Team Alpine Avengers return to defend their title at the 2024 Rogue Raid.
After 24 hours of furious, muddy racing at the Rogue Raid, team Alpine Avengers crossed the finish line to reclaim the title of Rogue Raid champions, closely edging out team Thought Sports with a hard fought victory. Third place overall was taken by up-and-coming team Skillfull Tigers.
The Rogue Raid headed for the first time to the coastal village of Donnybrook with sponsorship support from the City of Moreton Bay. Despite early forecasts to the contrary, teams were greeted by wet weather which, while serving to keep the heat at bay made for a muddy parcours that only added to the challenge. Now in its fifteenth year, the 2024 Rogue Raid edition was an epic course with 86 optional check points in total spread over 236km of mountain biking, trekking and kayaking.
Teams poured off the start line for the first stage which involved a quick dash to the shoreline of Pumicestone passage followed by a long paddle south to the southern tip of Bribie Island, taking in a number of check points criss-crossing the passage and even into the canal systems. The varying route choice options which are a feature of the Rogue Raid were immediately evident on the first check point, with the field split in half taking two different directions to paddle to CP1. Teams had a roaring tide with them to take them south; however, the dropping tide did prove an additional challenge, exposing mud flats and sand banks that caught out many teams with less than optimal route choice. Coming off the kayak leg it was team Marginal Gains from the Gold Coast first into the transition area followed shortly by Thought Sports. An ultimately ill-advised route decision to run as opposed to kayak to one check point cost team Alpine Avengers valuable time on a discipline which would normally be their strength.
The second stage of the race was a trek loop around the forestry and deserted beaches on the southern tip of Bribie Island. Thought Sports managed to maintain the gap to Alpine Avengers on this stage, with the Skillfull Tigers managing to briefly move into the lead. Meanwhile, many different strategies played out throughout the rest of the race field, with some teams opting to drop the trek leg completely while others stayed out for much longer, wisely opting to delay the return kayak back through to HQ to make the most of the turning tide. At this stage we were also seeing significant route choice differences between the teams, with Thought Sports bee-lining for HQ while Alpine Avengers collected several additional check points on stage 3 with a few optional portages, but were on the leg for much longer. Interestingly, if you were to look at the points per hour at this stage, both teams were relatively on par.
Stage 4 saw teams hit the bikes for the first time, with the muddy weather and maze of forestry tracks of variable condition proving extra challenging. One of the crux stages in any Rogue Raid is the overnight trek leg, and this certainly proved true again in this year’s race. Teams were challenged with a highly lucrative stage with check points dashed around the base of a number of the Glasshouse Mountains imposing peaks which required solid navigation and ability to move over rough terrain to collect efficiently. A highlight of this stage was the coffee and sausage sizzle sponsored by Tiger Adventure (who had a large number of teams racing) to help soften the impacts of the challenging weather.
Stage 6 was the largest of the race, with up to 98km of mountain biking and 26 check points up for grabs. This stage was set to offer no single lucrative option for points, leaving teams free range to judge how much to go for before the final push home. Come dawn on the second day of racing, teams had just a single kayak leg followed by a short run around the Donnybrook township to finish off the race. Team Thought Sports had been running ahead on time from the Avengers, but with fewer CPs in the bag. They managed to sweep the final kayak and trek stage and come in to finish with no more course to chase but with 20 minutes still on the clock. It was then just a matter of seeing what the Alpine Avengers could pull off.
Looking back over the trackers with the function that allows you to run a replay from an arbitrary starting point on the course, the paddling speed difference between the Alpine Avengers and Thought Sports was clearly apparent with the Avengers having the clear edge. However, come the 24 hour mark and the Avengers had still not crossed the line, and had now entered into points penalty territory. Three minutes later, they punched the finish, and had done enough to hold off Thought Sports for a narrow 50 point victory. Skillfull Tigers picked up a small penalty for an out-of-bounds infringement which saw them relegated to third place overall. With the win, the Avengers not only retain their title but pick up a free entry to the Adventure 1 Asia World Cup race, Iron Bound, in Malaysia later this year.
It’s an old adage that a good rogaine course is set such that every check point is visited by at least one team, but no team visits every check point. This proved the case again for the 2024 Rogue Raid despite the massive scope of the course and the 86 check points up for grabs. Interestingly, both the Avengers and Thought Sports were tied at the top of the table on the same number of check points collected – 65 of the 86, with the variation in route choice proving the ultimate difference. Again, the Rogue Raid proves to be a race not just about speed, endurance and navigation, but also strategy and perseverance. Check out the full set of results including leaderboard, race maps, tracking replay, photos and more here.
A big thank you to all of the teams who supported the race. A turn out of over 160 competitors across the 24 hour and 6 hour events is a mark of the popularity of this event. These races are run on the back of many volunteers who are out there manning transition areas, collecting check points and generally looking out for teams, so thank you to them along with event sponsors the City of Moreton Bay. We can now turn our heads towards the next big Rogue race: the Raid 100 set for 4-9 May, 2025. Full details to be posted when entries open in July here: https://raidadventures.com/the-raid-100/ – It’s never too early to get excited right?