This weekend sees two of the world’s most extreme races take to the streets and waters of Scotland as the fifth annual Rat Race lands in Edinburgh and the Glen Nevis River Race sets sail in the highlands.

Over Saturday and Sunday, the Edinburgh Rat Race will unfold.  The Rat-Race is a multi-disciplined team challenge of navigation, endurance, mental agility, running, climbing, mountain biking, kayaking and abseiling, combined with surreal sporting tests and obstacles at different checkpoints across some of the city’s most challenging terrain.

Over the years Rat Race competitors have been seen kayaking out to sea and mountain biking in the Pentlands, orienteering around Arthur's Seat, speed cycling without brakes, abseiling from the roof of Murrayfield Stadium, playing wheelchair rugby, space hopper racing, and a final hurdle of getting a team of three up a large ramp covered in banana skins and butter!

 It will see total newcomers competing alongside the fittest endurance athletes in the country and will include runners, triathletes and outdoor types in addition to many locals and city dwellers.  In mixed teams of three, competitors will fall into two categories:  the 'Mean Streets' class (rookie teams) and the 'Adventure' class. 

The Glen Nevis River Race on Sunday, meanwhile, is an extreme challenge involving participants navigating through the icy waters of a two-mile stretch of the River Nevis on an air-bed in order to raise money for the Lochaber Mountain Rescue, the UK’s busiest mountain rescue team.

The intrepid adventurers begin by launching themselves off a tiny ledge on a high rock face at the head of the glen, plunging into the freezing waters of the River Nevis below.

Participants then have to follow the deepest course of the river through rocks and rapids, whilst negotiating major obstacles like the Gurgling Gorge, Dead Dog Pool, the Leg Breaker and the Lower Falls Leap (a thirty foot waterfall); finishing in the calmer waters further down the glen.

More than 3000 people have taken part, and in a successful thirty year run from 1973 to 200, the Glen Nevis River Race enjoyed a high media and public profile as an awe inspiring spectacle, a unique challenge (for the likes of Blue Peter’s John Noakes, musician and TV presenter Dougie Vipond and star of TV’s Taggart, Blair Duff) and as a worthy fundraising event.

The Edinburgh Rat Race - www.ratraceadventure.com:
Glen Nevis River Race - www.nofussevents.co.uk/event/Glen-Nevis-River-Race/1018