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Story & photos by Dave Blair
(Additional photography courtesy of Don MacDonald and David Kramer)
Washington Steals Crown from B.C.’s 2-year Reign
The date set for running the 26th annual Northwest Challenge was set for September 26th. This event open to Land Rovers only, consists of a driver and co-driver/navigator team, and alternates between Washington, Oregon and British Columbia each year.
For 2014, the venue was down in Washington and backed by the Pacific Coast Rover Club (PCRC). The area chosen once again spotlighted the spectacular Naches area, found between Mount Rainier and Yakima. This area is just barely on the dry side of the Cascade Mountains, so while the area is fairly arid, surprise weather can be dropped on you on a regular basis.
I had resigned myself to the fact time commitments meant I would not be able to compete this year, or even go as volunteer. Plus my competition Rover is now a trail weary worn out Disco II that is just not in top competition form anymore, let alone up to the challenge of the long drive down from BC’s Interior to NWC’s Base Camp at Kaner Flats.
As September 26th approached my very good pal Don MacDonald (NWC champion 2012 and 2013. I co-drove with him in 2012), and I got talking and one thing led to another, which ultimately led to our last minute entry into a field of 12 teams.
Friday’s arrival to camp was not entirely smooth as our departure out of the Lower Mainland was late. After getting across the border, through busy Friday afternoon traffic down I-5, and battling torrential rain on Hwy 410 – we finally rolled into camp, a mere half hour late.
After years of competing, you learn that being early and rested is just one of the foundation stones you need to set yourself up to win, and this year we just didn’t get it quite right.
I quickly adjusted our gear load hoping nothing would bounce around too much or come loose. Don turned his big 110 (the White Rabbit) around in camp and we headed out to the first challenge. The Northwest Challenge is typically made up of a driving/navigation portion, combined with various “tasks or challenges” along the way. The first task was called Curling with Land Rovers.
This challenge consisted of accelerating forward for about 30 metres, then coasting towards a cone another 60 metres away without using your brakes to see how close you could get to the cone. Wow, with our lack of prep and being late, Don and I (the lone Canucks this year) aced this first challenge – our front tire came to rest right by the cone. Off to a good start... or so we thought.
However, it all went downhill from there. The navigation portion only revealed half the information on Friday night; the rest of the information with more tasks was not given out until Saturday. Two routes were made available to the teams on Friday’s start, where we were teamed with two other crews and chose route B, all the other teams chose route A. This is where our lateness factor really kicked in as it took time getting ourselves organized for the GPS navigation portion.
We did not get as much of section B done as we’d hoped for when we limped back in at 10 p.m. Yes, I said limped. We were tearing around on FSR’s, not even tough trails, when around 9:00 p.m. the 110’s right rear shock snapped.
Back in camp the next morning we had Ryan Phelps from Team 09 to thank as he loaned us a spare shock, already welded (Ryan drives a 110). Seems there is an engineering issue between the shock maker and Defender 110’s as the heavy Land Rover likes to break even the newest and fanciest off-road shocks. Don plans to work on re-engineering this for next year. With Ryan’s borrowed shock in place, we tackled the missing parts on route B once again Saturday morning.
Mike Bach, this year’s NWC organizer (and PCRC President), had hidden over 100 GPS waypoints on all four of the routes (sound familiar 2013 teams?) and it took Don and I some time to get into Mike’s head determining how they were hidden. Once we had it figured out, it wasn’t too hard finding the needed markings, all on dead trees or the backs and undersides of rocks.
However, at the top of route B, which was Ravens Roost, something diverged from what we figured was Mike’s logic, and we couldn’t find the waypoint. This was an important one as there was an envelope hidden that we would need later. We gave up after an hour looking for it as we had a compulsory challenge at 9:30 a.m., back at the bottom of the hill and about 15 km away.
This challenge actually turned out to be two – an old-school Compass Navigation Challenge determining “azimuth” and distance to a point a hundred metres away, and a Parts ID Challenge. The parts identification turned out to be quite challenging as it included parts not just from Land Rovers but (very sneakily) parts from other British vehicles too. To make it even more challenging, they gave you a few Land Rover model labels they did not even have parts for. We didn’t win either of these challenges, but felt we were holding our own at this point in the competition.
We then tackled route A of the Navigation Challenge and found it to be an all round fun challenge. We were paired up with team 11, a 1995 Discovery I 300tdi from Oregon driven by Casey Solonika and his co-driver Kristen Ingram. They were not experienced off-roaders however; this was their first NWC. Casey asked me what he should do and I joking suggested, “Just keep up and we’ll work together to find the waypoints”. Well, Casey kept up! Don is a maniac behind the wheel and a tad competitive, but Casey kept up at 100 metres behind the whole day. Kristen turned out to be the most eagle-eyed spotter I’ve ever worked with, finding most of the waypoints along the route.
During the route A section, which navigated some of the old renown Naches Trail, the big 110 decided to break yet another shock and we were back to bouncing all over the trail again. The problem with a shock breaking is that the rear axle can then articulate too freely and the spring pops out. So we took a time-out and strapped the right rear spring into its seat and bolted a length of chain between the shock mounts so that the axle couldn’t extend too far. This worked very well, and was the end of any future shock trauma for Don during the rest of the event.
On to route C we went, not too far behind schedule and fairly confidant we would be in time for the next two challenges. We were concerned though. Coming up was a certain hill, known as Aardvark Hill (which is crazy steep and slick with clay mud) and I had been the victim of carnage on this hill when descending in my Disco II at NWC2011.
We figured we would first look for the main road as our time was now limited due to our earlier mishap, handle the challenges then go back and do the hill, finding the waypoints along the trail. However we couldn’t locate the forestry main. The worst case is we would have to winch the big 110 up the hill. On Don’s second attempt to drive up, we suddenly heard a horrible sickening “SNAP,” and that was the end of the driving up idea.
We had snapped a front axle shaft and there was no way we were going to get two Rovers up the hill with the heavy Defender now crippled and down to 2WD. Out came the chains.
It was challenging enough turning around on the slippery clay, but after chaining up, Don did an admirable job of working his way back down to the bottom, with Casey right behind us. Team meeting ensued once on flatter ground, we decided to make the best of a very the messy situation.
We found as many waypoints as we could without getting White Rabbit horribly stuck. Reaching the main road, we were forced to give up on reaching any challenges at the top of the hill. Sadly, we missed the Medical Challenge and T-ball Driving Challenge.
We decided to still try and find as many waypoints as possible, as we knew that route C waypoints showed it came back out to the main road about 15 km east of where we had started. So, we unchained, headed down the highway and did the rest of route C in reverse, climbing high up onto Manastash Ridge collecting valuable waypoints until about 6 pm.
All teams were to be back in camp by 7:00 pm, and it was a mad scramble back down to camp with daylight rapidly disappearing. We rolled in a few minutes after 7:00 hoping Mike wouldn’t dock too many points off for rolling in slightly late. Reality set in, and we knew we would be well out contention to make the top three or five, but for us two ole veteran NWC competitors, we were okay with that, having a heck of a lot of fun together.
PCRC hosted Saturday night’s feast, which was a great spread of chili, salad, buns, veggies and chips served up by Lou and Jae Tauber. After filling up, teams turned in early. No surprise there.
Sunday morning has traditionally become a group event, where everyone gets to watch each team compete around a marked course. This is a crowd pleaser, as the rest of a typical NWC event doesn’t lend itself well to spectator viewing.
This challenge randomly pairs teams up with different trucks, and the task was a “trials” type task – being a course through pylons. The catch was that we had to link two Rovers together with a strap, and the strap could not touch the ground. Each group had their own strategy, and some worked better than others as the trucks navigated a rough course about 0.5 km in length.
Once completed teams and volunteers headed back to camp to start packing up, while Mike and his crew scooted off tallying up points and preparing the awards table.
This was the 11th NWC I’ve been involved with since 2001, either as a competitor or organizer, and in my opinion this one was up there as one of the best. It was great to meet new teams entering for the first time, and visiting with old pals for the weekend.
Big thanks to a hard working group of volunteers and the tireless Mike Bach for putting on an excellent event!
Don and I finished in 9th place, but you know what, we had a blast and as my Pamela always says from her long distance riding days, “To finish is to win!”
Next year NWC will be held in Oregon. So, if you’re looking for a way to prove your mettle and make great friends, then Northwest Challenge just might be the event for you. See you in 2015!