i think the actor bloke would be dead if he had showed up

Worst tactics I've ever seen: hubris, misguided heroics, short sited, machismo. classic brit tail of woe"

It's TV, that's what they do on TV. If they all coped perfectly, got on fine and had no problems it'd be boring TV (for some viewers at least).

Results….

Missing Link 19:03, 21st January – 17 days 8 hours 58 minutes

QinetiQ 15:15, 22nd January – 18 days 5 hours 10 minutes

Danske Bank 17:00, 24th January – 20 days 6 hours 55 minutes

Due South 16:10, 26th January – 22 days 6 hours 5 minutes

South Pole Flag 22:09, January – 22 days 12 hours 4 minutes

So in the end the Norwegians were 20 hours ahead – would love to know what sort of condition they were in & how they managed it given the punishing schedule the tv people took on.
Would've been interesting as well to see how the 'slower' teams managed themselves as well. Perhaps the doc would've worked a little better if it gave an rough overview of the whole race rather than concentrating 100% on fogle etc..

Worst tactics I've ever seen: hubris, misguided heroics, short sited, machismo. classic brit tail of woe

That may be true, but if they did everything wrong, and still came 2nd only to an incredibly strong pair of ex special-forces polar travel experts, that blogger could have given them at least a "PS: hats off!" I'd have thought.

And no matter how much Andy KP has done, I'd be surprised if he wasn't a weenie bit jealous, if only because of the thought of how much better he could have done, with his better knowledge of expedition racing tactics.

I'm sceptical about these televised "adventures".

There's Gear Brylls hanging from his fingernails telling you how dangerous and remote this is and we forget that there's a guy doing the same thing a few feet away, and he's also running the camera and sound, but it's just his job.

Not to mention the rest of the support team.

As for a Race to the Pole, there was never any danger of serious consequences with the backup they had.

Cracknell's ability to push on regardless of his own discomfort is probably a real asset when he's in pain in the final of an olympic rowing event. In the context of an endurance event, it appeared as more of a liability, causing him to make basic errors of judgement that resulted in a deteriorating performance.

I caught two of these when i was in the UK. It was interesting to watch. I looked at it from my experience of expedition length AR racing – mostly at or near the pointy end of the field. I saw lots of familiar traits and decision making processes going on. As quoted above errors of judgement start to go on a sliding scale in long distance/endurance racing of that type – ultimately decisions are made that are so poor someone can pay the ultimate price. Some friends were involved in a race where exactly that happened – fatigue, "race pace", poor checkpoint placement, bad decision = in that case a death.
I've been involved in situations where we have had to make marginal decisions to either stay in the hunt at some detriment to someones health or step back and manage the situation. Adding in the cold and conditions they were in its impossible to criticise them for the way they acted. Maybe if you;ve done it or raced 990K in 5 days with 4 hours sleep you can comment with authority. But i take my hat off to them treating it like a race and actually racing as opposed to finishing.

its impossible to criticise them for the way they acted.

But the point being was that it was Cracknell making almost all the bad decisions, treating his team-mates with contempt, putting himself and the rest of the team at risk.

Yes the others made some bad decisions, but Cracknell made way too many (judging by the edit and subsequent interviews to camera).

I think others have made the same point, but I guess the things that make Cracknell such a brilliant 2000m rower are perhaps not the ideal character traits for a long distance expedition.

Interesting series though

Adding in the cold and conditions they were in its impossible to criticise them for the way they acted. Maybe if you;ve done it or raced 990K in 5 days with 4 hours sleep you can comment with authority.

Yes because you can only have an opinion on things when you have done them yourself to the same level. Hence why only people who have played football professionally ever comment on football threads.

Gentlemen and Ladies,

It would appear you watched a different series to me.
The one I watched was about antarctic travel. Not arctic travel.

Well done to them!!

The team dynamics were spot on!

Cracknall needs to MTFD

I was secretly hoping that James Cracknell would accidentally die as Beverley Turner would then be back on the market.

Yummy

Would love to know how the Missing Link team managed to beat them by such a margin… <wanders off to google>.

Anyone speak norwegian and care to translate? http://www.missinglink.no/content/view/57/55/

Would have been nice to find out more about how the blind guy got on….

Having played around with google translation, the daily entries from the Norwegians sound a heck of a lot less (melo)dramatic than Team Qinetic documentary.

Would have been nice to find out more about how the blind guy got on….

I forgot about him – anyone know?

I think people are forgetting Missing Link were/are Norwegian special forces that spend their entire lives in similar conditions, this was probably just a literal walk in the park for them…

I think James and Ed did really well to hold back and not descend into petty slagging or fighting. We have no idea the levels of exhaustion these guys must have been dealing with on a day to day basis and to not crack completely at some point is amazing. A couple of hissy fits after 20 odd days of racing really is bugger all in the grand scheme of things. They all went into it knowing what Cracknell was like and would have been breifed by the support crewe to try and riegn him back from total self destruction. I blame Ed and Fogle for being too weak to stand up to him – they should have done a damn site more than just make a couple of suggestions then bitch about it to the camera when Cracknell had ignored them and kept walking.

Good series though.

great that cracknel was proved to be a bit of an idiot, hope that it stops mrs mt going weak at the knees whenever he's on the the telly or in the newspaper. Think thy all did well though, after all none of us is perfect and under pressure the bad stuff in us can be worse. Fell sorry for the doc chappy working on those smelly feet of the others. Who did all the filming while they we all in frame?

Who did all the filming while they we all in frame?

I reckon all that stuff will have been done in camp and edited in.

I think it was in the telegraph yesterday but a film crew dropped by for an hour or two every four to five days, hence the footage of cracknell breaking down and wandering off into crevace land…

I think it was in the telegraph yesterday but a film crew dropped by for an hour or two every four to five days, hence the footage of cracknell breaking down and wandering off into crevace land…

Ahhhhhhh!

who would you pick, of the 3, to be with on an epic bike ride that goes wrong. something like heavy fog descending on a cross fell and getting lost or injured. without any doubt i would prefer to have Dr. Ed there. i don't think i could even be a mate of cracknell, based on how he came across on the programme.

I think people are forgetting Missing Link were/are Norwegian special forces that spend their entire lives in similar conditions, this was probably just a literal walk in the park for them…

Wish they had made a programme about them instead of 'celebrities' like Fogle. I might have watched it then.

Wish they had made a programme about them instead of 'celebrities' like Fogle

You might want to watch out for this then… CLICKY

Just a bloke, riding a bike. The first series he did (world record solo around the world on a bike attempt) was fantastic.

this is it, quite interesting…

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/5901936/James-Cracknell-I-broke-down—and-I-cant-bear-to-watch.html

That was a great link bigdawg – cheers 🙂

comment with authority.

Yes because you can only have an opinion on things when you have done them yourself to the same level. Hence why only people who have played football professionally ever comment on football threads.

As you can see thats not what i said – the bit "with authority" was the clue.
Taking your pish analogy, i can wnk on about football however if someone who has played professional football states his experience then he is doing so based on some more knowledge than i would ever have as a desk jockey. That was my point.
Anyone can comment however i think its fair to say that unless you have actually experienced something like it then you are speculating. Thats was my point i suppose.

and great link bigdawg