Team 2017

A Feat of Great Stupidity!
By: Tom McCarthy (2008/07/23)

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There is a trail on Vancouver’s North Shore mountains that I’ve always wanted to run, start to finish. I’ve spent a lot of hours on this trail over the years I’ve been in Vancouver, running many sections, but have never run the whole thing. It’s the Baden-Powell trail, named after the Scout founder, and built by Boy Scouts in his honour. Ed and I decided to run it this weekend, and invited others to come along. One friend, former Nordic combined athlete and active-man extraordinaire, Paul Lebel, took up the challenge.

The Baden-Powell (or BP) runs, according to the KneeKnacker website (http://www.kneeknacker.com/ ), the annual race across the length, for 48 kms. It stretches from Horseshoe Bay at the western end of the North Shore to Deep Cove at the eastern end. It is purported to have 16,000 feet of elevation gain/loss. It is the backbone of the North Shore trails, much like Ridge Road in Gatineau Park.

Baden=Powell trail profile.

I am not fit. I try and get to the gym a few times a week, and maybe a long workout on the weekends, and the odd bike-ride. Intervals? Forget it. I think it is with this in mind – my declining fitness – that I threw my hat in the ring. Because when else would I be in better shape? The bell curve of my fitness, folks, is certainly on the downward slide.

We started at a leisurely 9:30, figuring it would take 6 or 7 hours. I realized I had old orthotics in (new ones are being adjusted), but didn’t think much of it (I would later). We took a wrong turn almost immediately – instead of running up almost 4000 feet to the top of Black Mtn, we swung around it on an access road. A bit disappointing, kind of – but none of us minded the reduced elevation gain. I have since been accused of running too fast at the start, but defend that charge with ‘When else were we gonna get time?’.

We got to Cypress Bowl ski area, and started the second quarter of the run. Not long after that (I blame this one on Ed, mostly) we took another wrong turn – up to the top of a mountain, Hollyburn Peak. And burned I was, when we figured it out – an extra 4k and 45 minutes of climbing and descending. To make up for that, we ran downhill probably too fast for about an hour and a half, which is how long the descent is on that part of the BP. And my knees started hurting – first the right one, then, gradually, the left one, with the pain in the left fully overtaking the little trifling right knee.

Cleveland Dam is the halfway point, and we had about 1.5k on a busy, uphill road after that. We were sweaty and muddy and about 4 hours in, and I was grumpy. Then, a mirage – two kids selling ‘Freshly Squeezed Lemonade’. For 25 cents a cup. The smallest bill we had was $10, so we gave it to them, had 3 cups each, and left them a lot richer. A good lesson in consumer vs. producer surplus, I suppose, for those budding economists among you. The lemonade was not fresh, but it was refreshing.

Paul had had some severe indigestion a ways back, and it started slowing him down on the next section. Ed twisted an ankle, and it swelled up, and I had two sore knees, so the next few k were not quick. Paul decided to call it a day at about the 2/3 point, having run a very demanding 36k. He later said he regretted it, but walked into town to a coffee-shop and spent two hours waiting for us, watching the Tour de France on their TV.

We tried to speed up after that, and managed to pick the pace up somewhat, but I had to stop a few times to shake the old knee-caps around. We had one last real uphill grind – about 850 feet of rocky, rooty terrain – before the long, long 5k downhill finish. That was my mental low point, and probably Ed’s too. My arch started cramping badly, his ankle was bugging him a bit, and I was feeling pretty out of gas. This was also at about the 7 hour mark. We made it down to a road crossing, and a sign that said 3.2k left, which cheered us, until the next sign 10 minutes later said 3.1k left – and it turned out to be accurate.

We crossed paths with a bear with about 2.5k left – we had a section on a road, and he was chilling a couple hundred metres ahead. We figured we should make some noise, and the only songs we could think of – independently – were lumberjack tunes.

The finish took longer than hoped, with silly unexpected uphill bits, and then we climbed down the last staircase and out into the park in Deep Cove, where we walked into the ocean, pretty pumped, tired, and sore, 8:15 after we started. A long car shuttle back, and here I am, on the couch, icing the arch of my foot and dreading waking up in the morning.