By Jesse Adams
Three days' worth of clothes. Check. An abundance of iPads, GPS devices, laptops, GoPro cameras and a tangle of 12-volt cabling to power them. Check. One Jaguar F-Type. Check. You can try all you want to be prepared for the Cannonball Run but the fact is, you go in blind.
It's our second year contesting this supercar-riddled charity event, so we're not exactly newbies, but everything about where we're going, what we're doing and how much cash will be required to get there is kept very secret. It makes for a helpless feeling.
Day one is done and dusted, and I'm writing this from a hotel room in Swaziland... but until about an hour ago I had no idea where I'd be sleeping tonight.
Jaguar South Africa has kindly lent us its new roadster and sponsored our run, after a successful Cannonball Run 2012 - apparently it sold at least one car because of our antics last year in an XKR-S).
EXOTIC METAL
I'm again teamed up with Sunday Times motoring hack Thomas Falkiner which is a good thing because his driving skills are up to snuff, but a bad thing because he ate a broccoli noodle dish for dinner last night. The F-Type's cabin is rather confined if you get my drift. Or his.
This morning the entire convoy of exotic metal - about 32 cars worth at least R32 million - met at Zwartkops Raceway near Pretoria. That was our only instruction going into Cannonball Run Africa 2013. Of course some hot laps ensued, and much to our better-endowed (kilowatt-wise) competition's surprise we went quickest with a 1minute 13.1second lap.
That was two full seconds better than the second-place Mercedes SLS and three from the Nissan GT-R in third. A fleet of Audi R8s, 911 Turbos and Maserati Gran Turismos followed from there. Did I mention our F-Type is the middle-spec V6S model and not the flagship V8?
CRYPTIC CLUES
Some well-heeled rivals have already eyed out the F-Type for possible garage additions. We'll take at least some credit for that.
Unfortunately for us the Cannonball is not entirely about full-taps track sessions; there are also plenty of cryptic road books and scavenger hunts between numerous checkpoints. Needless to say Tom and I didn't fare as well in this department and our early points lead quickly disintegrated after a series of wrong turns, missed clues and many hundreds of kilometres in wrong directions.
Somehow our Jaguar still managed to sniff its way to all the first day's mandatory waypoints, and we regained some points log composure with second place in a gymkhana, and even sixth in a wheelchair race.
SECRET DESTINATION
All these challenges were sprung upon us as we arrived at each pre-arranged, and secret destination. Same can be said for our Swazi overnight which, as mentioned, we only found out about a little while ago.
More Cannonball Run Africa 2013 challenges are in store on Friday and Saturday, and we'll keep you updated daily with the goings on. But first, some air fresheners for the Jag.... - Star Motoring
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The Cannonball Run Africa, now in its 11th year, is a charity-driven supercar tour organised by the Round Table. All funds generated by the Run are donated to the QuadPara Association of South Africa and to date the Cannonball Run has raised hundreds of thousands of rand.