Tarquin Cooper joins the adventurers who run, cycle, kayak and navigate all over Britain
I'd like to think Christopher Columbus, the explorer, would be proud. Just a few miles south of Weybridge, in the midst of Surrey's suburbia, I have discovered a swamp - a proper, dank, bug-infested swamp.
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"Do you think they have any leeches here?" a doctor in the group asks. She is only half joking. It feels like we could be in the Amazon. Unfortunately I'm supposed to be in a car park, but my navigation skills are not up to much. I'm here to spend a day with Team Helly Hansen, one of Britain's top adventure racing teams, and explore this strange world where adventure meets extreme endurance.
Adventure racing might have been dreamt up by a masochist. Races are multi-discipline events in which mixed teams run, mountain-bike and kayak around remote locations, navigating between checkpoints with a map and compass and eating only the high-energy supplies they can carry on their backs.
Some races last a few hours and are shorter than a marathon; others last several days, have no stops for sleep and cover up to 600 miles. Additional elements can include climbing, canyoning, sea-kayaking and abseiling.
In the past few years, hundreds of these races have sprung up in Britain. "Triathlons and marathons are personal and you're perhaps trying for a personal best," says Jim Mee, managing director of Detail Events, which organises the biggest races in Britain.
"Adventure races are not based on pure physicality, they're also mentally engaging." And, claims Mee, anyone can get involved. "At our events, you get competitive triathletes and armchair adventurers who just want to give it a go."
Among the most popular events are the Rat Races, which take place in urban settings. At last year's London event, competitors ran and cycled around the capital, abseiled off Twickenham Stadium, canoed in the Thames and ate jellied eels.
For Howard Lowe, 32-year-old captain of Team Helly Hansen, part of the sport's appeal is that it takes participants to places they wouldn't normally visit. "How often do you see the sun rise on a mountain at 5am?" he asks.
In the past few years, events have led him to New Zealand, Canada, Slovenia and all the wildest parts of Britain. "One of my highlights was paddling from the Isle of Rum [in the west of Scotland] to the mainland last year. It was very rough, lots of water in your face. Then suddenly there was blue sky, we were in a sheltered spot and it felt like the South Pacific."
Alas, when I am put through my paces and capsize my kayak in the Thames, it feels more like the glacial Arctic, only less drinkable.
In a race, competitors don't stop between stages, and nor do I. As I get out of the water, Howard straps the kayak onto a makeshift trolley, then I run back to our base at Weybridge Health Club pulling it behind me.
Tough enough, but at the top end of the sport it's common for teams to not sleep for days on end and experience hallucinations - or "sleep monsters", as they are known in the community.
Can it really be fun? "In the face of adversity we have a good laugh," says team member Nicola MacLeod, 29, an Army doctor. "It's a laugh or cry thing."
She adds that adventure racing is a sport where women, who comprise a third of British racers, are just as good as men. "Women are known to have a higher pain threshold than men. We do well at sleep deprivation. We have that mental ability to carry on."
Lowe adds: "It's really satisfying to complete a journey as a team. It's funny but afterwards the pain quickly dies away and you only remember the fantastic parts."
In the space of a few hours I've paddled a glorious section of the Thames, ridden and run around some woods - and it has been great fun. Whether I've learnt enough to complete a full adventure race remains to be seen.
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