I called up my usual team (long expedition style adventure races are done in teams of 4) but everyone was preoccupied with work, so I ended up reaching out to another team I had met during a previous race, and it just so happened they were looking for a fourth team member to join them for this particular race! I signed up that day and booked my flights for what would turn out to be an incredible race, aptly named The MAGNIficent. 

We woke up to fog and cold rain at the start of race day, which is not a very inspiring start to a six-day adventure through the backcountry, but we threw on our rain gear and congregated at the starting line with the 120 or so other racers to kick things off. All adventure races are broken into several stages, and the first stage of this race was a four-hour bike ride to the base of a mountain where we would start a long trek. After riding through the rain and mud for several hours, we were thoroughly soaked, and our white jerseys had already turned dark brown but our spirits were high.

We made it to the the transition and grabbed our pack rafts, which we had shoved in our backpacks for a massive hike up and over several peaks to a distant river that would take us right back to our bikes the next day.

 This was probably one of the hardest legs of the race because it was freezing cold, visibility was very poor because of the fog and clouds, and we were hiking with extremely heavy packs that held all our mandatory gear plus our boats, paddles and PFDs. With thousands of feet of vert ahead of us, we trudged on through sunset and into the night and we continued to orienteer through darkness, seeking the checkpoints that were scattered throughout the course.

We made it back to the bikes and had a huge ride ahead of us with about 10,000 feet of vertical gain, involving a lot of 'bike-pushing' through steep hillsides covered in thick grasses with no trails, which was exhausting and a true testament of grit.

This was by far one of the most difficult courses of my life....

.... but worth every minute of it!