Icebreaker - Pure Merino

Jordan Pearson recently completed the Speight’s Coast to Coast, racing a gruelling 243 km’s from New Zealand’s West to East Coast, crossing the mighty Southern Alps and some of our merino country in the process. An Icebreaker sponsored athlete, Jordan put our GT Baselayers to the ultimate test.

“My first Speight’s Coast to Coast went better than expected with great results in all of my sections. My school team finished 3rd in the 2 Day School Boys section.

On the beach I received a lot of media attention in my R&R Sport kit, a bright yellow school team race bib with Icebreaker tattoos on my face. The race began well with an average run placing me in the third bunch up the road. Ok but the bunch wasn’t working well together so using my awesome Giant TCR Advanced I made the jump up to the second bunch. However, this bunch wasn’t working well together either, so when I got the chance I made a break up to the first bunch. With about 20km to go on the first ride, the individuals expected the team members to tow them to the run transition. This left me pulling along the first bunch without help. I soon got sick of towing them along so I broke away seeing if I could catch Steve Gurney. I didn’t quite catch him before the transition but still good enough to be 5th overall into transition giving my team runner a five minute lead over the other school boy teams. After a decent run by my team mate, we were still placed third, 20 minutes behind second place. A good day 1.

Day 2 began well, with Steve Gurney, Olivia Spencer-Bower and Kate Cambie in my start group. Steve and I charged through the bike catching other competitors easily as we worked together to Mt White Bridge. I was really pleased to actually lead Gurney while running down to the kayak. My Icebreaker GT layers were ideal for the paddle through the higher than normal gorge. Took a few waves over the bow but great fun and fast! The kayak was going well until just before Woodstock where the wind picked up to almost impossible conditions for paddling. Thanks to the wind and my relative light weight I had several swims which lost me at least 40 minutes. Even the elites and heavier paddlers were having major issues with the wind. After a fast transition, my team mate was flying down the final cycle until 2 punctures ended any chance of moving in to second place, crossing the line in an overall time of 14:10:00.

Overall, the race went well with only a few glitches. Thanks to Icebreaker for the merino layers.”

- Jordan Pearson, Icebreaker Sponsored Athlete

After our wonderful sailing experience my family and I spent some time on the island of Crete. My dad decided it would be a fun idea to walk the Samaria Gorge – the longest gorge in Europe.

The gorge is 16 km long, starting at an altitude of 1,250m at the northern entrance, and ending at the shores of the Libyan Sea in Agia Roumeli.

Dressed in Icebreaker GT and Superfine, the family was all geared up to tackle the gorge – we had convinced ourselves it was nothing more than a “walk in the park”. Everything we read said you only needed a medium level of fitness, there was a well worn “footpath” to the end, and as it was all downhill it wasn’t very strenuous. I mean, we had all done the Tongariro Crossing, this would be a piece of cake – right?

WRONG! The guide on the bus had warned us – if you are having any knee pain within the first 4km, then turn back…it’s only going to get worse. At the 4km mark, after a very steep descent, I had rolled both of my weak ankles numerous times, and my left knee felt like it was facing the wrong way. I then started favouring my right knee, which started feeling the strain very quickly!

The terrain was definitely not what I would describe as a well worn footpath – more of an uneven rocky stony trail – often there wasn’t a trail to follow and you made it up yourself.

The hardest part was trying to beat the heat. We started the gorge at 8am but were advised to try and finish before pm as the last 3km were exposed. With temperatures in the high 30′s, walking in the blazing sun was to be avoided – so keeping a fast pace became essential.

We had a quick stop at the half way point, the ancient village of Samaria where we lunched with the Kri-Kri’s – Cretan goats that are only found in that area.

We made it through the most famous part of the gorge, the Iron Gates, where the sides of the gorge close in to a width of only four meters and soar up to a height of 500m.

We reached the 14km mark at a painful shuffle. Mum and I were experiencing bad knee pain from the constant downhill over rocks, and my feet were more than ready to get out of my trail shoes! The shoes and Icebreaker socks came off, and the jandals went on…and suddenly I thought I was hallucinating. Up ahead was a small shack with a sign “Bus to Port – 1 EURO”. Not surprisingly I was the first person on that bus for the last 1km ride to Roumeli!

We shuffled into a taverna, put our feet up, and enjoyed ice cold beers for the rest of the afternoon before a ferry took us back to Hóra Sfakíon.

Wearing Icebreaker was a saviour – the heat was intense, but our tee’s kept us cool and dry. I have no doubt that wearing Icebreaker socks saved our feet from blisters!

Luckily the knee pain only lasted a day, our calves and feet were back to normal a couple of days after that…but the photos will last forever!

- Leah Evans, Global Communications Executive

In an effort purely to make my Icebreaker colleagues extremely jealous, I thought I would share my recent experience of wearing our gorgeous Icebreaker products in extreme heat – and in a glorious location!

I have just returned from a month long holiday in the Greek Islands with my family (Mum, Dad and my brother Richard). For one of those weeks, we sailed our wee yacht, Mikinos (a Dufour 385), as part of a Nautilus Yachting flotilla around the Sporades Islands.

Highlights of the week of sailing were seeing various sites from the Mamma Mia movie – including THE church (and yes, humming the songs while we were there), having dolphins surround the boat and play around our bow, and visiting gorgeous quaint Greek villages on the islands of Skiathos, Skopelos, and Alonissos.

Greece was experiencing a heat wave in June (as most of Europe still is!) and temperatures averaged 35 degrees plus each day. To say that we lived in nothing but Icebreaker is an understatement!

I think our fellow yachties thought that dad only owned one t-shirt as his Icebreaker GT Velocity Crewe was pretty much his skippers uniform each day; Richard liked to pull out his Superfine tee’s or Stripe Club Polo for dinners at the local taverna’s each night; and mum and I (who are lucky enough to be the same size) simply shared Superfine tanks – together we had eight different colours!

The other members of the flotilla were amazed to hear that we had all been wearing nothing but Icebreaker for a couple of weeks, yet the garments didn’t smell.

When you are travelling and living out of a backpack, and then confined to a small yacht, space is of a premium. Being able to pack light and make the most of the garments we took was essential.

The fact that one t-shirt could take us from hoisting the sails and sweating during the day, being thrown on after a swim off the back of the boat, and then worn out for dinner at night and still look good was just awesome!

- Leah Evans, Global Communications Executive