Team Rookie Rampage
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Photo by Mike Bitton
Rookie Rampage team members practice ropes skills in the Portland, Ore., back yard of teammate Ivan Arredondo.

Squamish, B.C., Canada, is a rock climber's paradise. It's also the site of Rookie Rampage's next adventure race, the May 12 Mind Over Mountan Adventure Race, aka MOMAR sprint. Today we did some ropes training for the MOMAR, which promises at least one 100-foot rappell during the four- to eight-hour competition.

Jon Ng and Charley Wachsmuth, climbing buddies who go way back, and dear friends of Rookie Rampage, gave us a ropes primer in Ivan's back yard. Then they took us to Portland's Rocky Butte to step off a 20-foot rock wall for a self-controlled fall.

Jan Newport, Kim Reidholdt, Ivan Arredondo and Scott Markham will be racing in the MOMAR, so we sent them off the ropes first. It was the first time on a rope for Jan, Kim and Ivan.

Jan loved rappelling, and after a couple of trips down the wall, declared herself ready for race day. Kim, grinning from ear to ear, gave me a spirited "high five" when she reached the end of the rope. Ivan, too, was all smiles, and confident he'd be "ready to rap" on May 12.

Since the gear was all set, Scott went down the rope to remind himself the difference between his brake hand and his free hand. I also went down once just for fun. So did a newcomer to the Rookie Rampage training group, Lyle Kopnicky. We met Lyle through the PDXAR website.

Many thanks to Jon and Charley for sharing their equipment and knowledge on a rare sunny spring day in Portland. There were other things both could have been doing this morning, and we appreciate very much the sacrifices they made to be able to teach us how to stay safe on the ropes in 2007.

Photo by Ivan Arredondo
Rookie Rampage team members negotiate a pair of slippery trees to grab a checkpoint on the other side of a creek during the PDXAR Spring Fling Adventure Race.

Just as the Inuit of the Great White North have many words for snow, we in the Pacific Northwest have many words for rain.

Barely noticeable is very light rain, or mist. Then comes light rain, which we'd call drizzle. Next is moderate rain, also known around here as showers. None of these genres of "rain," by the way, would ever cancel the outdoor plans of a true Northwesterner.

Now for the truly uncomfortalbe stuff. It starts with heavy rain, and ends with very heavy rain. If you've ever been on the receiving end of 5-gallons of water all at once, like, say, during a really lopsided water fight, you've experienced -- albeit briefly -- very heavy rain.

We experienced just about all the stages of rain during the PDXAR Spring Fling adventure race at Champoeg State Heritage Area. We had six Rookies up for a day of action, so we created two teams. Racing as Rookie Rampage were Jan Newport, Kim Reinholdt and myself (Mike Bitton). Racing as Rookie Rampage Light were Cristina Fillis, Scott Markham and Ivan Arredondo.

The race format included 14 miles of out-and-back mountain biking on paved country roads, followed by an extensive "advanced" orienteering course set by the Columbia River Orienteering Club (CROC) for its own Play in the Woods Expo. CROC invited PDXAR to organize an adventure race for the expo, so piggybacking on the O-course simplified things for the adventure race.

Both Rookie teams decided to stick together on the course. Almost immediately, though, the rear derailleur of Cris Fillis' mountain bike started mysteriously switching gears without her input. She dropped out, encouraging the rest of us to get on with the race. We pounded out the bike section, which included an olfactory assault near the town of Buttville (Butteville, actually). The "rain" was only a mist at this point.

After checking in with Cris, who declared her day done, we transitioned to the trek/O-course. That's when Oregon unleashed its rainmaking glory. Many of the checkpoints were in or near water, so we didn't care much that we had to get wet to punch our SportIdent keys into the little beep boxes. Overall, our navigation went extremely well. The race was almost mundane until we got to O-course control point 9.

The orange and white control point bag was halfway down a steep, muddy bank along the Willamette River. Scott had the SportIdent key for Rookie Rampage Light, and tried to carefully work his way to the beep box. No such luck. He slid all the way down the slope, nearly landing in the drink! He crawled back to the top of the riverbank, punching his key at the halfway mark. The rest of us laughed uncontrollably the entire time. I had the SportIdent key for Rookie Rampage, so I tried next, hoping to avoid Scott's mistake. I immediately slipped in the mud, and went speeding down the slope on by backside. Intent to punch the beep box if I could, I reached for it and accidentally took it with me as I sped past the orange and white checkpoint marker. With the beep box in my left hand, and the key in my right, I slid faster and faster until SPLASH! I was under water in the Willy!

I stood up, punched the key in the beep box, and low and behold, it beeped! Now I just had to get back up the slippery slope to my team so we could catch the final few checkpoints. They were all laughing too hard to help at first. In fact, Ivan was recording video of me standing in the river. Eventually, he gave me a hand and I was back atop the riverbank. Nothing eventful happened after that.

We finished in 3 hours, 45 minutes, which was just under the 4-hour limit. It's the first adventure race we weren't short-coursed on, so even though we were the last teams to finish, the experience was a victory for us.

Here's an historic view of the route I ran today with Gordon Wright of Outside P.R., whose office is at the Presidio in San Francisco.

I'm in San Francisco this week doing some writing and publicity work with Gordon Wright, president of Outside PR. His office sits on part of an old Army base called the Presidio. What an incredible view he's got! I parked my Jeep out back, it looks a little something like this:

Beautiful, fire-engine red 1995 Jeep Grand Cherokee Limited, recently washed and waxed by my great friend Rand Dunn of Napa, Calif. South tower of the Golden Gate Bridge on the left side of my Jeep. North tower of the Golden Gate Bridge on the right side of my Jeep. Marin Headlands jutting up behind the bridge. It's as perfect as a post card, and me, without my camera!

The workday here at Outside PR is interrupted every afternoon for play. Yesterday, Gordon declared it would be a run along the San Francisco Bay. Intern Jeff, who will soon turn 25 years young, came along to see what it looks like when Old Dogs try to run with a Pup. It does not look pretty.

Much to my surprise, I was able to run the length of Crissy Field, a one-time airstrip now serving as green space. Then I just plain walked. Gordon and Jeff kept running, all the way to Fort Point (under the south tower of the Golden Gate Bridge). On their way back, they were STILL running! I'd already turned around, and was walking back toward the office. Guilt prompted me to run again as soon as they caught up. We saw Canada geese, egrets, lupine in vigorous bloom, and indian paintbrush thriving. This place is Eden.

Back at the office, all huffy and puffy, sweat-soaked and stinky, we got right back to work. What a bizarre ritual! A mid-day run? Gordon tells me sometimes it's a swim. Other days, a bike ride. These are workday tasks that I, with my somewhat rotund figure, can clearly appreciate. Too bad today's my "last day" in the office for a while! Tomorrow, it's back to Portland, a drive that takes about 10 hours if I don't stop very much. But I'll be back in about a month, doing more work for Outside PR and its newest client I helped land, Guide Dogs for the Blind in San Rafael, Calif. Yea me!