Del Lloyd
Del is the token female on the TORQ adventure team. Every premier category Adventure Racing team must include a female. This one is a bit of a bossy boots, but knows what she’s doing so usually gets away with it…
Starting Adventure Racing was a fortunate accident; a result of being a tad gullible, and incapable of saying “no”. I bid my triathlon ambitions goodbye after my first AR in 2003, and never looked back. We can’t always choose what inspires us, and “why do you do it?” remains a tricky question. The thrill of adversity, unique and unknown challenges faced in each adventure race remains my best explanation. My strengths as an adventure racer include a scary resilience to sleep deprivation, a stomach which tolerates almost anything, and an appetite equal to the rest of the team put together! I truly love team racing; particularly the camaraderie and the challenges of remaining within 100m of each other at all times! In recent years I have committed my training specifically to racing at the highest level in Adventure racing. My career highlights include wins at the 2007 Keen Adventure Race (5 days), Mark Webber Challenge (6 days) and 1st Solo Female Upper Murray Challenge 2005 & 2006. Like Luke, I hold my 2006 NZ Coast to Coast crossing among my proudest achievements, and long to be able to get back for another crack at it. Paddling from Victoria to Tasmania is also on my ‘to do list’. 5 mins in the shoes of Team Keen TORQers goes like this… “You got the map? Uh? How far Lukie? Food anyone? You got any nutella Stew? What bearing are we supposed to be on? You sure? Ugh that stinks Sooty! Hey come back............”
Scariest AR moment - Paddling at GeoQuest in 2006 was awful; at one point in the middle of the night at about 40 hours of racing we were all tired and exhausted and we were trying to paddle home against the current. One of my team mates had hypothermia, one was hallucinating about fairies and swimmers coming after us, and our navigator was asleep. I paddled as hard as I have ever, but there was nothing I could do, and I really didn’t know if we would make it back.
Other hobbies and interests include coffee shop surveillance: an apple scroll connoisseur, bad violinist, passionate horse rider. President of Melbourne Adventure Club – expert late night e-mailer.
Pet hates? Packing, march flies, leeches, getting lost, hike a bike, unpacking.
Where’s that accent from? I grew up in a small Welsh town called Llantrisant. Sadly no one there has ever heard of Adventure Racing. These days Melbourne is home.. too many boats/bikes/gear to contemplate moving!
Favourite place/location in the world? Generally any sort of wilderness is good. I spent a lot of time in the NT Tanami Desert when I first came to Australia. Great sunsets and night skies.
Favourite TORQ product? I actually think I could live entirely on Raspberry and Apple bars if necessary. I’ll be testing that theory in August’s 10 day race!