The pub with no barman …..

As the XPD crew poured into Tintaldra yesterday the guys from Caffeinated were not going to let a good pub meal pass by. They wandered down to have a quiet word to the publicans that there would be 150 hungry adventure racers and staff in town tonight all looking for a hot meal.

I think it may have been quite some time since this small town country pub (town population 20) had seen so many people, but the publican took it in her stride, pouring herself an 11:00am sherry and then taking a few moments (and another sherry or two) to figure out how she was possibly going to feed us all.

After a whip around all of the freezers of the houses in the town she felt reasonably confident that none of us would go hungry.

Murray (team caffeinated) at the fear of not getting fed, put his event managers hat on, discussed capacity with the publican and began to sell tickets to the teams for the evening meal. $15 for a roast dinner - a bargain and a welcome change to race food!!

Staff was the next issue to overcome but team Caffeinated to the rescue again, swapping dinner for an evening behind the bar with Clayton and the guys working the bar and pulling beers all evening.

The bar was alive, the aussies got flogged by the kiwi’s in the football, to the joy of the NZ teams in the race and lots of stories of adventures were swapped from the last few days of racing.

A new style of racing may have just been born, expedition style racing with a mandatory 24 hour pub stop!