The Crazy Stuff I Do These Days
My Endurance / Obstacle Event Résumé
The Brief “Origin Story”
I played soccer as a kid when we lived in Calgary, and I was a pretty decent sprinter in high school here in BC. Between high school and my 30’s, I was pretty much a couch potato. Then I got into martial arts, strength training, and high-intensity intervals as part of my own fitness journey, eventually starting to work as a trainer in 2009.
I used to get lots of clients who were recreational runners, and almost without fail they HATED training heavy strength and high-intensity interval stuff, and I always told them they needed to do the stuff they hated and sucked at to build real fitness…and then sometime in 2015, I realized I was being a total hypocrite. I was strong, explosive and powerful, but I never trained any kind of endurance.
So, in true JP fashion, I decided to search for the worst possible endurance event I could find nearby, and settled on running the Spartan Beast at Sun Peaks. I had no idea what I was getting into, and it kicked my ass. You can read all about it here.
That event really opened my eyes to how unbalanced my own fitness really was, and set me on the quest to become more of a hybrid athlete myself and to help develop that kind of all-purpose, always-ready ability in those I train. Still, for many years, I would always refer to myself as “not a runner”. In the last few years, I’ve begrudgingly come to accept that I have become, at least, a “trail runner” and “Spartan Racer”. But I’m still “not a runner”.
Honestly, though, I really enjoy the trails now, even though I have just about the worst possible build for it, being short, stocky and fairly densely muscled. Whether grinding up the climbs, or running fast, flowy flats and descents, trail running is one of the few situations when I can be most present and in-the-moment, and even approach a “flow state”, whether that’s out on a training run, in a trail race, or as part of a Spartan Race event.
At times in the years since, my focus has swung too far to the trail running end of things, chasing more performance or distance on the trails to the detriment of my overall fitness, and the five more major injuries I’ve experienced since 2015 have all been on trails (four of those on Sumas Mountain!). Six, I guess, if you count a cracked rib from a fall on a training run. I’ve never been injured in the gym since I started strength training heavily back in 2008, despite doing some pretty crazy stuff.
Still, I love being out there on the trails, but now I’m trying to get back to that idea of balanced fitness again in order to build more resilience back into my body as I push into my 50’s.
What I’ve Done So Far
Anyway, since that first Spartan Race Beast in September 2015, I was hooked, both on Spartan Races, and on trail running in general. I’ve raced over 500 km between 15 trail races and 26 Spartan Race events, plus the 2023 Spartan Race / Peak Events Death Race, and I’ve run several multiples of that mileage in training for sure.
Because nearly all of my Spartan Race events have been run supporting clients / teammates rather than running my own pace, I haven’t bothered to list times for most of them. The only ones I’ve listed times for are my first-ever Beast at Sun Peaks and ones that are my PR’s for the distances so far.
For the trail races, I’ve listed finishing times where I could find them, and injuries when they happened! I also listed placings for two events where I was particularly proud of the results, both of which I ended up finishing in 18th place overall, weirdly…
2015 Events
2015 Spartan Race Sun Peaks Beast (7:34:51)
2016 Events
2016 Run For Water Trail 10K (broken ankle at 7.5 km – DNF)
2016 Spartan Race Red Deer Super
2016 Spartan Race Red Deer Sprint
2016 Spartan Race Sun Peaks Beast
2016 Spartan Race Seattle Beast
2017 Events
2017 Run For Water Trail 10K (sprained ankle at 0.5 km – finished in 1:58:27)
2017 5 Peaks Alice Lake Enduro (1:56:48)
2017 5 Peaks Golden Ears Enduro (1:51:12)
2017 5 Peaks Golden Ears 2 Enduro (1:47:23)
2017 5 Peaks Cypress Enduro (1:44:00)
2017 5 Peaks Whistler/Blackcomb Enduro (1:51:21)
2017 Spartan Race Calgary Super (Age Group)
2017 Spartan Race Calgary Sprint
2017 Spartan Race Sun Peaks Beast (Age Group)
2017 Spartan Race Sun Peaks Sprint
2018 Events
2018 Run For Water Trail 10K (knee issue at 8 km – finished in 1:45:35)
2018 Spartan Race Calgary Super (Age Group)
2018 Spartan Race Calgary Sprint
2018 Spartan Race Vancouver Super
2018 Spartan Race Vancouver Sprint
2019 Events
2019 Run For Water Trail 10K (1:26:11; 18th overall, 13th place male, 4th place male 40-49)
2019 Fraser Valley Trail Races Bear Mountain 10K
2019 Fraser Valley Trail Races Manning Park 21K (sprained ankle at 10K – finished in 3:45ish?)
2019 Spartan Race Whistler Sprint (Age Group; 1:11:00 – Sprint PR)
2019 Spartan Race Whistler Sprint (Open)
2019 Spartan Race Whistler Super (Open)
2020 Events
2020 Spartan Race Virtual TWC Beast
2020 Spartan Race Virtual TWC Super
2020 Spartan Race Virtual TWC Sprint
2021 Events
2021 Spartan Race Red Deer Super (1:41:01 – Super PR)
2021 Spartan Race Red Deer Sprint (1:11:36 – not a PR, but not bad having just finished the Super!)
2021 Spartan Race Red Deer Beast (3:47:25 – Beast PR)
2021 Spartan Race Blue Mountain Beast
2021 Spartan Race Blue Mountain Super
2021 Spartan Race Blue Mountain Sprint
2022 Events
2022 5 Peaks Golden Ears Enduro (ran injured – finished in 2:08:17)
2023 Events
2023 Run For Water Trail 25K (coming off of 6 weeks with a back injury and no running - finished in 5:02:01.6)
2023 Spartan Race / Peak Events Summer Death Race (entered with only 4 weeks’ notice; DNF – lasted just over 24 hours)
2023 Heads Or Trails Coldwater Classic 26K (3:40:35; 18th place overall, 14th place male)
2023 Spartan Race Seattle Sprint
2023 Valley VertiKiller 30K (sprained ankle badly at 2.4km and rolled it again at 9.9 km; somewhere in there also had an avulsion fracture, but not sure when…LOL – finished in 6:28:12, NOT LAST!)
2024 Events
2024 Spartan Race SoCal Beast
2024 Spartan Race SoCal Super
2024 Spartan Race SoCal Sprint
2024 Run For Water Trail 25K
2024 Spartan Race Kelowna Ultra (on my 50th birthday!)
2024 Spartan Race Kelowna Super
2024 Spartan Race Kelowna Sprint
2024 Around The Lake Give’R Take 30K
Before the races listed here, I ran the Vancouver Sun Run once (I think - maybe twice?) because my future wife made me do it, and the Run For Water 5K road race several times, but I hated (and still do, except for specific training purposes) road running. My body is much happier on the trails, for sure (the 6 times I injured myself notwithstanding).
I also ran a Sprint Triathlon with my wife in 2018, but being an absolute boat anchor in the water did me no favours, and I was dead last out of the water by a LONG shot, just barely avoiding being disqualified. Raina was exactly 17 MINUTES faster than me on the swim, so I had no hope of catching up. Still, I pushed hard on the bike, but then backed WAY off on the run to save my legs some wear and tear for a trail race I had coming up the next weekend. Needless to say, the water is not my friend, and I have not done another triathlon since. I would like to spend more time on my road bike, but alas, there’s only so much time I can spend training.
Oh, and I decided to run a DIY road marathon on Labour Day weekend in 2023, using my car as my “aid station” for four 10.5 km loops, both to just “see if I could” and because I was annoyed that every ultramarathon program I looked at started off with a sentence like “this program presumes you’ve run at least one road marathon.” I didn’t really train properly for it, but I got it done in just under 5 hours. Not fast, but now I never have to do it again…LOL.
Future Events
In 2025, my plan is NO races or events. I’m working on trying to get back to having some fun with training, without the pressure or restrictions of training for specific events. I’m also planning to get back to some more intense strength and interval training in the gym, and trying out some new movement flow stuff too.
I DO have one crazy outing planned - trying to complete the Juan De Fuca trail both ways, non-stop, sometime in June. We’ll see if that pans out…