My main goal for 2006 is to have my team on the finishers list for Primal Quest. This promises to be the biggest and badest expedition adventure race in the last 5 years, we are going in with a team of complete rookies! We have already started training and no matter what happens, we have to finish. Something interesting is that my personal total adventure racing experience to date is a culmative 700k, PQ will cover 800k through 8 disciplines! I honestly think we will have a shot at top 30 (out of 90) if things go well for us...this is an outside goal we are shooting for.
I haven't had the time to think beyond PQ yet, so I'll be improvising as I go here:
-Complete a 100km ultra run, and have a respectable finish time
-Break the single lap record for Mountain Highway Madness, presently 1h0m20s, and throw in a second lap if feeling up to it after this. This is something I told Jackson I'd do in 05 but my race schedule did not allow me to do either of the runs. MHM is the first trail run I ever did in 2004, my life hasn't quite been the same since.
-I would set a goal of a 5h25m KKer, but since this race is just four days after PQ, I will regretfully have to withdraw my name from the entrant list, event though I was the first person to sign up for 2006. This will be my goal time when I next get to do KKer.
-I will hopefully be taking part in Diez Vista, and as long as I get in I am setting a goal of a top 5 finish. As long as the 'top guns' aren't out I might have shot, but ya have to aim high!
-To outright win a race, whether an AR or trail run, it doesn't matter, I just wanna win!!. I promised my girlfriend that I'd win a race for her in 05, unfortunately I did not get to do as many trail runs as I would have liked. I am focused on building a solid adventure racing base and this often takes me away from my strongest discipline of running, and puts me on my bike or in a kayak. If I can find a trail run that Ean, Andy and Dom don't know about I may have a shot!
-Dirty Duo, solo (run/bike). Top five finish, with fastest run time.
-Vancouver Sun Run, beat last years time of 37m51s
-Climb/scramble Mount Curry in Pemberton, Sky Pilot in Squamish and The Black Tusk in Whistler
-Significantly improve my navigational skills
-Siginficantly improve my kayaking abilities
-Stretch regularly...well at least more than last year!
-Top five finish at a Yeti snowshoe race
-Canoe/kayak trip from Squamish to Anvil Island
-Remember that I have a girlfriend, she actually likes to spend time with me, and I have to fit her into all of this somewhere!
That's it, I just took myself out of the 'running' for the free pair of shoes!
HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL, AND GOOD LUCK TO ALL RESOLUTIONERS (it's a word, I made it)
GARY ROBBINS, SQUAMISH