Secondary Schools Outdoor Adventure Race Finals

7 May 2013

Secondary Schools Outdoor Adventure Race Finals About to Get Underway

Teams from around New Zealand and one from Australia will assemble at the Sir Edmund Hillary Outdoor Pursuits Centre (OPC) in Tongariro next week for the Genesis Energy Hillary Challenge finals, regarded as the toughest teenage outdoor adventure race on the secondary school sporting calendar.

Taranaki teams have dominated the event with New Plymouth Boys and Girls High seven-time champions, but beaten last year by neighbouring Opunake High. Sixty teams have been through North and South Island elimination rounds. Just 12 teams of eight (four boys and four girls) per team have made it through to the final.

Guest international team, St Leonard’s College in Melbourne, is the reigning Australian secondary schools champion team, where the event is becoming increasingly popular.

The intense five-day event starts with 12 one-hour-long problem-solving challenges, testing outdoor skills on land and water. Days three and four involve a 20 hour, 60 to 70 kilometre rogaine/bush navigation challenge, with over 80 checkpoints to find on mountain tracks and valleys.

The final day is a multi-sport challenge of canoeing/kayaking, mountain biking and trail running, over a 50 to 60 kilometre bush course. The teams accumulate points for the time taken and challenges met involving physical fitness, mental acumen and teamwork.

“Training and fundraising for the event usually starts eight to twelve months before the final with the teams putting in hundreds of hours of training, on their mountain bikes, running in the bush and practicing vital navigation and problem solving skills” says event manager Darren Ashmore of OPC.

“We’ve heard stories where starry first fifteen rugby players can’t hack the endurance element, the cold, the rain and the wind and find the Hillary Challenge too tough,” he said. “Winning the event is an enormous source of pride and win or lose, it’s an epic week building confidence, camaraderie and mental determination that will remain with them for their lifetime.”

Ashmore says the current junior world orienteering champion is a former Hillary Challenge racer and a number of past students have gone on to represent NZ in mountain biking and orienteering.

This year’s teams are –
• Opunake High (reigning champions)
• New Plymouth Boys and Girls High (2nd last year and seven-time champions)
• Whangarei Boys and Girls High (3rd last year)
• Cambridge High (4th last year)
• Middleton Grange, Christchurch (5th last year) – have won once before in 2010
• Trident High School, Whakatane
• Thames High
• Auckland Grammar/St Cuthbert’s – have won once before in 2008
• Onslow College/Wellington Girls
• Waimea College, Nelson
• MacKenzie College, Fairlie
• St Leonard’s College, Melbourne (reigning Hillary Challenge Australia champions)

www.opc.org.nz.

ENDS

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