Mar 15 2010
Keir finished the Atacama Crossing “4 deserts” race — 250 km across the Chilean desert.
We tracked him using a GPS Insight TT-1900, and here is the track of his entire journey:
GPS Track of Keir Oxley finishing a 250 km race in Chile
Here is a picture of him crossing the finish line:
Picture of Keir Oxley finishing a 250 km race in Chile
He finished in 64:13:23
Congratulations Keir!
Rob.
Mar 12 2010
Keir is still hiking across the harsh Chilean desert as we speak, tracked with a 5.9 oz. satellite tracker in his pack.
Keir hiking across the Chilean desert
Not to be outdone, I covered 40 miles today in the harsh wilderness myself, with only the assistance of 20 ski lifts, gravity, 2 skis and a couple of beers:
Ski tracking in Deer Valley at Park City UT
Just kidding, obviously a lot harder to walk 20-some miles across the desert than ski around a bunch. Maybe I should invite Keir next time…
Rob.
Mar 12 2010
Keir is doing well, in 112th place (out of 127 left in the race), and there are a LOT of people who have dropped out.
112th out of 127 left in the race
The site says he has raced for just shy of 40 hours. We are tracking him every hour with a GPS Insight TT-1900.
I ran a track like this:
GPS Track of Keir across a Chilean desert
And see where he’s gone (roughly — we update once an hour):
GPS Track of Keir across a Chilean desert
This shows 94.2 miles, but it’s been more than that, since he’s not racing in a straight line.
Good luck Keir! He’s got 1 more 25 mile day, then a 50 some mile day tomorrow to complete this race, his second Racing the Planet race.
Rob.
Oct 30 2009
Apparently the hard 57+ mile “day” (40 hours allowed) of Keir’s Sahara race is over. Here was yesterday’s GPS track. Our device which only reports every 1 hour shows 48 miles, but he really went 57 — this is because of the “as the crow flies” way we’re determining distance. Our vehicle tracking devices (vs. satellite based asset tracking devices) don’t have this issue — they are as accurate as an odometer.
Hard part done with the Sahara Race
Now it’s just 10 more miles to go — apparently they do this so most competitors can cross the finish line roughly at the same time. He’s still in 70th of 95 competitors. (125 started & 30 have had to leave the race)
Here is a total track of how far Keir’s gone, using the lightweight Satellite tracking device in his pack (with yesterday standing out):
GPS Tracking of Sahara Race
Congratulations Keir!
Of course, my wife, kids, & I probably walked close to that long yesterday at Disney:
People Tracking at Disneyland using GPS Insight EZ-1000
Our dogs are barking!…
Rob.
Oct 29 2009
My brother in law Keir has covered over 30 of the total 54 miles for today as of 9:15 PST. This final 5th stage requires him to go 54 miles in 40 hours.
Here’s a picture of what we’ve tracked so far since he left Base Camp 5:
GPS Tracking Keir across the Sahara
Rob.
Oct 27 2009
My Brother in Law Keir Oxley is half-way through the 162 mile long Sahara Race.
He’s in 70th place (they started with 125 and are down to 96 at this point).
Here is a shot of their route so far & all of the base camps they’ve had:
GPS Tracking in the Sahara Desert
I think our Driver Efficiency Report would have something to say about their route of choice…
Here is a screenshot of Egypt & the tiny area they’re in, which is a 75 mile trek covering 30 actual miles so far:
Tiny area of Egypt the race takes place in
And here are the rankings — Go Keir!
Racing the Planet Sahara Race standings for stage 3
Rob
Oct 26 2009
I guess my assumption that they would have a destination (e.g. the Nile River which was 162 miles away from base camp) was invalid. In the past 2 days, my brother in law Keir has been on a race through the Sahara, but they are just running around a track with no real direction:
Running around the Sahara
They’ve only gone 16.6 miles away from base camp, although they will have finished up with 49 miles of racing by the end of today (probably a couple more hours).
Today is a 28 mile day and a half hour ago Keir had gone 21.1 miles, as the crow flies, with one hour updates, which understates mileage by probably 8%. This means he should be done in the next 2-3 hours hopefully.
Tracking Keir across the desert with GPS Insight GPS Tracking
I’ll keep putting tracks up on the blog for interested people (e.g. Keir’s relatives…).
Interesting to see this type of tracking though — it is not the typical “where’s my driver” stuff.
Rob.
Oct 25 2009
I was curious when Keir, my brother in law racing 162 miles across the desert, would get started today, so I put an alert on his tracking device and built a quick geofence around his “base camp.”
GPS Tracking Geofence around Egypt Base Camp
Then I created an alert to let me (and his wife/parents in law) know when he got moving in the morning (down to the hour — the device only transmits to the satellites every hour since it costs around $.25 per “ping” and it probably doesn’t matter much to us which exact route he takes through the God Forsaken Desert):
Geofence Alert for Keir's Satellite Tracking Device leaving Base Camp
Then I got the email (I didn’t send myself a text message since it would wake me up in the middle of the night):
It went off at 12:14 AM local time, and Egypt is 9 hours ahead of us so they must have started between 8 and 9 AM local time. Here’s the alert I received:
GPS Tracking alert
And a quick image of his trek so far — I think they do 26 miles a day (a marathon a day until they do 162 miles). He had done 19.7 miles so far today so far, and is averaging around 2.6 miles per hour. That means a couple more hours I would imagine.
Hiking across the Sahara Desert with GPS Insight satellite tracking
Makes me tired just thinking about it. Actually, I think I’ll go for a run this morning, but a lot shorter and a lot cooler than this one.
Rob.
Oct 24 2009
My brother in law Keir Oxley starts a 162 mile race across the Sahara tomorrow. (This is the same brother in law who almost got me killed scaling the wrong part of Camelback Mountain 15 years ago…)
Here are 2 pics from the last race:
Egypt Race tracked by GPS Insight
Egypt Race tracked by GPS Insight
He wanted to be able to “show” the family and friends his progress and asked for a tracking device. We have a perfect one for that, the TT-1900 (we don’t really advertise it much — it’s a tiny version of the TT-2000/2100).
He needed it light, battery operated, and satellite capable.
We programmed one up for 1 hour updates, and sent it to him.
I gave them a login & password, but didn’t want everyone in the world using it, so I also created (using “customer sites“) the following link: http://www.gpsinsight.com/egypt — it took 1 minute.
For iPhone & Google Mobile Map users, they can “search” and see Keir’s location by entering/refreshing http://gps-i.com/k/oxley/1778.kml
Anyway, this is a pretty interesting new use for GPS Insight devices. The TT-1900 is intended for container tracking and is waterproof, heat-proof (well, we’ll see how it works in the Sahara Desert…), and works on satellite networks across the world.
It only weighs 5.9 ounces so it won’t be difficult to lug 162 miles across the desert over 7 days. It’s rated to 212 degrees F & Keir said it was 122 today — 90 F to spare.
GPS Insight Satellite Tracking unit TT-1900
I’m guessing they’re hiking to the Nile river — it’s exactly 162 miles from where they are right now, & they start soon.
Hiking across half of Egypt being GPS tracked by GPS Insight
Keir is doing this A) to prove he can do it and B) to raise money for poor African schools — if you are interested in saving schools from being destroyed by elephants by helping to purchase a fence for them, feel free do so in Keir’s name here: http://www.asanteafrica.org/donate.html#online
If you feel compelled to buy GPS Tracking devices for your company based on your love for Keir & his cause, we’ll donate 10% to Asante Africa.
Have fun & be safe Keir!
Here is a link to Keir’s online blog from the race — they have an opportunity to use satellite internet to update this once a day.
Rob.
