Hello all,

While I haven't lived in California for a few years, I just can't bring
myself to unsubscribe to SCARABS or BAAR yet.  There just isn't much of an
AR community up here and while I can't join in for any of your crazy
adventures or BRAWLs, it's comforting to know that they exist and there is
still such an active group discussing AR issues.

Well, some of you (the ones headed out for PQ) may have already heard that
the race organizations has just decided to allow the use of GPS units by the
teams at PQ.  They think that it will be safer for teams.  Of course,
they're right.  It will be safer.  In fact, it would be even safer if they
just marked the whole course with bright orange tape, or even safer if the
whole race was on paved blocked off roads, like a triathlon... or even safer
if there was no race at all and we just decided who was the winner by
playing bridge in a climate controlled card room somewhere.  I bring this up
because I feel like this decision by PQ destroys the soul of adventure
racing and turns it into a glorified triathlon.  Adventure racers are
passionate people and we like, no LOVE our sport.  For the biggest race in
the world to just disregard the one basic premise of adventure racing is
sad.  There may be nothing that can be done, but that doesn't mean we
shouldn't try.  If we don't, I fear this will become "just the way it is"
and we'll see adventure racing as a whole take a big giant step nowhere.
I'd like to encourage you to email the race organization and tell them you
think this is a bad idea, even if you're not going to PQ to compete.
Unless, of course, you think having teams use a GPS is a good idea... in
which case I'm not sure you can call yourself an adventure racer and you
should probably unsubscribe to SCARAB or BAAR.

Send an email to PQ and ask them to preserve the integrity of our sport at
news@..., don.mann@...,
dawn.mann@....  I think if the get a big enough response from
the AR community, they may reconsider this potentially huge blunder.  I've
already emailed them 4 times today, but obviously this can't be accomplished
by just one person.

Thanks for taking the time to read this.  If any of you are ever up in
Boise, Idaho, drop me a line and I'll show you some sick
biking/kayaking/trekking in my back yard.

Jason Quinn
formerly of the Silly Rabbits
racing PQ with Team Bones


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]



----- End forwarded message -----