Adventure at Speed

Christchurch endurance athlete and orienteering champion Chris Forne, 31, has navigated Team Nike to first place in America’s 10-day adventure race, Primal Quest Montana 2008. Over 800km and up heights of more than 30,000m, Forne and his four-time defending team trekked, mountain biked, whitewater kayaked, riverboarded and, in a rare instance, free climbed their way to the finish line. It had been barely a year since Forne joined the team, and for Nike to hand the navigational reigns to him at the time was akin to the Super Bowl champions asking a college star to play quarterback – albeit one who began reading topographic maps at age six. “He’s the best I’ve ever seen on a race course, by far,” Nike’s captain, Mike Kloser of Vail, would say after the race. What began June 23 as a 56-team competition quickly turned into the latest illustration of why an obscure unit of aerobic mutants can be counted among the most dominant institutions in professional athletics. Forne is “basically king of the thriving endurance-racing world in New Zealand” wrote Colorado paper Summit Daily. “At home, Chris sort of sets the benchmark, and everyone else tries to beat him – in anything,” says Aaron Prince, Forne’s former teammate and fellow Christchurch native. “If you can get one over Chris, ever, it’s a good day.”