faq

Wolf Pack creates analogue adventures across the UK. Real expeditions on real terrain, off screens and on foot, navigating by paper map instead of phone.

Right now the main format is a two-day, team-based hiking and navigation race. You carry a heavy pack, cover a long distance over two days, and find your own way by map and compass the whole time. No phones, no GPS, no money. Along the route, checkpoint challenges test teamwork, brains, strategy and nerve.

Challenging but thoughtful, intense but playful, gritty but anti-macho. Think Bear Grylls meets Wes Anderson, with a bit of indie-folk campfire.

This is a genuinely tough physical challenge, and we would rather you know that now than find out on Day 1.

The format is around 30 miles on foot over two days, a longer first day and a shorter second. Most teams walk a bit more, and more again if they get lost.

The part that catches people out is the pack. You carry everything you need to cover the distance and sleep outside: tent or bivvy, food, water and layers. A well-planned pack gets down to around 10kg. Being generally fit is not the same as being ready for this. Gym fitness, running and the odd day walk do not prepare you for carrying a loaded pack over long distances two days back to back, and that is the thing that decides how your weekend goes. Unless you are very fit, train with the real pack weight over the real kind of distance, more than once. Do that and you will be fine.

When people do not finish, it is rarely the distance. It is almost always something preventable: a sleeping bag that got wet because the kit was not packed properly, boots that were never walked in, an old injury flaring up under load, or never having trained with a heavy pack. In good conditions around 10% of teams do not finish. In poor conditions it is closer to 20%. Most of that gap is preparation.

If you are willing to train and prepare properly, you can do this. If you are not in shape right now and cannot commit to the training, this might not be your year, and that is a fair call to make.

Yes, and ideally everyone in your team should learn, not just one designated navigator.

This is a navigation race. Finding your own way by map and compass is not a side task, it is one of the main things you are here to do. Teams who share the navigating make better decisions, catch mistakes faster, and are not sunk the moment one person is tired or wrong. Leaving it all to a single person for two days is how teams end up lost and miserable.

And navigation here is not only about finding the route. It is about choosing the least punishing way through. The map will often offer you a choice: the direct line that drags you up a steep hill and through thick undergrowth, or the slightly longer path that saves your legs and your morale. Reading the ground well, spotting where a track will be firm and where a shortcut will turn into a fight through brambles, is often what separates the teams having a good day from the ones grinding through a bad one. Distance on the map is not the same as effort on the ground.

You do not need to be an expert. The basics are very learnable in a few evenings: reading an OS map, taking and following a bearing, and reading contour lines so you can see the shape of the land in front of you. A few good tutorials plus one practice walk where you actually navigate, rather than follow someone, will get you most of the way there.

Getting it slightly wrong, working out where you are and correcting, is part of the challenge and part of the story. But turning up unable to navigate at all tends to mean a lot of unwanted extra miles, so it is worth the preparation.

Possibly to the first, yes to the second. Getting temporarily turned around is part of the race. It happens to good teams, and working out where you are and correcting is one of the skills you came to practise. What does not happen is anyone genuinely disappearing.

Your phone is sealed at the start, but it stays with you and it is part of the safety plan. It is not for navigation or messaging, but if there is any safety or welfare concern you unseal it and call for help. That is exactly what it is there for.

Alongside that:

• you navigate with a proper map and compass
• the route runs through clear checkpoints, and we know who has and has not checked in
• there is crew at every checkpoint, paid staff and trained volunteers, with qualified first aiders throughout
• a support vehicle can reach you if you genuinely need it
• some races also provide each team with a GPS tracker

It is adventurous, not reckless. Getting disorientated is part of the adventure. Being unaccounted for is not.

The full mandatory kit list is published on the event page, so you can see exactly what you need before you book. Read it early, because some of it takes time to get hold of, and you will get further guidance on how to prepare once you have booked.

At a high level you carry everything you need to cover the distance and sleep outside: lightweight shelter (tent, bivvy or hammock), sleeping bag and roll mat, waterproofs and warm layers, headtorch, food and snacks, a water bottle, a basic cooking setup, first-aid basics, and a backpack that fits it all. You can share a tent and cooking gear across your team to cut weight.

No GPS devices are allowed during the race, including smartwatches. Some races provide a team GPS tracker, which we supply, so that does not count against this.

We always try to find a campsite with soul, something secluded, simple and atmospheric.

Expect running water, toilets, a big shared fire, hot drinks through the afternoon, evening and morning, a live set with an indie folk, country or world music vibe, and your own tent or shelter.

Do not expect showers, electric hookups, or anything polished. It is intentionally stripped back and communal.

The challenges are a big part of what makes Wolf Pack Wolf Pack. They are absurd, funny, clever, sometimes surreal, and they test teamwork, brains, strategy and nerve rather than brute strength.

A few from past events: the Great Welly Wang, where precision meets ridiculousness. The Return of the Sacred Aubergine, following clues across the landscape to return your team's sacred object. Fire lighting, simple, primal, and harder than it looks.

Every event has its own flavour. The challenges are demanding, but never macho or humiliating.

Wolf Pack is a team event. You navigate together, solve challenges together, make questionable decisions together, and finish together.

Team size. We recommend 3 to 5 people for the best mix of navigation, morale and decision-making. The minimum is 2 and the maximum is 8. If there are just two of you, get in touch and we will usually place you with others to form a bigger team.

Coming solo. Individual sign-ups are very welcome, and coming alone is one of the most Wolf Pack ways to do it. We place you in a team with other solo racers, which is often how the best Wolf Pack stories start.

Booking for a team. One person can book for the whole team. At checkout you choose your team name, which is permanent and cannot be changed later, and you enter each teammate's name, email and mobile number. From then on all comms go to each racer individually, so make sure those details are right.

Minimum age is 18.

We run in rain, wind, mud and heat. It is part of the experience, and the race goes ahead in almost all conditions. The two that catch people out are persistent rain and hot sun. Persistent rain is a kit problem more than anything: come with proper waterproofs and a reliable way to keep your sleeping bag dry, because a wet bag is one of the more common reasons people do not finish. Hot sun is a pace and hydration problem: carry enough water, cover up, and slow down. In bad weather the route may be shortened or adapted at the Race Director's discretion. Only genuinely dangerous conditions, such as a red weather warning, would lead us to cancel.

It varies by event.

Getting there: many races start at a secret location, so everyone meets centrally and we take you out by coach. This outbound coach is included in your ticket.

Getting home: for remote finish points we offer an optional return coach for a small extra charge, with limited seats, so add it early. If you do not book it, your way home is your own to arrange.

Tickets are non-refundable. That applies whether you choose not to attend, cannot attend, arrive late, leave early, or are removed or disqualified.

You can transfer your ticket to someone else up to 10 days before the event. Email hello@wolfpackleague.co.uk with the replacement person's details, and you arrange the handover.

If we have to cancel an event before it takes place, for reasons such as severe weather, safety, or loss of site access, our default is to move it to a new date and your ticket transfers automatically. If you genuinely cannot make the new date, we will offer either a transfer to another Wolf Pack event, subject to availability, or Wolf Pack credit valid for 18 months. If none of those work for you, contact us and we will consider it fairly.

If an event goes ahead but has to be shortened, rerouted or adapted for safety, it counts as having taken place and no refund is due. If an event has to be stopped partway through for safety, we consider fair credit case by case.

If you booked an earlier event under different terms, the refund and transfer terms that apply to you are the ones you agreed to when you booked. If you are unsure, check your booking confirmation or email hello@wolfpackleague.co.uk.

Full terms are in our Terms and Conditions.

Email hello@wolfpackleague.co.uk. Happy to help with anything.

The name is about the pack, not about being tough. A pack looks after its own, moves at the pace of its members, and gets everyone home.

If you are wondering whether this is a macho, elbows-out endurance thing, it is deliberately the opposite. No heroics, no chest-beating, nobody trying to drop you. The people who come are all sorts, different ages, backgrounds and fitness levels, and many are trying something like this for the first time. What they share is a willingness to look after each other through the hard bits.

Grit, humour and looking out for one another, with a streak of ridiculousness. That is the whole idea.

A Wolf Pack tradition. The aubergine turns up in different ways across the events, as a symbol, a clue, a joke, a test, sometimes a curse, sometimes a blessing. It is part of the myth-making that runs underneath the whole thing. You will understand when you get there.