Castrol Extreme Adventure

Off Roading the Carpatian Mountains

 

The month of July brought with it a large number of off road events, in the Carpathians. To be noted, among these, are the Transilvania Adventure Trophy, now in it’s 10th edition, The Castrol Extreme Adventure a week later but also Red Bull Romaniacs – off our 4x4 charts, dedicated only to extreme enduro motorbikes but certainly worth a visit at a trial stage.

The Castrol Extreme Adventure (previously known as the Romanian Extreme Adventure) has set itself up for a real big name due to its difficulty and range, during the last few years. It has been deemed the most extreme week of all wheel off road in Romania and it stands to reason that the rumors be based on facts.

The camp in the Carpathians was home to a large group of participants, both Romanian and foreign. Since the Redbull Romaniacs was in the same period, huge names from the enduro world checked into the event, names like Graham Jarvis or Laszlo Olah – who also climbed the podium in first and second places.

The Auto section, as everyone’s already been accustomed to, span over mountains, forests and rivers, putting car and driver to the test. The first day invited the auto classes to an easy track, design to accommodate everyone with the following days, 65 kilometers for Extreme and Open classes, and 103 for Standard.

The first problems appeared with the Extreme class team Miko and Fiko Istvan, who have had some problems along the way and were late in checking into the control points along the way. The day was won by Robert Tutuianu/Dan Coroama who will later occupy the third overall position in the week-long race. Finally Fiko and Miko, leaders in the national off road championship, managed to get to the finish line with a two hour time loss. This was due to the two flat tires they had which took a long time to fix in the given conditions.

The second day would take the competitors on a winding 55 km of Extreme tracks and 62 kilometers on the Open class. In the first half of the track, the well-prepared buggy driven by Andrei Museteanu abandoned and was retrieved by the assistance team. Things got more difficult along the way as the rain that was announced “light, in the morning” turned into a heavy downfall. The first teams to reach the Extreme class finish line were Miko and Fiko, followed by Robert Tutuianu and Dan Coroama, two hours later. After this, the route was modified due to weather conditions. The organizers decided to shorten the tracks by 30 kilometers, due to the fact that the 1.2 km loop that was given saw competitors spending more than 5 hours digging the trucks out. Teams were still stuck there overnight while HQ struggled to inform everyone that the path is a known bear territory. At 9 pm, recovery teams set out to close the tracks and bring everyone into camp. Open class had the same issue with a 700 meter loop, which was crossed in almost six hours. This led to a shortening of the tracks of about 40 kilometers.

In the third day, the tracks kept their lengths, while the Standard class went up to 150 kilometers of tracks. Today’s route took all competitors, both auto and moto, to a height of approximately 1770 meters. This day, however, was not without problems. Fiko and Miko encountered a brake failure just after starting, which took time to fix – eventually, they were the first to reach the finish line.

The following day, 6 out of 16 cars in Open class managed to start the race. Of those left, two more abandoned due to technical problems with the vehicles, basically leaving just podium competitors, while other classes spent time fixing their rigs and getting ready for the last day of competition, which would also be one of the toughest. Turns out that this finals take a toll on yet another giant truck, the second US built buggy, driven by Bogdan Oprea. He abandoned due to technical difficulties. However, he was to compete in the trial stage in the last day, much like most of the competitors who managed to get their trucks going, put on a great show for one of the few sections where spectators were allowed to participate in and, of course, climb on the podium.

R.T.
4x4OffRoads.com

 

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