Shortly after online registration filled for this week’s Primal Quest Montana adventure race, a list of mandatory equipment was posted on the event website.
Included among the packing list for the expedition-length, multisport race that got underway at the Montana ski resort of Big Sky early Monday was the usual array of trekking, mountain biking, rock climbing and whitewater paddling gear, along with snowshoes, a “riverboard” and roughly a metric ton of safety equipment.
The traveling toy chest represented quite a skill set. About the only item missing from the five-page inventory was a little something known as “selective memory.”
Apparently each of the 82 teams of four to sign on for this fifth rendition of “The World’s Most Challenging Human Endurance Event” (a sellout registration in less than 24 hours) had forgotten a little thing called Utah, the site of the most recent Primal Quest. It took place amid 120-degree desert heat in July 2006.
It seems even the team most up to that challenge — and every previous challenge PQ has dished out — has conveniently forgotten the 450-mile, sand-covered slog its members afterward referred to as “adventure suffering” rather than adventure racing.
“I think it’s one of those deals where, right when you finish the race, which is one of the most difficult things you’ve done in your life, you start to question your sanity and potential future in a sport like that,” said Mike Kloser of Vail, the 48-year-old captain of four-time defending PQ champion Team Nike. “After a while, all the brutal aspects of it you tend to forget, and suddenly you start remembering all the highlights and the fun times. Sometimes that happens much quicker than others.”
Learning from mistakes
Perhaps, then, it’s for good reason that the largest adventure race in North America hasn’t managed to keep itself going for consecutive years since 2004, two years after launching what was expected to be the domestic successor to the now defunct Eco-Challenge, which popularized adventure racing in the mid-1990s. The spotty schedule conveniently allows ample time to forget.
In 2002, Primal Quest debuted in Telluride and gained almost immediate acceptance as a premier event within the expedition-length adventure race community. By 2003, it became the first expedition adventure race to be shown on network television (CBS), but suffered a devastating setback a year later when Australian competitor Nigel Aylott died in a rock slide, prompting sponsor withdrawals and resignations of top PQ officials.
This week’s race marks the second restructuring of the event in four years. Aside from the drastic change of venue (the desert of Utah to the mountains of Montana), the most obvious change is a significant dip in prize money from $100,000 to the first-place team in 2006 to a total purse of $80,000 this year. Bear in mind that the top team will split a prize of $25,000 four ways and have its $12,000 entry fee to next year’s race waived.
Still, Kloser’s Team Nike — also composed of veteran racers Michael Tobin of Idaho, Monique Merrill of Breckenridge and New Zealander Chris Forne — views Primal Quest the most significant event on the race calendar this year.
“The race has never been profitable. But by restructuring, we hope that we’re putting it on the path to make it a permanent race that will be around in the future and will be a healthy race,” event spokesman Kraig Becker said. “Last year, when there was no PQ, there was a lot of talk in the community about whether adventure racing was dying as a sport. Really it was a matter of restructuring.
“We’ve got a new business plan that includes a sprint race series now that allows more people to participate without having to give up their day job or their entire savings buying gear. The bigger races like this one demand a higher level of commitment and expense. But I think they really capture the imagination of the fans and the general public that hears about these events.”
Challenge remains draw
While the race course is kept a secret until just before the start, the ensuing drama of a six-sport, 10-day romp through more than 525 miles of mountainous wilderness is a foregone conclusion. The teams of four, including at least one woman, can expect an elevation gain of more than 100,000 feet throughout the race, the equivalent of climbing Mount Everest more than three times.
There will be no shortage of snow at higher elevations of the Northern Rockies and gushing whitewater as it melts down to the valley floor for paddling and swimming (riverboarding) portions of the race in the Gallatin River. Top teams can hope to finish within six sleep-deprived days, while most will push the limits of the 10-day cutoff.
“It’s going to be tough to top the brutal conditions in Utah for sure because of the temperatures and everything. But they tend to get a little ambitious at times and try to make every one of these a little more challenging and difficult than the last one,” Kloser said before the start of PQ Montana.
“We’re talking 12,000 to 16,000 vertical feet per day on average, which is very different from the last one,” Kloser said. “But that diversity is what I really like about adventure racing. It’s what has always kept me enthusiastic about this sport — there’s always something new.”
