Note: This is a pretty long post. If you want the Cliff notes, go to the bottom.
I'm really big on the idea of obstacle courses and adventure races and have always wanted to do one. Back in March I was looking for a race similar to the Warrior Dash when I came across a partner adventure race in Seattle. I asked Claudia if she would be into and, if I remember correctly, our friend Angela told us there was one in Vancouver we should look into. So we did.
A week later (or so) we met Bill Lin, the producer/organizer of the Amazing Hunt and signed up. It's very similar in theme and form to the Amazing Race, and it's even filmed in HD and put on Youtube for all to see. There are 3 Legs to the race, and each feature a surprise challenge, a fair bit of running and, since we were doing the "Transit Race", a test of your knowledge of the city, and how to navigate it using only public transit (with one exception).
Yesterday (July 3rd) we met downtown near Science World (the Olympic Village, to be more precise) at about 10:00 am. We met the other teams, did our interviews and went over the rules for the race. There were supposed to be 9, 2 person teams in total, but only 6 other teams besides us showed. Here's a pic from the beggining (Claudia and I are on the far right, the Green & Black Attack).
Leg One - 11:00am
With the teams all lined up and anxious to start, the Host, Stephan thought he'd have a little fun with us by making us wait, then just randomly yelling "GO!". It was pretty funny actually and helped us relax a bit while the crew got set up. Once everyone was in position, the host yelled "Race" (or something like it) and we all bolted off the Start Line to get our packs. From there we had to find the
Centennial Rocket , which according to walkjogrun.net, is just over a kilometer away. Neither of us knew which way to go really, so we just followed the pack. We got there third, and grabbed out clue:"Find the worlds thinnest office building in Chinatown", then ran to the Skytrain and went downtown. A quick transfer over to the Expo Line and another 500 meter run through China Town we came upon our next marker. Actually, we ran right past it, but another team, Raja and Craig, pointed us in the right direction. They could have let us keep going, but helped us out, so I made a mental note to return the favour, if possible. We grabbed our clue, which indicated we needed to get to the
Dr. Sun Yat Sens Gardens about 2 blocks away.
Raja and I eating the disgust-o-buns
We were neck in neck with Team Blue (not an official team designation, just Raja and Craig were both wearing blue) when we
arrived at the Gardens. We located the Marker near the pond (which is pretty cool, by the way) and got our challenge: One member would have to run to a Chinese Bakerey and get something for their partner to eat. Claudia did the run, and despite going the wrong way, was actually pretty fast. She brought me back what looked to be like two Coconut Buns. Yum! However, looks can be deceiving, and I knew that it wasn't going to be that easy. What I had were pasty, thick, barely chewable buns with a
Century Egg in the middle. One was bad enough, but the second one... my god. I had to sit down, as I started feeling a bit nauseous. I came pretty close to tossing the egg into the pond when nobody was looking, but I didn't want to cheat myself (or anyone else) of a proper victory. But man, I did NOT feel good eating that second one. What really amazed me were a brother and sister (on different teams though) that both ate them in under 5 minutes. It seemed like 2 minutes at the time, because they started their first when I was on my second, and were both done before me.
After all that, we ran to the Skytrain and went over to Pacific Central Station. We probably should have just ran directly to it, but it didn't matter much at this point, as no teams were going to be eliminated in the first leg. We finished a few minutes later as Team #4.
Leg Two - 12:00pm.
After a bit of a rest and a chance to regroup (and let our stomachs settle) we prepared for the 2nd leg of our race. We were 3 spots behind 1st place. The way it worked was that Team 1 got a 2 minute head start, and each team after got a 1 minute lead. This put us 4 minutes behind the lead team. No biggie, as the first thing we had to do was take a Skytrain ride to Commercial Drive (Skytrains only leave every few minutes on the weekend). Claudia and I got there second I believe (with Team Blue right behind us), and we ran to Grandview Lanes (Bowling). We had just celebrated her birthday there a few weeks prior, so we knew exactly where and how to get there. We ran in, and saw the Race Marker that contained our challenge. Now we had another choice: Bowl 10 Pin and get a Spare between us, or bowl 5 Pin and get a strike each. Claudia wisely suggested we take the 5 Pin, as no one else was on that lane yet, and trying to pick up your partners last pin or two for a spare can be tricky. She went first and got a strike on her first throw! I wasn't surprised really as she kicked ass on her birthday, too. I took 4 tries to get mine, but once I did we were in the lead as most of the other teams, which had arrive by then, had all picked the 10 Pin Challenge. Suckers!
We ran out of the bowling alley and headed back to Science World to get our next set of directions: Take an Aqua Bus, False Creek Ferry or cab (we didn't see the cab part) to Granville Island and find ARTISAN.
We ended up taking the Ferry, and I'm glad we did! I'd like to give a great big "Thanks" to Yannick, our "helmsman". He left a bit early to accommodate us and even helped us find the location of our next challenge. Claudia and I took some time to chill out, let our legs rest and enjoy the ride.
Claudia (right) and I. Team #1 (at this point).
Dude that saved us tons of time covering False Creek, Yannick (right) and myself. Looking confused.
Next we went to Granville Island and found Artisan Sake. There we saw several large bottles lined up with clear liquid and a large (1 meter) straw in them. The first part of the clue simply said "Who can suck?". Claudia took up this challenge, which required her to drink all the water out of the bottle through the 3'+ straw! She wasted no time and and hoovered the entire bottle in almost one go! Thankfully it was just water, as that would have made the rest of the race quite challenging if it had been sake (but still fun, I'm sure). I was just glad it wasn't me slamming anything back as those egg buns still weren't sitting right with me.
From there we ran another 800 meters or so to the Pitstop. We got there at about 1:00 pm, and we were well ahead of the other teams by at least 10 minutes. We actually waited about 30 minutes for everyone to get there!
Leg 3- 1:30 pm
At this point we were interviewed again. The producer asked us to do some trash talking, and since we were in the lead we went first. Claudia didn't disappoint the crew and gave them a good dose of profanity and attitude, and they ate it up. It was all in fun though, and I hope they don't edit it in way that makes us look like we really meant ill towards the other teams.
Now we were in the lead and we had a 2 minute head start over the other teams. Our biggest "threat", was Team Blue, and they were sitting at Fourth. Unfortunately, our head start didn't mean jack-shit, because the first Marker we encountered at Burrard Bridge was a Stop Sign. We had to sit and wait for the next team to catch up before we could leave! Not only was the huge gap we earned from Leg 2 nullified, so was the 2 minute head start we had. In my opinion, it seems kinda stupid to have that Stop Sign right off the bat, especially on the Final Leg of the race. Anywho... Claudia and I waited for the second team, then we had to run across Burrard Bridge. I've done it on bike and that's easy, but man, it seems a LOT further when you're on foot and packing stuff on your back. I started to cramp up a little bit and Claudia was fading too, but we were still in the lead (barely) and we pushed on through to Sunset Beach.
Here we found our last Challenge. "Test Your Strength of Patience". Since Claudia had done the last one, and was needing a rest-stop break, I took up this challenge. And man, it was much harder than it sounds! I had a giant bucket to fill with water from the Ocean, but only a small plastic cup (approx. 500ml) to do it with. I had to run down, fill the cup and run back up a hilly, sandy beach. What made it hard(er) though was the cup had holes in the bottom! It took me a a couple trips to realize this. Team Blue arrived after us and I saw that they didn't realize the holes were there either. I decided to re-pay them the favour of helping us and told him to plug the holes. He was pretty quick and caught up to me in no time. He actually finished filling the bucket about 2 trips before me, but what the producer didn't see was that their bucket was partly full of gravel! Sneaky buggers.... I had thought of doing the same, to be honest, but didn't want to risk getting DQ'D, or worse, having to do it all again!
Sweaty, with a spasming back and soaked feet, I finished with my task, then Claudia and I grabbed the next set of Directions- Intersection: Go to either Little Sisters Book Store or the Odyssey Night Club for the last destination! We didn't know where either was, but figured they were up on Davie street, since they are both landmarks for the gay community. Davie street is close to the beach, but up very steep hills. This was the first and only time in the race where I couldn't push myself any further and actually walked the last block up.I thought Team Blue were ahead of us, but they stayed just a bit behind. I found out later they were checking their Blackberries for directions! We got directions to the book store, and Claudia had correctly guess it was closer and we made a B-Line for it. Team Blue was literally 2 steps ahead of us though and got the last set of directions just before us. We had to wait for them to read it, take our turn to read it to the camera, and bolted out of there as fast as possible!
Hot on the heels of our competition, we dodged through people and traffic to get to our last destination. We split down Thurlow as we thought there would be less people in the way, while our rivals went a different route. I thought we had lost them but they had took a side street. We ran to the intersection of Nelson and Burrard where we saw the Finish Line, but we had a red light and couldn't cross! To our right was Team Blue, flying down the sidewalk to the End. We bolted across and got to the Finish Line, but we were literally 2, maybe 3, seconds too late! We gave up the win of a four hour race by a heart beat.
I was pretty choked at first, as we were so close and I felt that the head start we had worked so hard to earn in Leg 2 was completely wasted due to poor planning of the course. Within a few minutes though I was good with it, as I knew we did an amazing job and kicked a lot of ass. Team Blue (Raja and Craig) did a great job too, and were really good folks.
However, one of the crew pulled me aside and said that the Finish Line was actually supposed to be where we had crossed (about 15 meters closer) but they had to move it as there was too many people in the way! Even with all the other things at the beginning of the Leg that slowed us down, we still could have taken it! Oh well, I can take heart in knowing that we only "lost" due things beyond our control.
All in all, it was a great day. I would definitely like to do this, or something like this, again.
I'd also like to add that I couldn't have had a better partner; Claudia was an awesome navigator, a kick-ass bowler and she could keep up on the running (even though she wore skate shoes that were hurting her feet a bit). Not only that, but her awesome sense of humour and general "kick-ass, but have fun" attitude made the whole event that much more enjoyable!
Left to right:
Me, Claudizzle, Raja and Craig. Just moments after the dramatic finish!
Cliff Notes: We did a race. We kicked a lot of ass and were way ahead for most of it. Then some lame stuff happened and we were only a little bit ahead. Then we got to the finish line, but we were about 3 seconds too late. I ate some crap that made me a bit ill, Claudia kicks ass at bowling and chugging water with a straw and we both ran our asses off. Fun was had by all, then some beers were had by us. My girlfriend is the personification of awesome-sauce. The End.
