News

We made it! The lockdowns are over, and we’re thrilled to be back to bring you adventures and launch the third season of Adventure Cup Series. 

The first race of Adventure Cup Series 2021-2022, the Upper Murray Challenge starts this Saturday. The 16^thedition of the race will introduce two new features; a shorter novice course and live tracking to allow all spectators to follow this iconic event. Participants will complete a unique course set within multiple private properties that is not accessible to the general public starting in Khancoban NSW and finishing in Corryong Victoria. 

The race program>> 

The first Adventure Cup winners are officially Maria Plyashechko and James Pretto in female and male ranking accordingly. They both managed to accumulate the biggest amount of points based on results in three brutal multisport events:  Upper Murray Challenge, East Gippsland Challenge, and Grampians Challenge. 

The full ranking is here>> and we would like to congratulate all participants that took part in the inaugural edition of this unique Series. We hope you have achieved your goals whether it was to finish one leg of a single event, beat your best mate or get on the podium of all three challenges.

Melbournian Elizabeth Dornom and Albury’s Josh Roy claimed victory in the second season of Adventure Cup in the female and male categories respectively.

Elizabeth secured the lead after her convincing win in the Baw Baw Extreme race.

Josh has been a consistently strong performer during the whole Series. Achieving second place in Baw Baw Extreme allowed Josh to reach the top of the Series podium, while Newcastle-based Nathan Stewart achieved second position.  Nathan commented after the finish, that there are not many hills where he lives, therefore the Baw Baw race was extremely tough for him.

Sorcha had a great season of racing establishing herself as one of the strongest Australian multisport and adventure racing female athletes with convincing victory in the Grampians Challenge.  This is what she said after her race: 

“I have found myself going to the Grampians quite frequently for training because it’s close to where I’m living at the moment, it’s a beautiful place to go to on my days off and has the only hills of any degree I can get to within 2 hrs drive! So I was pretty excited when I found out AJ host a race there.

The race started with the run and I looked around at the start line and thought, “it’s going to be a hard day!” The field was strong. My vague race intention was to try to get a bit of a gap in the run, try not to lose too much time in the paddle and then go all out in the bike, as it’s my strength. 

After a hot week and fires threatening the race, East Gippsland switched on a ten degree day with pouring rain, which however, magically stopped by the time of the presentations. The overall majority of registered participants did not pull out of the challenge, gathering under the arch and tents, trying to stop shivering. 

In the male category the pressure was on, with Nathan Stewart coming to the race from Newcastle. The female category promised to be extremely competitive, with a rare occasion where both of the amazing Dornom sisters making it to the event. Local triathlete Alex Keith, Shelley Bambrook - bronze finisher of the Grampians Challenge 2019 and Lisa Dominguez - winner of the Grampians Challenge 2018, all hungry for the podium.

Daniel Jones, not a stranger to multisport and adventure racing podiums all around the world, confirmed his entry to Adventure Cup finale, Grampians Challenge. We welcome Daniel to the Grampians Challenge and here is a quick pre-race interview to introduce Daniel to those who don't know him yet

Just a quick Bio and AR racing highlights, what do you consider your main achievement?

After successful introduction of the Series in 2018-2019 we’re thrilled to launch the 2019-2020 season and announce the Victorian schedule for the upcoming season. 

The old and new events will be parts of the Series and once again the female and male winners will be announced at the prize-giving ceremony of the final event of the Series. 

The ranking is based on sum of points obtained at each race of the Series. All participants - relay, AR Duo and solo racers receive score at each race they finish.

I competed in my second ever X-Tri on the 23rd February this year at the Australian National Championships held in the beautiful surrounds of Lake Crackenback. I was looking forward to a cruisy race where I could just plod along and have fun with no pressure, as it wasn’t my normal sport of on-road triathlon.

We arrived at Lake Crackenback at 7 am when it was a chilly 2 degrees. Luckily it later warmed up to be a beautiful day. After setting up our gear in transition, we headed to a warm spot in the cafe for an early coffee while waiting for the race briefing and the start.