Camaraderie is a big reason Lyndie Hill feels people enjoy taking on the White Kennedy Elevator Race.
“It’s just such a fun team event. It’s also a challenge,” said Hill, owner of Hoodoo Adventures, which puts on the event. “It’s a really unique challenge in the way you are covering so much different terrain. It’s so beautiful too. The course is just world-class really.”
The course provides a 6,000-foot elevation change and is described to have terrain and views “that stand above the rest, making the Elevator Race the only one of it’s kind.”
Once the paddle is completed, participants get on their road bike, then its run/snowshoe, mountain bike, Nordic ski, hike and downhill ski/board from valley floor to mountain top.
Hill said another factor helping the event grow is that it is part of the Elevation Series of four races. They have also partnered with Travel Penticton to help with marketing. Word is getting out and people know it is a reliable event since is in its sixth year.
This year, 130 people will gather and psyche each other up at the SS Sicamous, racing into the lake to start the paddle leg at 8:30 a.m. Athletes will be officially finished once the individual or team member crosses the finish line past the gates of the downhill ski at Apex Mountain Resort and being handed an Elevator beverage, compliments of Tree Brewery.
Proceeds from the series are donated to a not-for-profit society that supports local youth, The Youth Outdoor Recreation Society. (Y.O.R.S), which provides affordable programs for mainstream and at-risk youth in the Okanagan to participate in outdoor recreation, education and leadership activities.
So far, the series has raised $1,000.