travel / adventure zone
| The Adventure Zone |
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| Photo: Marc Campbell |
Have Snowshoes, Will Travel
Capturing the adventure of a growing winter sport
By Christopher Mason
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Photo: Marc Campbell |
Having managed to fill his summers with the adventure races, mountain
biking and running that make the west coast a Mecca for outdoor
enthusiasts, Marc Campbell needed a winter activity to build on that
would allow his athletic training business to become a year-round
venture.
But Campbell got more than he bargained for by combining the
snowshoeing he had been doing more of along with the race approach he
had developed during summer competitions. Who knew snowshoe racing
would develop such a following?
In the midst of the sixth season of the Yeti Showshoe Series of races,
Campbell is taken aback by the following the sport has attracted in
Canada. Showshoe racing had developed in the United States and
especially Europe, but mostly on flat-terrain courses. Campbell's idea
was to take the concept but adapt it to between five and 14 kilometre
mountainous routes.
This year's series began on Mount Washington in January and continues
with two February races and single March and April competitions, all
in the Vancouver area. The races are still open for registration, as
are the various clinics Campbell runs through his adventure company.
The first race six years ago attracted 23 participants but today the
races consistently attract between 150-200 participants and interest
in the clinics is growing as more people begin training for the races.
The Yeti race series is named after the Hymalyan term for abominable
snowman, which Campbell felt was a fitting term for the sport.
Despite the growing popularity people still do a double-take at the
image of waves of people traipsing through the mountains on snowshoes.
"People always ask how you run in these things but it's simple,"
Campbell says. "You run. That's it. [The snowshoes] are asymmetric so
you don't get shoe slap, you don't have to change your gait. It's an
awesome workout."
Since the race's inception three other Canadian snowshoe race series
have been established and this year Campbell says the various race
organizers plan to hold their first national championship to capture
the sport's growing interest.
Campbell says the idea of a national championship is part of an
attempt to professionalize the concept of snowshoe racing to make it
less of a weekend hobby sport and more of a respected and highly
competitive winter sport.
"We want to keep raising the bar on this sport," he says.
To learn more about the race series, the clinics and the sport in
general, visit www.theyeti.ca
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