While some of the team was in NY for the Snowgaine a couple weeks ago, Steve made his way to Quebec City to race in the ITU Winter Triathlon on the Plains of Abraham. Competing against Olympians and other world-class athletes, the podium understandably eluded him. The race consisted of a 5km snowshoe, followed by a 12km speedskate, and capped off with an 8km cross-country ski. This was essentially the same format as the St. Donat race a few weeks back.
Had he raced in the age groupers categories, his likely placing would have been 8th or 9th overall. Instead, due to the intense competion, he fell to nearly the bottom of the pack. In spite of this, it was a great race, and and gave him a chance to get a taste of racing at the elite level! If you'd like to read the full story about that race, check out the blog post on his website.
On Friday March 7th, James, Nathalie, and John left Ottawa to meet Harper in Berne, NY, just outside of Albany, for the Central New York Orienteering Club's annual Snowgaine. The Snowgaine is a 2-day orienteering-style "rogaine" (meaning you try to get as many checkpoints as you can in any order in a specified amount of time) that allows the option of travel by foot, snowshoe, skis, bikes, or any other human powered mode of transportation. The rule though is that you have to keep whatever gear you take with you at ALL times (so you would need to bring your bike with you to go get a checkpoint that is in the woods). Since we are a running team, we chose not to bring our bikes with us to the race. As some members of our team had managed to clear the course for the last couple of years on foot with plenty of time to spare, we expected to be able to clear this course in the same way. But it seems the race director had other plans for us... 