Squamish adventurer Chris Christie trekked 392 km across Newfoundland this summer - but it wasn't quite enough.
Chris Christie took part in the Adventure Racing World Championship the first week of August. Race officials stopped him and his three North Shore teammates with only 75 kilometres left in their 467-km journey.
Their end result wasn't what they hoped for. Despite that, they can say that they made it farther than many other teams. Forty-five teams started the race, only 29 officially finished. The local team wanted to finish in the top 30 and within five days.
Christie, Denis Fontaine, Cheryl Beatty and Bob Faulkner, also known as HellyHansen/metprinters.com, were travelling with a group of other teams near the end of the race when a storm started to roll in.
After three mountain range crossings and days on the course, Christie's team reached the final rappel. At the bottom of the rappel was the final paddle section.
"Race officials were concerned about an impending storm; the paddle was in an exposed area in the St. Lawrence so they pulled us off the course with only the 35 km paddle and 40 km bike ride left," Christie said.
A few hours earlier they made the difficult decision to drop Faulkner and continue the race as an unranked team. Faulkner started experiencing serious foot problems and couldn't carry on.
"He was voted second worst feet in the race at the after party," Christie said. "Our feet were wet for 85 per cent of the race."
The wet foot adventure in Newfoundland started with a 20-km run near Corner Brook. A major crossing of a channel that had a massive riptide followed the run.
"We looked like a pile of lemmings jumping in and getting swept away," Christie said. Fog was a real issue for the teams. Christie said it made navigating difficult in some places. The racers had to make their way through swamps, rivers and thick bush, or Tuckamore as they call it in Newfoundland.
The team tried to get some sleep in the heavy fog of the first night but for the most part they were awake and freezing until first light at about 3:30 a.m. They passed a few teams on the second day after losing some ground in the fog and the dark the night before.
They hit dark at a bad time the second evening. "Racers are not allowed on the water from 9 p.m. to 4:30 a.m. and of course we got there at nine," said Christie in describing his team's arrival at the next water crossing. "Another sleep, not good if you want to race well. We had a great paddle in the morning saw some incredible views, small fishing villages and even a couple of moose crossing an inlet. Heavy fog rolled in once again making the paddle on the east coast unnerving. Navigating was a little slower but I think we did well on the 60-km paddle. Next up was an amazing 40-km ride."
After Faulkner made his decision, Christie said the trio had some very quick sections but the storm erased any chance of crossing the finish line.
Team Nike ACG/Balance Bar won the event and Team Cross from Sweden crossed the finish line just 20 seconds behind after a sprint to the finish line.
"The people there are incredible and very friendly, the experience was top notch and the team put in an incredible effort to have a strong finish," Christie said after the race
