Banff-Jasper Relay
In the shadow of snow-capped Rockies and up the Columbia Icefield, the Banff-Jasper Relay is both challenging and eye-catching.
It wasn’t a place where Alison Shepherd expected to find a soul mate, but there Ed Oosterbaan stood, along the side of the road waiting to start his leg of the Banff-Jasper Relay as a member of another team. It was June 1, 2010. Their post-run chat spurred a long-distance romance and soon Oosterbaan moved from Ontario to Cochrane, Alta., with his two teenage children to form a family with Shepherd and her two teenagers. They got married last September. “This race has special meaning to me,” says Shepherd.
Shepherd and Oosterbaan’s 15-person Twisted Blister team was one of 60 groups winding their way along Highway 93 through Banff and Jasper national parks for a distance of 258k. The Banff-Jasper Relay first began as the Jasper-Banff Relay in 1979, took a hiatus after 2000, and was reborn in 2005 when a group brought the race back in memory of a friend, Garth Huck, who died of a brain tumour in 2004. This year’s race was held in honour of another friend, Jim Morris, who passed away in January 2013 after a long battle with brain cancer. Since 2005, the race has raised more than $170,000 to support the Brain Tumour Foundation of Canada.
Because it’s held in two national parks, the race follows some strict guidelines: There’s an environmental assessment done prior to the race; the racers stick to the highway, which is not closed, so they don’t disturb the landscape; and organizers place 35 porta-potties down along the route so bears are the only creatures doing their
business in the bush. A mandatory captain’s meeting with Parks Canada takes place the night before the race to discuss particulars of running inside a national park. If a team’s captain misses the meeting, that team doesn’t participate. “For instance, one of the rules is that none of the runners can run with personal music devices or earbuds,” race director Blair Shunk explains. “You’re yelling at them that there’s a bear behind them and they just wave at you and keep going.”
The day ends with one of the big social events of the year in Jasper, with dinner for 500 organized by students of the Jasper French School, who use money they raise to pay for field trips. The Jasper Brew Pub donates wine and beer, and the Jasper Fire Department runs the bar to make money for the Multiple Sclerosis Society. In order to start and finish in the daylight, the relay is split into two phases, which run at the same time. The North Phase has 16 stages, starting at Saskatchewan River Landing. The South Phase has nine stages, starting in Banff at Castle Mountain. The finish line for both phases is in Jasper. Runners are required to maintain a pace of 5: 45 per kilometre. The longest leg is 20.6k; the hardest is likely the 15.7k that goes up the Columbia Icefield.