We should have read the fine print - Webnode



Wilf: Had we read the fine print, we would have noticed that the Amazing London Race was sponsored by Animals for the Unethical Treatment of People (AUTP). We would have understood that events like this generally attract triathletes and hyper-fitness fanatics, not 40- to 50-something couch potatoes. And I wouldn’t have been laying in bed for the past 2 days, feeling exquisite pain from the simple act of ... well ... existing.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s go back to Saturday morning. We ate a hearty breakfast, did a few stretching exercises and shared some laughs. We’d more-or-less resolved ourselves to finishing last, and decided to do a (hopefully funny) photo-documentary of the whole experience.

You know … stuff like this:

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Judy prepares for the race. Wilf offers positive encouragement.

But once the race started, something kicked in … some kind of Darwinian, survival-of-the-fittest instinct. That was a mistake, of course. But it all seemed so natural at the start.

Along with 20 other teams, we charged out of the AUTP facility (a.k.a. WADA) at 10 am. sharp. We were 3rd out of the parking lot and 6th to arrive at East Park. [This was the beginning of a consistent theme: We drove assertively, but not aggressively … unlike some of our esteemed competitors. And I'm not only saying this because one of our sponsors is a cop. We actually did interpret red lights to mean “stop”.]

Anyway, through dumb luck, I was actually the first to arrive at East Park’s rock climbing wall. Even then, I was only the third climber. Crazy me … I didn’t realize “lining up” was a contact sport. As for the rock climbing itself … not fun, but I did OK.

Judy: Wilf's being humble. One of the other contestants complimented him on his impressive rock-climbing calves.

Next, we headed over to Rona where we were given two options: assemble a wheelbarrow or get someone to donate $5 to Mackayla’s Fight for Sight. No-brainer there … Wilf and I are both allergic to tools. Asking for money: Well, you know we can do THAT!

[Note: We met Mackayla later. That’s her to the right. She’s a doll.]

Wilf: Next destination: London Scuba Centre. Now I don't want to be critical here. And correct me if I’m wrong. But isn’t it the navigator’s job to realize that we passed the Scuba location 6 blocks back, and that we really should turn around and return to the point where the driver originally asked, “Isn’t it around here somewhere?” I’m just asking.

Judy: Now Wilf, this is a team sport and there is no “I” in team. So stop pointing fingers. Just get in that pool and retrieve that clue! We're wasting time here! Do you expect me to do all the work?

Wilf: All right, all right! I took a quick dip and sprinted back to the car, shoeless and dripping wet. Then I sprinted back to the pool to find Judy, who seemed to be chatting up the lifeguard.

Judy: Hey, I was waiting for you to get out of the men's change-room. I was not about to charge in there myself. What was it about me yelling “Wilf, where the heck are you” that you couldn't hear?

Wilf: Ummm ... I was in the car already. But never mind. There is no “I” in team. And we were still, somehow, in 3rd place.

Judy: On to the Razzle Dazzle Cupcakes – the location I’d been waiting for! I bolted in the door, was presented with the most beautiful cupcake I'd ever seen, and then proceed to rip it apart with my thumbs after being told there was a cryptogram inside. I'm sorry cupcake … you really deserved better than that. Anyway, Wilf and I decoded it to find our next clue: Make your way to Victoria Park. I then licked the icing off my fingers as we flew back to the car and on to our next destination.

Wilf: At Victoria Park, we got a sheet of paper with 10 questions: What year was the cenotaph dedicated? Who fired the first canon in the infamous North London vs. South London conflict? How may chucks could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood? That sort of thing. You basically run around the park looking for memorials and statues and signs.

Judy: I think the fact that Wilf was running around in a bathing suit and bare feet worked in our favour. People gave us a lot of room. And all those summer festivals spent wandering around the Park didn’t hurt either. Bottom line: We left the park in 1st place – woohoo! – and headed south. The drive gave us a chance to catch our breath and rest our legs. My shins were starting to hurt! It also gave Wilf a chance to put his shoes on. Good thing. The next destination was the Days Inn, and they have standards.

Wilf: Days Inn involved – and I know this will surprise you – running around, looking for clues. We had some “issues” there. For the sake of familial harmony, and to ensure I continue to have a place to stay when I’m working in Toronto, let’s just leave it at that. We arrived at the Days Inn in 1st place and left in 3rd.

Judy: What?!! You disappeared while I was finding all the clues. What were you doing? Do you know the personal sacrifices I made at that stop? There were tons of handsome, attentive single men hanging around the pool, the horseshoe pit and the lobby calling out, dying to talk to me. I've never had so much attention in my life. But no, I remained focused on the task at hand!

Wilf: At this point, it all becomes an adrenaline-induced blur. There was Adventures on Wonderland, where Judy dove into a pit of plastic balls and triumphantly emerged with one labelled “Amazing Race.” Then Panago Pizza, where we assembled 5 pizza boxes, stuffed them with flyers and gave them away to some Western students along with a Shinerama donation.

Wilf: And then came Rona North. Now don’t get me wrong. I’m sure they’re a wonderful organization. I’m sure they provide value to customers and fulfilling employment to their staff. They obviously give back to the community. But they were exceedingly cruel to us. We had to walk up and down all 3,584 aisles in order to find 10 products that were surreptitiously marked “Amazing Race” in tiny, invisible ink. OK … the ink wasn’t exactly invisible, but it was close. We spent over an hour there. It would have been longer, but we eventually formed a temporary alliance with Jay and Terry and closed the deal. Given my longstanding phobia of shopping in general, and big box stores in particular, I felt I did quite well. Even better, I am now intimately familiar with the differences between epoxy, cement and resin-based grouts.

Judy: I love to shop, so didn't mind Rona at all. Retail is exhilarating and therapeutic – pretty much no matter what's for sale! Plus, by this point, I could handle some leisurely aisle walking. Of course, had I known at the time that Jay and Terry were doctors at London's Children Hospital, I probably would have chatted them up some more. But hey, them's the breaks.

Wilf: Hot diggety dog! Before we left Rona, we had to eat a hot dog at one of those “I wonder when a Food Inspector last had a good look at this” carts.

FYI, the world’s best wiener-wolfer can down 68 dogs in 10 minutes. That’s 8.8 seconds per hot dog. Judy needed a full 4½ minutes to finish hers. And that still gave her enough time to return to the parked car (which was located in the closest available spot 6.3 km away), drive it back and sit there honking while I finished my meal. As a fan of the slow food movement, I’m actually proud of that. Who wants to be known as a wiener-wolfer?

And we left Rona in … cue drum roll … 3rd place!

Judy: I'm still suffering from that weiner wolfing!

Wilf: The next destination was Masonville Place. By this time, we were totally exhausted. We were ready for something easy. Like a massage. What we got instead was an ogre in medieval armour with a “rack” and a pot of boiling oil. No, I’m kidding. It was worse than that. It was a 23-year-old fitness freak with a rowing machine, a whistle and a stop-watch. Out of generosity, let’s call him Dr. Evil.

Aside: When we arrived, Terry was on the rowing machine beside us. Terry looks like Brock Lesnar, except that he’s a marginally better dresser, and he has a medical degree. He actually put less exertion into his rowing than I put into a average Sudoku. Then he had the machine as a post-workout snack.

Our story was different. Neither of us had ever rowed before. We begged for mercy. We begged for the rack. We even tried for a Senior’s Discount. But Dr. Evil was having none of that. By the time we had completed our 2,000 meters of high-intensity rowing, 200 full-extension toe touches and 50 burpees, we were snivelling like babies. Our faces were fire-engine-red, our muscles were seized up and our heartbeats were in the defibrillation zone. I was definitely regretting not having read the Death Waiver & Release before I signed it.

Judy: Full declaration: I’ve actually rowed before – for about 5 minutes in a GoodLife gym more than 10 years ago. There's a reason I only rowed for 5 minutes. Plus, I've never been able to touch my toes – and what the heck is a burpee! In thinking about this Race in advance, I’d envisioned Wilf and myself cheering each other on through the challenges. Trust me, there was none of that enthusiasm here! In our short breaks between exercises, both Wilf and I were collapsed against an ATM machine. You know how people wobble around when they’ve wandered through the desert for days without water? That was me. I think I might be able to do a burpee again in 2010. One consolation: We got LuluLemon headbands!

I guess it’s possible that Wilf may have done a bit more than 50% of the rowing. Yeah team! And when the torture was over, we were still in 3rd place.

Wilf: We crawled into the Build-a-Bear Workshop … an event that even my relatively-low testosterone levels prevented me from participating in.

Judy: This is where I specialize. I picked a fuzzy, flat bear out of a box, and sweat all over the helpful sales associate while she filled it up with stuffing. Then I got to pick out an adorable little red heart, kiss it, rub it over my heart, and make a wish before stuffing it in the back of the bear. How cute!!! Then she sewed it up and we donated it back to kids at the Hospital.

Wilf: We crawled back to the car.

Judy: That's not far from the truth. I could hardly walk anymore. My legs were only moving forward because I was shifting my hips and forcing them forward. There was NOTHING left. Wilf picked me up at the curb of the mall.

Wilf: We cranked up the A/C, hooked up the intravenous, and cruised over to the Windermere Golf where we puttered around a bit.

Judy: Actually, Wilf puttered around a bit. He had the task complete before I even made it to the green.

After that was Fanshawe Pioneer Village. This was a cool challenge – and right up my professional alley. We had to spell out the letters of one of the event sponsors on an old printing press in order to make a thank you card for them. N-E-A-T-O!! We did it right, but the 4th place team – triathletes 20 years our junior – was hot on our tail. And I couldn't walk. One false hip swing, and I was going to be doing a face plant in the gravel. “Wilf, get the car and pick me up! I'll walk to meet you as far as I can.”

Wilf: And finally, we returned to the AUTP facility. First they put us into an oversized sand pit and had us dig for a key. The 1st place team had already been at it for 20 minutes … and they had a rake!

Judy: I loved this task! Sand – it's soft, and I could lay down in it! I was surprised how quickly I made it to the ground. If it took us 20 minutes here, I was fine with that!

Wilf: No such luck. We found our key in 2 minutes. [I knew that iPhone metal detector application would eventually come in handy!]

And so it was that we arrived at the second-to-last event in a virtual tie for 2nd. Could the impossible happen? Could a couple of middle-aged knowledge workers win the Amazing London Race? By this time, only 4 teams were left in the race, and we only had to beat one of those teams to make the final.

And what was the second-to-last event? It was a series of football-related activities. Oh oh. My brothers played football in high school. I belonged to the Chess Club.

Judy: And I was on the Reach for the Top team. This wasn't looking good. It took me about 10 throws of the football to get it through that tiny hole.

Wilf: Ten? That must be the confangled new math they teach these days.

[And yes, there is an “I” in “close, but no cigar”.]

Judy: Then I got stuck in the plastic gauntlet. Yes, I got stuck. Next, we had to do some crazy military crawl under a 12-inch net. Let's just say I moved as fast as a six month old making their first moves. Then we had to roll two tank-sized tires across the field.

Finally, we had to push some crazy heavy metal thing across the field. Was it a gridiron? I've actually used that word in my writing as a metaphor for something that’s hard to do, but I have no idea what it is. [Wilf: Fellow males: Feel my pain.] Anyway, it'll come as no surprise to you that we weren't too speedy with it all.

After all 4 teams had completed this challenge, they announced the 3 teams that had qualified for the finals. Wilf and I were none too disappointed to hear the words “Team Double Dutch, I'm sorry to tell you, but you have been eliminated from the race.” Thank the heavens!

I slumped against the wall, and watched as the three remaining teams did some insane beep-timed running thing. It was an endurance race where they had to keep running faster and faster until only one team was left running. In the end, it was Jay and Terry … a well-deserved win! They donated their $500 winning prize back to the charity.

Exhausted, spent, silly with fatigue, we were pleased with our fourth-place finish. “You guys did great,” said a few of the other teams, with the obvious but unspoken subtext, “especially for really old people.” To be honest, we surprised even ourselves.

Wilf: To those of you who told us to have fun: We did … at least, most of the time.

To those who told us – and I’m quoting here – “I want you to earn every cent of it, through your blood, sweat, tears and terror”: Oh yeah, we definitely earned it. Judy spent the rest of the evening with a wicked case of sun stroke. And 3 days later, Wilf is still feeling like he’s been worked over by a 2-by-4.

And to those of you who had a delusional expectation that we would win: Well … we actually did win! We were the biggest fundraisers among all contestants ($1,650 in total), and that won us a first-class London-to-Ottawa round-trip on Via Rail.

But the big winners, of course, are Mackayla’s Fight for Sight and the Children’s Health Foundation.

Thanks, everyone for your amazing generosity.

Now pay up (. You can pay in person, or – if that’s inconvenient – you can send us a cheque. (We’re on Canada 411).

Judy: I’m pleased to report that we're still good friends at the end of it all.

Wilf: True, true. But I think we’ve also agreed … we won’t ever do this again!

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