Bridlewood runners finish first in city’s amazing race

city chase. Long-time friends and Bridlewood residents Mike Reade and Mike Bessuille finished in first place in Ottawa’s City Chase, an annual competition with hundreds of teams completing challenges for chase points and racing for the best time. The Kanata duo will be off to Quebec City to compete in the national City Chase in September. Submitted photo

Mike Reade and Mike Bessuille, friends since attending classes at Earl of March High School together, competed in their 12th City Chase, an urban spinoff of The Amazing Race reality series.

The duo, both 39-year-old Bridlewood residents, competed for their fourth year on July 18, taking on 450 other teams to compete for chase points across the city.

From performing a short children’s play to answering trivia and navigating an obstacle course on a skateboard with one member blindfolded, the team raced around Ottawa to be the first to cross the finish line at Major’s Hill Park.

Within the first hour, the team – known as the Moops, a term from a Seinfeld episode – had about half of the necessary 10 chase points.

“We knew we were running a good race from the beginning,” said Bessuille, who works at Adobe.

“We’re pretty good at the challenges,” said Reade. “That’s one of the reason we do so well. We stay away from the ones that have a long line up.”

He said they missed needed buses twice, so they had to make route adjustments on the fly.

“We were on the buses for like 45 minutes, I thought the whole race was slipping away from us,” said Bessuille.

But they completed the 10 challenges in three hours and one minute; the second and third place teams both finished within three minutes after the Kanata duo.

Reade, who works for Nortel, said the race was more complex and difficult than last year, but having his wife and two friends ready at home to look up locations, plan routes and answer questions was a huge help.

“They’re just as much a part of the team as Mike and I are,” said Bessuille about the support system.

“The clues were harder this year as well, it wasn’t as obvious,” explained Reade. “We had to spend more time working through it.”

Last year, due to one wrong answer on a trivia challenge, the team had to complete an extra chase point than they expected and put them in third place.

“We really wanted it this year,” said Reade.

On Saturday, they crossed the finish line in almost the exact same time as last year – but this time, no one was there ahead of them.

Reade said the most rewarding accomplishment was collecting the most donations for Right To Play, a charity that provides sports equipment and opportunities to children suffering from poverty, disease and war.

The team raised more than $2,500 in less than 48 hours, the time allotted to complete the challenge.

The reward for their hard work was free lifetime entries into City Chase.

“That was definitely worth our efforts,” said Reade. “We couldn’t have done it without all the other people that helped us.”

 URBAN CHALLENGE

Bessuille first convinced Reade to join Urban Challenge, a similar Amazing Race-style challenge, when it was held in Ottawa. They were hooked, so when City Chase came to the capital, they signed up and have now completed 12 races in Toronto, Montreal and Ottawa.

Reade said the two have been friends since high school, so there is no discussion about who is doing what when they reach a challenge – they know each other’s strengths and weaknesses well. But that doesn’t stop them from some disagreements.

“We argue the whole time basically,” he said, adding that it’s usually about whether to wait for a bus or keep moving.

“He’s the runner,” Reade said about his partner. “He’s yelling at me the whole time.”

“I’m more the impatient Mike,” admitted Bessuille. “He’s the one that wants to think it through.

“That’s one of the reasons we do so well,” he added. “We have skills and attributes that compliment each other.”

The duo will be off to a new city in September as the prize for winning in Ottawa; taking on Quebec City with the first place finishers of the six other Canadian City Chase competitions. The top team will take home brand-new Mitsubishi Lancer Sportbacks and represent Canada at the world championships, which was held in Morocco last year.

“We’re looking forward to that, to representing Ottawa there,” said Reade about Quebec City. “We’re hoping to do well – we’re hoping to not be eliminated first.”

Reade said the national race is completely different from the city version; instead of receiving all the instructions at the starting line to plan a route, directions are given only for the next chase point. It’s also a lot longer and more intense: Ottawa’s City Chase had a time limit of six hours, but the national version could take up to two days to complete.

“It’s very different challenges,” he explained. “It’s much more intensive.”

Bessuille said he is afraid of heights, so the possibility of bungee jumping or sky diving has created some nervous anticipation – but he won’t let difficult tasks slow him down.

“We’ll do just about anything,” he said. “We don’t care what it is. We’ll do whatever it takes.”

Reade said he and his partner are very in shape – playing ultimate twice a week and running when they can – but need to step it up to make it through the Quebec City.

“We’re definitely going to start training now,” he said.

Part of the preparation will be learning about Quebec’s provincial capital, like major centers and popular destinations.

“But you can’t learn everything they might throw at you,” Reade said.

“This is not going to be an easy race at all,” added Bessuille. But he said the advice  given from previous winners was to simply enjoy the ride and experiences they wouldn’t normally have.

Bessuille said it will be easier to appreciate the race after it’s all over, in the middle of it he is expecting to be exhausted and pushed to the limit.

“We’re extremely competitive,” he said. “We don’t do anything without going all out and trying to win.”