Junior Hotshot Joins Sporting Legends for Gold Coast Anaconda Adventure Race

In a move that shows their support for up and coming junior athletes, Guy Leech’s sporting legends team at this year’s Anaconda Adventure Race at the Gold Coast will be joined by a 16 year old hotshot mountain biker for the grueling event on September 11.

Although all are retired from professional racing, the Legends Team includes some very formidable names when it comes to surf sports and triathlon with the likes of Guy Leech, Brad ‘The Croc’ Bevan and Gold Coast local Phil Clayton all teaming up to complete one leg each of the renowned Anaconda Adventure Race. All athletes were national and world champions in their chosen sports throughout the 80’s, 90’s and early 2000’s with surf life saving, ironman and triathlon trophies resting in each of their cabinets at home.

The team was one man down for the multi discipline Anaconda Adventure Race with Clayton set to complete the 1.9km swim leg, Leech the 15km paddle leg and Bevan the 12.5km run leg, but they still needed a cyclist to tackle the 18km mountain bike leg to complete their entry and get all the way around the course – and that’s where Rodger Pogson-Manning stepped up to the plate.

Rodger is aged 16, comes from Noosa, has been riding his mountain bike for two and a half years and has showed enough talent to be recruited by the formidable Ay Up Racing team. He says he’s as ready as ever to race with these legends. “I’m really stoked to be asked to join a team with these guys. I look forward to meeting them and learning what I can from them,” Pogson commented after joining the team. “I’m happy with how I am going at the moment and am thinking that I could go alright on the MTB leg of the race”.

Despite not even being born when they were winning races on the world stage, Pogson-Manning has been making his mark in the local mountain bike racing scene with some impressive results of his own with a recent 3^rd place overall in the Merida 50km Pursuit earlier in August. He trains on either his mountain bike or road bike 5-6 times a week and says that since a friend introduced him to mountain biking a couple of years ago he just can’t get enough of it. He also admits that he has never done an adventure race before so will be relying on his team mate’s experience when it comes to tackling the Anaconda in September.

Leech and Bevan completed in the Gold Coast race as a 2 man team last year where they placed 7^th but upped their performance at the Forster Anaconda Adventure Race where they wound back the clock, beating all comers - including some in their teens - to win the 114km combined teams’ race over two days.“That makes it sweeter,” Bevan said at the time of beating the youngsters. “I don’t think either of us had done something like that before. Going into it, it was a bit of an unknown. It was great to team up with Guy.”

“The competitors on the Gold Coast are definitely a higher standard of athlete and are better swimmers and ski paddlers due to all the surf clubs. It was a suffer fest for me as I was up against ex-Olympians and people in teams of four. I just want to represent the 40 something and do well,” comments Guy when thinking ahead to this year’s edition of the race.
Hundreds of other adventure racers young and not so young will descend on the Gold Coast’s beaches and hinterland jungles on 11 September for what is the second hit-out of the four-race Anaconda Adventure Race National Series.
Starting on the golden sands of Palm Beach at Currumbin Alley, competitors in the Gold Coast event will swim in the Currumbin Creek and Pacific Ocean; paddle along the coast and up the Tallebudgera River; run through creeks, over the mighty Trees Road hill and down rough and tumble tracks in the rainforest; and finally mountain bike along rolling single track on the NSW / QLD border back to the finish line on the coast.

The event also includes the renowned Anaconda Junior Survivor for kids, an adventure expo of sponsors stands and displays, food, drinks, entertainment and fun for the whole family so if you’re competing or not why not come down and watch all the action. www.anacondaadventurerace.com 

11 September, 2011 - Anaconda Adventure Race, Palm Beach Parklands, Palm Beach, Gold Coast, QLD.
For further information, quotes and photography on this event, please e-mail chris@rapidascent.com.au