Silesian events titled the Rat Race are not as popular as the huge, headquarter games organized annually. Despite this, they have become quite cult-like among players interested in team-based games. Not without reason - the organizers of this series of events inspired numerous successors, thus leaving a permanent mark on the shape of airsoft in Poland, contributing to the popularization of demanding team games.
This type of competition is played by numerous, more or less organized airsoft teams. All of them compete with each other in symmetrical activities, in which the additional opponents are the expansive terrain, limited time and ambitious challenges set by the organizers. It's no wonder that when the Rat Race reappeared on the event calendar last year, players stormed it, and this excellent preparation was later widely commented throughout Poland.
The organizers followed suit and, responding to the needs of the community, have prepared the fifth edition of the Rat Race for this year - even larger, more diverse and longer. It attracted participants from various parts of the country. We, as WMASG.com, had the undoubted pleasure of taking this event in our media patrognage.
This year's V Rat Race took place last weekend. It was organized in the same general area as the previous one, but it was significantly enlarged: the most distant points were placed almost 10 kilometers apart! The biggest novelty, however, was the introduction of two starting categories: Rookie (in a format similar to last year) and Veteran (extended and more demanding). The latter, instead of starting on Saturday morning, began shortly after midnight between Friday and Saturday, thus giving the teams a chance to test themselves during an additional few hours of night activities.
Both categories shared the same locations and tasks, but had separate classifications. All players were also subject to identical rules of play, including the unplugged convention - prohibiting the use of optoelectronic devices in the form of night vision goggles and thermal goggles during the game.
We had the opportunity to take part in this year's competition in the Veteran category. Observing the number of cars and players who appeared at night near Lubliniec (Silesian Voivodeship), it can be assumed that the idea of extending the game turned out to be a hit. On site, one could find not a very large, but efficiently separated parking area, as well as relatively modest stands of the organizers and a measuring point for the replicas.
Although the enthusiasts responsible for preparing the Rat Race (Czajson, kizaR, Gugiet and others) made every effort and shared detailed rules and regulations, and a recorded tutorial for the participants with the interpretation of the rules long before the event started, they also decided to restate the most important of them during a briefing for team leaders immediately before the start of the game. This doesn't happen often, but everything took place according to the previously announced schedule and the players were able to set off on time.
The next hours (18 for the Veteran category and over 11 for the Rookie category) were spent competing in a vast and diverse area with many attractively prepared locations. It was possible to get points in the final classification in many different ways: by visiting control points scattered throughout the game area, completing special tasks, maintaining control over strategic points (using the RFID system) and stealing "souls" of fallen opponents. It is worth noting that among the many new activities there are also some known from last year's edition, which caused the teams the most problems at that time.
The Rat Race, although it was definitely a very demanding game, was not a typical milsim game. Players were provided with simple healing mechanics as well as many respawn points where they could rest for a while, recharge and replenish their water supplies. Premature termination of participation in the game was possible if a given team lost the full pool of his/her own "souls" (dogtags in the form of wristbands). Although the fun was accompanied by perfect weather (no rain and moderate temperatures), the difficult, swampy terrain and the non-standard start time of the competition (in the Veteran category) meant that only a few groups persevered until the very end of the game, most often while covering several dozen kilometers on foot.
Rat Race V officially ended on Saturday, April 13 in the evening, leaving a lot of work for those involved, including collecting props from numerous locations in the vast game area. Even before the official announcement of the results, the first reports from participants began to appear on social media. Their tone was very positive, which confirms the high level of the event and allows us to hope that the organizers will not stop to improve and will give players even more reasons to be happy and satisfied with their own passion in the coming months.
23 teams took part in this year's edition of the Rat Race. In the Veteran category, the winner was the Lone Wolves Team, while in the Rookie classification the winner was Zbieranina squad operating together with NEMO Airsoft Team.
Thank you for the opportunity to participate in the event!
Photos: Paweł Ciecielowski (WMASG.com) - the full gallery is available below:
