bloodrayne
09-25-2004, 03:01 PM
Falling Boulder Kills Australian Adventure Racer
Despite death, Subaru Primal Quest will continue
A day after a leading adventure racer was hit and killed by a boulder while descending a steep mountain, his fellow competitors decided to continue the race.
Nigel Aylott, a 38-year-old Australian, was killed on Illabot Peak in the North Cascades Tuesday afternoon during one leg of the Subaru Primal Quest, a grueling 400-mile multisport adventure race that combines trekking, mountain biking, orienteering, kayaking and more.
The race, which began Sunday, was expected to take five to 10 days, depending on the performance of the four-person teams. It was about half-way over when the accident occurred on the 21st of 40 checkpoints. Aylott's Team AROC, all Australian nationals, had been neck-and-neck with Team Montrail, sponsored by the Seattle trail shoe company.
As Aylott was making his way down the rock face about 4:20 p.m., John Jacoby of Team Montrail was above him, searching for a handhold as he started his descent from about 6,000 feet. That's when the large rock gave way.
Others managed to get out of the way, but Aylott was hit in the head by the 300- to 400-pound boulder and died of massive trauma injuries on site, said Chief Deputy Will Reichardt of the Skagit County Sheriff's Office.
Jacoby, a fellow Australian, crawled back to the top of the mountain and was airlifted to Skagit Valley Hospital with an injured left leg.
After a night in the hospital, a bandaged Jacoby rejoined racers yesterday evening as they gathered for a prayer service, followed by a barbecue in Aylott's honor at Steelhead Park in Rockport.
Lying on a cot under a tent yesterday, the 39-year-old talked of Aylott's love of physical competition. "He basically lived for it," Jacoby said.
Because of the steep, remote terrain, Reichardt said, the volunteer-run Skagit Mountain Rescue, assisted by rescue squads from Whatcom and Snohomish counties, did not retrieve Aylott's body until yesterday.
At the start of the race, being filmed by CBS for a future broadcast, 56 teams were in the hunt. By yesterday, two teams had withdrawn and a number were far behind the leaders.
The teams that gathered at Rockport yesterday, after consulting with Aylott's family and teammates, decided to continue the race -- though a shortened one -- at 12:01 a.m. today, picking up with mountain bikes. Members of Team AROC and Montrail said they wouldn't compete.
"There's no good answer for what we have to do now, and this is the best we can come up with," said Gordon Wright, a race spokesman.
Both teams were experienced veterans of the adventure racing scene, and Team AROC had picked up shoes to use in the race from Montrail last week, said Boo Turner, a spokeswoman for Montrail.
"Obviously, this is a huge blow to our team and everybody that supports them, and all the athletes up there," Turner said. "We have the greatest sympathies for everybody involved."
Aylott, a business analyst for an Australian telecommunications company, apparently was single. In the printed program for the race, Team AROC described its mission as "Enjoy life, enjoy racing and have fun. Oh, and find Nigel a wife."
Last year, Aylott and Team AROC came from down under to surprise the adventure racing world by placing second at the Subaru Primal Quest, held in South Lake Tahoe.
They were looking to win it this year, said teammate Matt Dalziel, and Aylott had quit his job last year to train and race full time.
"He loved to win, but he had to compete in whatever was on. He hated to miss out," Dalziel said. "There was no doubt in his mind that we were going to win that race."
In addition to multisport racing, Aylott was a former world champion in Rogaining, according to the International Rogaining Federation Web site. That's a sport of long-distance cross-country navigation on foot in which teams score points by finding checkpoints within a specified time.
AROC was a veteran team that had won numerous adventure races in its native Australia, including a 48-hour race in June.
Aylott also regularly ran and won ultra-distance races, such as 100-kilometer and 50-mile events.
Aylott's is not the first death on the adventure racing circuit recently. Last year, French veteran contestant Dominique Robert, a 47-year-old mother of two and pioneer in the sport, drowned on a river in Kyrgyzstan during the Raid Gauloises, one of the toughest of such events.
The participants elected to go on in that event as well; the race was eventually won by Team Montrail.
By one count, Robert's was the fourth death in the 15-year history of adventure racing. Aylott's would be the fifth. Yet, those in the adventure racing world say a death is shocking and rare.
"It's one of those things that randomly happen -- a freak accident, a rare occurrence," said Justin Yeager, head of NW Adventures, an Ellensburg company that hosts 24-hour adventure races.
Primal Quest race Director Dan Barger said the remaining racers would finish up where they started, on Orcas Island, though some portions of the route would be eliminated. They planned a group kayak session in his honor. Twenty-five percent of all the prize money will go to Aylott's team and family, as well as for a scholarship and memorial in his name, Barger said.
At yesterday's barbecue, racers sang songs and signed flags for Aylott's team and family.
Members of the Australian and New Zealand teams sang a version of Men at Work's "Land Down Under" in memory of their friend and teammate, Nigel Aylott.
Said one message: "He was the spirit of our sport. We shared a snowball fight in Sweden. I'll never forget him."
Despite death, Subaru Primal Quest will continue
A day after a leading adventure racer was hit and killed by a boulder while descending a steep mountain, his fellow competitors decided to continue the race.
Nigel Aylott, a 38-year-old Australian, was killed on Illabot Peak in the North Cascades Tuesday afternoon during one leg of the Subaru Primal Quest, a grueling 400-mile multisport adventure race that combines trekking, mountain biking, orienteering, kayaking and more.
The race, which began Sunday, was expected to take five to 10 days, depending on the performance of the four-person teams. It was about half-way over when the accident occurred on the 21st of 40 checkpoints. Aylott's Team AROC, all Australian nationals, had been neck-and-neck with Team Montrail, sponsored by the Seattle trail shoe company.
As Aylott was making his way down the rock face about 4:20 p.m., John Jacoby of Team Montrail was above him, searching for a handhold as he started his descent from about 6,000 feet. That's when the large rock gave way.
Others managed to get out of the way, but Aylott was hit in the head by the 300- to 400-pound boulder and died of massive trauma injuries on site, said Chief Deputy Will Reichardt of the Skagit County Sheriff's Office.
Jacoby, a fellow Australian, crawled back to the top of the mountain and was airlifted to Skagit Valley Hospital with an injured left leg.
After a night in the hospital, a bandaged Jacoby rejoined racers yesterday evening as they gathered for a prayer service, followed by a barbecue in Aylott's honor at Steelhead Park in Rockport.
Lying on a cot under a tent yesterday, the 39-year-old talked of Aylott's love of physical competition. "He basically lived for it," Jacoby said.
Because of the steep, remote terrain, Reichardt said, the volunteer-run Skagit Mountain Rescue, assisted by rescue squads from Whatcom and Snohomish counties, did not retrieve Aylott's body until yesterday.
At the start of the race, being filmed by CBS for a future broadcast, 56 teams were in the hunt. By yesterday, two teams had withdrawn and a number were far behind the leaders.
The teams that gathered at Rockport yesterday, after consulting with Aylott's family and teammates, decided to continue the race -- though a shortened one -- at 12:01 a.m. today, picking up with mountain bikes. Members of Team AROC and Montrail said they wouldn't compete.
"There's no good answer for what we have to do now, and this is the best we can come up with," said Gordon Wright, a race spokesman.
Both teams were experienced veterans of the adventure racing scene, and Team AROC had picked up shoes to use in the race from Montrail last week, said Boo Turner, a spokeswoman for Montrail.
"Obviously, this is a huge blow to our team and everybody that supports them, and all the athletes up there," Turner said. "We have the greatest sympathies for everybody involved."
Aylott, a business analyst for an Australian telecommunications company, apparently was single. In the printed program for the race, Team AROC described its mission as "Enjoy life, enjoy racing and have fun. Oh, and find Nigel a wife."
Last year, Aylott and Team AROC came from down under to surprise the adventure racing world by placing second at the Subaru Primal Quest, held in South Lake Tahoe.
They were looking to win it this year, said teammate Matt Dalziel, and Aylott had quit his job last year to train and race full time.
"He loved to win, but he had to compete in whatever was on. He hated to miss out," Dalziel said. "There was no doubt in his mind that we were going to win that race."
In addition to multisport racing, Aylott was a former world champion in Rogaining, according to the International Rogaining Federation Web site. That's a sport of long-distance cross-country navigation on foot in which teams score points by finding checkpoints within a specified time.
AROC was a veteran team that had won numerous adventure races in its native Australia, including a 48-hour race in June.
Aylott also regularly ran and won ultra-distance races, such as 100-kilometer and 50-mile events.
Aylott's is not the first death on the adventure racing circuit recently. Last year, French veteran contestant Dominique Robert, a 47-year-old mother of two and pioneer in the sport, drowned on a river in Kyrgyzstan during the Raid Gauloises, one of the toughest of such events.
The participants elected to go on in that event as well; the race was eventually won by Team Montrail.
By one count, Robert's was the fourth death in the 15-year history of adventure racing. Aylott's would be the fifth. Yet, those in the adventure racing world say a death is shocking and rare.
"It's one of those things that randomly happen -- a freak accident, a rare occurrence," said Justin Yeager, head of NW Adventures, an Ellensburg company that hosts 24-hour adventure races.
Primal Quest race Director Dan Barger said the remaining racers would finish up where they started, on Orcas Island, though some portions of the route would be eliminated. They planned a group kayak session in his honor. Twenty-five percent of all the prize money will go to Aylott's team and family, as well as for a scholarship and memorial in his name, Barger said.
At yesterday's barbecue, racers sang songs and signed flags for Aylott's team and family.
Members of the Australian and New Zealand teams sang a version of Men at Work's "Land Down Under" in memory of their friend and teammate, Nigel Aylott.
Said one message: "He was the spirit of our sport. We shared a snowball fight in Sweden. I'll never forget him."