile bike leg which the majority would all be on paved roads and flat. The first 12 miles were pretty easy as everyone rode in a peloton as expected. The next 4 miles were insane as we had to loop around some rice paddy fields. We were forced into a single file line through wet tall grass with mud underneath. It was a struggle to remain with the lead group through the slippery conditions, but we hung on. At the edge of the paddy field was a bridge that led us back to the road, but we had to heave our bikes up onto it as it was 4 ft or so off the ground. Kyle and I were back on our bikes and on the road only to find ourselves a good 200 meters behind the peloton. We knew we had gotten off the bridge before the Malaysians and needed to get back with the lead riders. Kyle took off and I got on his wheel and we road as hard as we could and eventually caught the group. We settled back into the peloton and enjoyed the pull and recovered from our sprint. The pace had slowed again and the French team(Chiru Racing Bikes) and the Japanese team each tried to break away, but each time we caught back up with them. With all the goofing around with the pace, our Malaysian friends were able to rejoin the group as well. No one would take the lead and push the pace except us and the 2 teams from South Africa (Team McCain Adventure). I took the lead and Kyle got behind me and we picked up the pace. The next thing we knew, we were all alone and the peloton had dropped behind us. We expected them to catch us, but that was the last we would see of them for the next 24 miles. Kyle and I alternated leading, giving 1 min hard pulls while the other recovered all the while thinking at any moment the freight train of riders would run us over soon, but they never came. We held 24-28 mph on our mt. bikes as we were led by a police escort and camera crews all the way to the TA. It was pretty exciting to have gotten a break-a-way from such a strong group of riders and be in the lead.

We had a quick transition into our kayak gear and were off for a short paddle in the Indian Ocean to Pangkor Island. At this point we still had no idea exactly how far ahead we were and just wanted to keep our lead as long as possible. We expected to be caught on the kayak leg, as we are not the stongest paddlers, but no one came. We reached the sandy beach and now had to run up a hill to a 60 m repel down a steep rock face right back down to the beach. Because we had done the entire bike section while wearing our climbing harnesses, there was no need for the transition and gained more valuable time on the Malaysian team who we knew was not wearing theirs.

Now we were off for a 6k run along the edge of the island through the town of Pangkor. We were still feeling pretty good and settled into a comfortable pace but tried to keep pushing. Kyle had fallen back a bit so he we connected the tow line so that we could keep together. It seemed as though the entire town of Pangkor had come out and lined both sides of the street to cheer us on. They seemed confused to find Kyle and I by ourselves , most likely looking extremely tired , and why were we tied together?? We pushed on and reached the aid station at the base of "Killing Hill". In the race briefing the night before, the Race Director had told us that this hill was harder than the one we had done on Day 2 and had almost destroyed a few teams. We decided to take the time to load up on water before continuing up the trail. As we headed up the steep trail we still saw no one behind us. It wasn't too much time later when we heard the Swedish team coming up behind us and moving fast. Within a few moments they had caught us, passed us, and dropped us. We kept on trekking and a few moments later, Pacific Adventure made up of 2 Americans caught us, passed us, and dropped us. We decided that was enough, and in order for us to grab 3rd overall, we had to hold onto 3rd for the stage win. We never saw another team. We reached the base of "Killing Hill", which ended up being way easier than expected and had a short run back out to the main island road. Here we would get to choose from a group of "local" bikes and would be allowed to use one bike for the 2 of us to go the remaining 5k to the finish. Kyle immediately grabbed a bike that had the essentials...2 inflated tires, 2 pedals, at least 1 brake, and hopefully the ability to shift a gear or 2. I took off running and Kyle passed me on the bike. It was hilarious as the bikes were all for people a bit shorter than us and he looked like he was pedaling a kid's bike. For the next 5 k, we leap frogged each other with one of us riding a short distance ahead and dropping the bike on the side of the road and then the other of us running to it, picking up the bike and continuing. There was a lot of traffic on the road and I was sure at some point our bike would either get run over or fall apart. With the bike being so small it was very difficult to ride up the few hills we had along the way to the finish and I was having flashbacks of riding my little niece and nephew's little cruiser bikes and thinking that maybe that form of training was paying off at last. ha ha. I was just starting to feel pretty crappy and had told Kyle as he rode by me not to make me run to far when we could start to hear the sounds of the finish line. Kyle dropped the bike immediately after he passed me and was off and running hard to the finish. I barely caught him when we rounded the final turn and crossed the finish line together to finish the 4th and final stage in 3rd place. Immediately we started our watches and waited to see who would cross the finish line next. After 3 minutes we knew we had the last spot on the podium secured. As time ticked by and only the Japanese team finished, we thought we had a shot at 2nd place as Chiru Racing bikes had 6+ minute lead heading into this stage. At 4 1/2 minutes, Team Chiru crossed the finish line. It was official...

1st place: Team World of Multi-Sport from Sweden, 4 day race total of 15:30:07 (co-ed team)
2nd place: Team Chiru Racing Bikes from Australia & France, 15:50:36 (all male team)
3rd place: Kyle and I, Team Tecnu Extreme/Asolo, 15:51:55

Thanks to all of our sponsors Tecnu Extreme, and Asolo, and Leki and Rollerblade for getting us gear last minute, friends, and family for following our blog and supporting us through this fantastic adventure. We will definitely put this race on the calender for next year.

Thanks for hosting us Malaysia, it's been great but, we're heading home !

-Mari & Kyle

3rd place on the last day puts us on the podium in 3rd place at the innagural 2009 Malaysian Eco Adventure! Congratulations Tecnu Extreme/Asolo!

Stage 3 race recap from Mari....Last stage tommorrow..

Today, we had a lot of fun and are quite happy with how we did. Another great day of working well together.

Race started with a 12 k road ride in which we basically just had a good time hanging out in the peloton. There was a small break away and Kyle and I went with the group. Then the ride got pretty tough, it was a mix of smooth 2 track rideable road and rocky creek crossings and bike pushes up hill. Kyle and I were not sure what position we were in as it got a bit strung out. I was very happy I had decided to change my slick tires to semi slicks as it helped me climb in the rocks and mud. Unfortunately , Grant from the Kiwi team took a pretty good crash on his bike on one of the turns. The rumor is he might have a fracture in his back but is doing ok.

We came off the bike to the white water raft section. We started out with Kyle in the back and me in the front with our "guide" in the very front showing us the path to take. We weren't doing the best so we tried switching spots and continued to have similar trouble controlling the 6 person raft w/ only 2 people, but we made it down the river with a few hang ups on some rocks. It's pretty much where we lost most our time, but hey, we stayed in the boat and had a lot of fun. We did get passed by the Malaysia team about 1/2 way down the river, but we had a very quick 30 sec TA and were off on the run ahead of them. This is where the heat caught up with me and I felt terrible. Kyle and I kept a very good pace for the next 9 k and eventually I had to take a tow from him. I would like to point out that this was the first time I have ever been towed running but wow was it HELPFUL and we were able to keep our pace and dropped the Malaysian team even more. I was quite happy when we reached the river and had a short run downstream to where we entered the Cave. This was probably the most fun as it was pitch black and we used only our headlights, or torches as they are called here, to navigate our way downstream through the cave. I got all of my energy back with the cooler temp and the army crawling we had to do in the water to get through certain sections. 12 minutes later we popped out into daylight and threw down a very fast 400 meter sprint to the finish. We ended up 7th, but only 7 minutes back from first place. Fortunately only 2 of the teams who beat us where in front of us in the overall placement so we moved up to 4th place overall and now only 3 minutes behind the Malaysian team in 3rd place.

Tonight we were welcomed at our next hotel with an entire festival going on with dancing, music, gifts, and games. The Malaysian culture is amazing and Kyle and I are enjoying every minute of it. We are feeling good right now and are very excited for tomorrow's final stage. It will be the longest stage with a very long bike , short kayak, a repel, a big hill climb on the run and a team biathalon (whatever that is....) . That's all for now, Kyle and I are heading back to the festival to do some christmas shopping. ;)

Hello from Malaysia to everyone back home !

-Mari

Enjoying our drink of choice on our day of rest - Kyle's new addiction "100 plus" an iso topic drink with carbonation and of course a coke for me.

Kyles stage 2 recap from racing yesterday in Malaysia.. Todays a rest day, back on tommorrow. Go team!

Stage 2 started outside the Taiping Zoo with 32 racers on inline skates and a large crowd lining the streets. The Swedish team took off like a bullet, and Mari and I found ourselves in 4th position. We started working together and hunted down 2 teams to finish the 2 lap / 8k skate in second place. Big thanks to Rollerblade for the SpeedMaster 90's and to Leki for the poles that helped conserve our legs for what was to come. After a quick transition, we headed out on what was to be a 6k run to the rappel. We spend the next 2+ hours rock hopping, sliding down rivers, clawing up impossible jungle steeps, sliding down slippery slopes, and trying not to grab the cartoon-like thorns that covered most of the flora all while keeping our eyes peeled on flagging that lead us to the rappel. We were caught by a few teams on the jungle trek as I was having a real low point on the steep climbs, but Mari did the brunt of the work pulling me through the jungle and route finding. After being out of out of water for around a hour, working together with the New Zealand and Malaysia teams, and edging a few other teams out by staying on course while they got off course by not paying careful attention to the flagging, we arrived at the waterfall rappel in 5th place minutes out of 3rd place. After a very slippery, wet, fun rappel down the waterfall we took a 15 foot jump into a pool of water below the falls and swam out to run an easy trail to the bike pick up. After slamming some water, Mari and I worked together to recover from the run. We managed to catch up to the New Zealand team. They managed to hang onto our draft, but weren't able to help do any of the pulling, and it was doing us any good sticking with them as we needed to make up 11 minutes on them. I dropped to the back of the pace line as Mari was pulling and noticed both Kiwi's were working extremly hard to hang onto Mari's wheel. Mari pulled off to let one of them take a pull and no one went to the front. That is when we made a big push and dropped them for good. We finished the bike ride 8 minutes ahead of them and put into the paddle section with the intent of holding them off and closing the remaining gap on the 3 teams in front. We were able to close the gap on the Yogaslackers who finished in third palce 1 min and 20 secs in front of us, but we weren't able to pass them on the short paddle. We finished the paddle strong, hopped out of the boats and sprinted 1000 meters on a wooden boardwalk to the finish line in 4th place and moving up 3 spots in the overall classification to 5th place and 15 minutes behind the leaders. We then got a fun ambulance ride to the local clinic to get our thorns pulled out from the jungle trek, our cuts and scrapes cleaned and dressed, and a tetnious shot for good measure. Didn't have to wait, fill out any paper work, or pay!! And Yes the needles were sterile. Rest day today. Stage 3 is tomorrow with a bike, raft, run, cave.

Newspaper clipping from the Malaysia race. Tecnu Extreme/Asolo was 4th today, moving into 5th overall..Go team!

Map of todays stage...Fits the teams strengths...Look for us to move up....

Final Standings after day 1 racing in Malaysia.

Final Standings after day 1 racing in Malasia.
Tommorrows a different day! go Team!

E-Mail from Mari after day one in Malaysia...

Well not the best start for us, but we're feeling good about it. We are in 8th and about 10 minutes back from leaders. We had a bit of a rough start as I absolutely SUCK at swimming and probably lost us about 5 minutes. The teams up front are very good paddlers so we lost a couple of minutes there but hung onto the middle of the pack. The jungle 1k "run", was more of a slippery sloppy trek as it had rained all last night and made the trail a bit of a disaster, couldn't make up any ground there. It was fun though and apparently is Malaysia's oldest rain forest. We got in a much better rhythm once we got on land. The bike was short and quick and we did fine on the muddy dirt road section. We caught and passed 2 teams on the hill climb. Then it was a 5 k run to the finish. We were hoping to be more like 6 minutes out of the lead, but are confident that are racing will only get better. Between the swim, long kayak, and having such a short bike, we knew today was going to be the toughest for us. But we are psyched to go hard tomorrow on our skates and close the gap and leave nothing out there as we have a rest day afterwards.

That's all from Malaysia. Yes, we are drinking lots of water and recovering well. We both feel fine and ready to rock. :)

-Mari

Here's the team list for the Malaysian Race 2009

1 Asia Pacific Adventure- Ryan Blair and Damian Gonzalez
2 C1 Mongolia-Tamir Andrej and Zoright Batchuluun
3 Chiru Racing Bikes- Pierre Arnaud Le Magnan and Mark Thirlwall
4 Fit For Fun- Stephen Farrell and Grant Schofield
5 Pink Panthers- Nina Saunders and Chiara Garzoni
6 Salomon TLDM- Mohd Puzi Bin Dolah and Heidilee Bin Mohammad
7 Sart EcoRac-e Hadi Masron and Kong Eu Yen
8 Satoga-ism- Takahiro Ogasawara and Hidehito Sato
9)Team Erdene- Dawson Brisco Jon Lyons
10 Team McCain- Adventure Addicts Graham Bird and Andre Gie
11 Team McCain- Adventure Fanatics
12 Tecnu Extreme/Asolo Adventure racing
13 Team Tenaga- Harold Zundel Adam Goodvibes
14 Team Worldofmultisport.com- Martin Flinta and Eva Nystrom SWEDEN
15 Malaysia local team DROPPED
16 The Seven Summits
17 YogaSlackers

Teams in Malaysia getting friendly with the natives..

Here's a 6 inch scorpion the team saw yesterday while getting ready for the 5 days stage race in Malaysia. Steer clear guys, steer clear! : )

Tecnu Extreme/Asolo at the pre race testing out the course

Here's the team in Malaysia yesterday doing the pre-testing. Word is that they saw a 6 inch scorpion running around that got them excited to play in the jungle. The race starts tonight at 6pm West coast time which translates into Wednesday at 10 am over there. Tecnu Extreme/Asolo, and a swedish and finnish team should be the favorites to win the race, so the teams go their work cut out but we are ready to race. The team ran the course today and got their strategy going for todays stage. Most of the teams were struggling badly practicing for the inline skate section so the race director decided to throw it out for todays stage due to a safety factor ad seeing most teams struggle practicing on a downhill section to a bridge. We of course are bummed because we are pretty good on skates and was looking forward to kicking teams butts on that leg. Thankfully the race director lengthenned the 2nd stages inline skating section from 4km to 8km's so the team can still pull away and make up some time on a leg where they feel pretty comfortable in our new Rollerblade 90's and killer new Leki inline skating poles. Last night was a banquet to honor the teams complete with dignitaries and traditional dancing. Word on the street was that the King of Pelak was in attendance, so Malaysia is treating the team literally, like Kings. Mari says " Lets get on with it! Lets race already!" More later. Rock on! Go team!

Pre-Race pics of the team in Malaysia

The Teams in Malaysia, here are some pre-race pics of them playing, getting ready to rock. Todays another day spent chilling poolside, then tommorrow is a pre-race brief/meeting, followed by interviews with ESPN STARS netowork where one billion asian households will fall in love with our two team-mates, Kyle and Mari. they are getting anxious to start the race, and going through last minute gear checks as well as fine tuning the new skates and inline skating poles we just got from our killer sponsors Rollerblade and Leki. Thanks guys for helping us go fast. More later. Cheers!

Tecnu Extreme/Asolo adventure racing arrived in Malaysia yesterday for the innagural 5 day stage race which starts Dec 2nd. Kyle e-mailed me and told me they arrived safe,the flight attendants on Cathay Pacific airlines were hotties,the flight was long, Malaysia was beautiful,and they were meeting some of the teams that had already flown in. Most teams competing are 2 person male teams,and we sent our A-team of Kyle Peter and Mari Chandler,and look out boys. Mari is a better athlete than most men on this planet having been sponsored by Nike for many years,and having run 4:30 mile in college so our co-ed team will give you a run. The team plans to hang in for the first 2 days,then make a move against the teams when they are feeling the strain days 3-5. For now its time to eat,sleep,recover from jet lag,and hydrate like a mother. Tune in for updates on how the race is going. Go Team! The scenery never changes unless your the lead dog.

Tecnu Extreme/Asolo heading to Malasia to race...

Tecnu Extreme/Asolo is going international to race. Kyle Peter and Mari Chandler will be heading to Malaysia to race at the Perak Amanjaya International Eco Adventure 2009 that will be happenning December 2-December 6th. They will be racing representing Tecnu Extreme/Asolo during this 4 day stage race against some of the better teams in the World. They are fast and we expect them to kick butt over there for us, and we are proud that their accomplishments have gotten them into this first year prestigious race put on by ESPNSTAR, the Asian ESPN partner. They will be racing across Malaysia in a super fast stage race with little navaigation, short disciplines, blazing fast transitions, and beautiful terrain. We wish them the best. Take lots of toilet paper, and whatever you do, DON'T drink the water! Have safe travels Teamies! Kick butt!

Tecnu Extreme/StaphAseptic at the Gold Rush Nov 4-8, 2009

Well...this weekend was a strange one, and the Adventure Racing Gods were cruel.. We were on pace to win the notoriously tough Gold Rush Adventure Race put on by Mark Richardson and Adrian Crane, and then someone threw a wrench in the plans, and it was all gone before our eyes. The team was stacked. We had borrowed Glenn Rogers from the famed Nuun/Feed the Machine who is an animal, and a cool duder to boot. We have our new teamie and comrade-in-arms Kyle Peter who is a human lung. Leslie Reuter who is a super tough all-around Queen of the Machine, and then Charlie"Sherpa" Kharsa who is pound for pound one of the toughest guys out there, and you had the makings of a SUPER squad. This team had pushed the pace and now had a comfortable 4 1/2 hour lead over 2nd place team NORCAL AR who only had 3 team members to our four, when Glenn took a tumble while race walking/map reading on a technical trail. The fall resulted in a broken finger which he almost cut off, and had exposed the tendons. The team races safely first so it was time to hit the SPOT gps 911 button, and get him out of the back-country and to the hospital to save the digit, and so we were off and running to do just that. So after a period at the hospital, and a well deserved burrito dinner, sadly the team was still in the lead, but out of the race due to receiving outside assistance. We raced hard, we pushed the pace, we learned alot about this team working together, and we came away proud in the knowledge that we worked well together, and until the mishap, were rocking the course and were on pace for a very fast race, and a well deserved win. But adventure racing sometimes throws you a curve to humble you, and so we live to race another day. When is that day? Jan 15-17th in Georgia where we will try to take the first Checkpoint Tracker points away from Granite AR and Nuun. We have our work cut out for us, but we feel we are ready to rock. 2010 here we come, whether your ready for us or not. See you there!


cheers!

Earring Doug Judson-Team Captain of Tecnu Extreme/StaphAseptic adventure racing