TRIBUTE TO NIGEL AYLOTT

Vale Nigel Aylott

Adventure Racer Extraordinaire

CLOSE to 1,000 people crowded in and around St. Marks church in Emerald, Victoria, to celebrate the life of Nigel Aylott. Nigel was an extraordinary rogainer, orienteer, paddler, ultra-distance runner and adventure racer. On September 21, in Washington State, US, whilst leading his Team AROC in 1st place in a 400-mile adventure race, the Subaru Primal Quest, Nigel was struck by a falling boulder and died instantly. Eight members of Nigel's team and an American team were using ropes to lower themselves during the trekking/orienteering segment when a boulder that weighed more than 135 kg came loose. Two other racers were injured. The Australian and American teams were leading the race, which involved hiking, biking and kayaking stages. The race, which was expected to last about 10 days, was halted after Nigel's death. Nigel, 38, was an experienced racer, finishing in the top three in 12 adventure races around the world. Nigel was best known for his running and rogaining. He held numerous Australian long distance running records and titles. He twice won the Australian Rogaining Championship, and was a former World Rogaining Champion. He also placed first in the Three Peaks yacht race in Tasmania in 2003, setting a course record in the process. His successful adventure-racing career included top-3 finishes in last year's Primal Quest race in California, the Eco-Challenge expedition race in Borneo in 2000, and the Southern Traverse race in New Zealand in 1999. Nigel was a business analyst for Telstra. Unstoppable; bulletproof – these are just some of the images held by friends and compatriots. Other descriptions were – highly inquisitive and intelligent; committed organizer; tireless volunteer. A champion who was always ready to assist lesser mortals, Nigel was one of the world’s best adventure racers. His passing leaves an enormous hole at the top of several extreme sports. Two tributes from friends say it all: “Nigel was a true Aussie in every sense of the word. Confident, passionate about sport, incredibly friendly and a bloody good adventure racer.” “Nige, you were always gentle, intelligent, funny, humble, lifeloving and just a damn good bloke.”

Nigel Aylott’s achievements read like a book.

Adventure Racing

• Primal Quest, Lake Tahoe, CA, 2nd place, 2003 • Wild Onion Urban Race, Chicago, 1st place, 2003 • EcoAdventure, Cairns 1st place, 2003 • Three Peaks yacht race, Tasmania, 1st place (course record), 2003 • Mountain Designs Geoquest, Sydney, 2nd place, 2003 • Arrow 24 Hour, Melbourne, 1st place, 2003 • Three Peaks yacht race, Tasmania, 1st place, 2002 • Arrow 24 Hour, Melbourne, 2nd place, 2001 • Three Peaks yacht race, Tasmania, 1st place, 2001 • Eco-Challenge Sabah, Borneo, 3rd place, 2000 • Southern Traverse, New Zealand, 1st mens team, 1999 • Thredbo Enduro, NSW, 2nd place three times

Other

• Oxfam Trailwalker, Melbourne, 1st place, 2004 • Oxfam TrailWalker, Sydney, 1st place, 2003 • Australian Rogaining Champion, 2001 & 2002 • Oxfam TrailWalker,1st Australian team, 2000 • World Rogaining Champion, Canada, 1998 • Victorian Rogaining Champion, Four times

Nigel in 1998 after winning the World Rogaining Championships near Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada.

Nigel’s Paddle

September 27, 2004

Gordon Wright (Primal Quest) Around a point, came the members of Teams AROC and Montrail. The flotilla quieted and organized more coherent parallel lines, forming a chute through which the athletes passed, singing “Wish You Were Here.” Our paddles were raised, and I got a wicked shock at the sight of what I swore was Nigel, paddling the lead kayak. It was Michael Aylott, Nigel’s brother, looking skilled and easy with a paddle in his hand. After they passed, we lowered our paddles and fell in line behind them, beaching the flotilla to quiet applause from hundreds gathered on the shore. It turns out that Nigel had been on the paddle after all. His ashes, inside a dry bag, were pulled from the hatch and carried to the finish line, where his mother waited. We sang; most of us cried a bit. Then we quietly dispersed into the morning, individually and collectively lost in remembrance and reflection.

Tributes

The following is a tribute from members of Nigel’s Team AROC:

Nigel once quoted “Everyman dies but not every man lives”. Nigel was definitely one who lived life to the fullest, last year taking a redundancy from a senior Telstra position to race and train full time. Nigel loved adventure racing and we loved adventure racing with Nigel. Adventure racing suited Nigel because there were just too many great things to see and do in the world for a single sport to satisfy him. Nigel loved competing. But whilst he loved to do well he was also happy to race with anyone, anytime and anywhere. Nigel just hated to miss out on anything. In July this year Nigel flew to Arizona, USA for the world rogaining championships – even though he didn’t have a partner yet. Team AROC was our adventure racing family and we always had a great time together. Our motto was “to have fun, enjoy life and find Nigel a wife”. We always had fun out there on the course. This year at the Subaru Primal Quest we had so many comments about what a great fun team we were and as a result there were so many people here barracking for us. Nigel was so many things in our team. He was the quirky one, sometimes just so annoying, sometimes so lovable, the one that told things just how he saw them. To quote condolence notes: “His capacity for extremes was phenomenal – he was so capable and strong and hard, yet so incredibly gentle and loyal to his friends” “The adventure racing community has lost one of the most humble, unassuming, inspiring, and world class adventure racers around. It is a truly great loss.” The best thing was that we loved Nigel for exactly who he was. As well he was a great team member. He was the packhorse that carried all the extra team gear. Always strong, always dependable. He was

Courtesy of Subaru Primal Quest. Photos by Holmstrom Photography Tim Holmstrom & Dan Campbell; Sherry Martin, and Michael Bitton.

tireless and so full of energy, the key to Team AROC’s success was our team and how well we got on.

And portion of a tribute from Vivienne Prince (TAS) gives an insight to Nigel’s sheer tenacity and endurance:

“The fantastic adventure race in the British Virgin Islands. We paddled into a hurricane, wore swim goggles kayaking, scuba dived where pirates treasure had been but your tenacity for locating checkpoints will never be forgotton. After leading us crawling through the same lot of dense cactus for the fifth time, you were actually crying and wimpering with pain and frustration, but still you wouldn't give up. "It's got to be here somewhere"! We went from the Carribean straight to minus 24degreesC in Sweden and spent hours dragging our bike boxes and trunks through the snow in the dark of night. No taxi would take us as we had too much gear. You loved the free Xmas dinner we had with the homeless, you could eat as much as you wanted. We all nearly froze alive trying to ski to Norway and you drove a skidoo through the ice in Finland. In Fiji we wore our life jackets for three days in the jungle trying to keep warm, then spent a horrible night huddled under our useless little pack-rafts on a muddy slope in the pouring rain because the river was too swollen to battle up any further. You kept assuring our hypothermic teammate in your irrepressible optimism "the checkpoints just around the next corner...." Nige, you are a legend in so many ways. You weren't scared paddling out the river mouth when the waves just kept coming bigger and bigger, you didn't know why the cargo ship kept sounding it's horn when you were trying to wash ride it in your Evolution, and you didn't understand why the cops kicked us out of the Burnley Tunnel when we tried to mountain bike through..... We will all miss you so much Nigel, but I thank you for giving everyone so much.”