Bears, Wolves, Mountains and More at J2 Adventures’ Best of the West Adventure Race,   An Incredible Venue and a Perfect PQ Tune-Up

If you’re looking for an awesome tune-up next year for PQ 2010, be sure to check out the Best of the West Adventure Race in Canada  (www.j2adventures.ca).  Run by Jay and Johanna Arns, whose passion for the growth of adventure racing is palpable, this year’s inaugural race was held last week in the dramatic Canadian Rockies of southern Alberta and British Columbia.

I competed with Greg McHale, Denise McHale, and Bob Miller on Team Peak Adventure, a primarily Canadian team that raced hard last year at PQ Montana, and we discovered early on that this was not a race for the meek.  After boldly calculating that we could run hard on the first trekking section for 12 hours to make a dark zone the next day, we were treated to almost 30 hours of exceptional backcountry travel peppered with awesome sunsets, thick bush, and technical terrain.  This initial push set the tone as the course continued to impress.

The mountain biking was exceptional.  Long, challenging climbs and steep, rocky singletrack regularly sandwiched epic hike-a-bike sections over burly mountain passes.  Suffice to say, we took bikes a few places that you would not usually think about taking a bike.

Navigation played out in a fun, old-school style, with few trails and numerous choices.  Crawling through alders and downfall was unavoidable in the valleys, and teams who chose to trek the technical ridgelines often saved time.

PQ veterans known as the Dancing Pandas raced hard and showed perseverance throughout, particularly when one teammate’s bear spray punctured in a trekking fall.  His teammates were able to wash the contaminate out of his eyes, and there were no lasting effects.  In another wild moment, Team Banff Lodging, which featured PQ 2009 competitors Scott Swaney and Tom Zidek), was awakened one night as a wolf sniffed and pawed at the team’s tent.

My teammates and I were lucky enough to see bears, moose, deer, elk, eagles, wolves, and enough breathtaking mountain scenery to actually stop and take it in on a number of occasions.  We came out victorious, and I can readily admit that this was an outstanding PQ training endeavor.

Oh yeah, and we did make that initial dark zone I mentioned—24 hours after we thought we would, by the skin of our teeth!

Happy training,

Travis Macy

This entry was posted on Monday, July 20th, 2009 at 10:30 am and is filed under Primal Quest. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.