Adventure Race

with Dario Padilla

An adventurous scavenger hunt? A local version of the 'Amazing Race'? A challenging, energetic, kick-ass time? Well it was all that and then some. On Saturday Jan. 24th a couple hundred adventurous people all met up at the Catalina Jazz Bar to get their race on. And should I mention that out of the couple of hundred people that attended, SCOA came to play with thirty of our own fun-loving competitors? Hell yes! Because by the end of the race, everyone there knew about our awesome SCOA Meetup group. We couldn't have asked for a better day to have an Urban Race either, nice and cool with intermittent cloud cover, it reminded me of why I love living in So Cal. Supplied with a list of questions to decipher (all those people with their IPhones had it much easier), each team had to make their way to specific destinations throughout Hollywood and Downtown Los Angeles utilizing only public transportation and their feet. When they said “GO,” a multitude of teams (ranging from 2 – 6 people) took off in different directions. Some teams wearing blue wigs, other teams dressed in their running attire, and many teams made up of people they had just met, made me think we wouldn’t come in first place…but we definitely wouldn’t come in last place either. Yes…because I did arrive late (Mea Culpa, Mea Culpa) my only teammate was the venerable Chris Ashford. Together our Wonder Twin Powers activated to form Team Jumbo Liah!

We walked, jogged, ran, and took the Metro to locations around the Grauman's Chinese Theatre, Capitol Records, Pershing Square, The Walt Disney Concert Hall, and the Central Market Place to name just a few. Through it all we continually saw other teams making their way through the urban maze of our city. Even more so, we got to meet many other random people who helped us on our Trek. It definitely surprised me to see just how many people asked us what we were doing and then said “That sounds like Fun!” After a full afternoon and several miles walked, Team Jumbo Liah headed back to the Catalina Jazz Club, picked up our T-shirt & bag of Swag, and had a nice cold beer with many other tired but happy competitors. It was definitely a great opportunity to see friends and meet new people. And throughout that day, we only had one casualty – Erica, who hurt her leg by jumping from rooftop to rooftop (or was that from doing a kung-fu kick on a rival team member?) and is hopefully OK by now.

I look forward to next year’s race, as I will definitely win it next time. And if anything, I can easily think that SCOA could probably arrange even a better event on its own! I look forward to seeing you guys out and about.