Robin – I am doing the Yukon 1000 as my Misogi—a challenge deliberately beyond comfort and certainty. This race isn’t about winning, but about transformation. By committing to 1,000 miles of raw wilderness, isolation, and endurance, I’m choosing to test the edges of who I am and what I’m capable of.
The Yukon is unforgiving and humbling, and that’s the point. Misogi teaches that true growth happens where failure is a real possibility. In facing this river, the silence, the hardship, and the unknown, I expect to strip away distraction and rediscover what endurance, resilience, and presence truly mean.
I’m racing not just to cross a finish line, but to cross a threshold — proving to myself that the limits I thought were fixed are in fact movable.
Mark – I was lucky enough to complete the race last year with my wife, Julie, as part of Team Bristol Train. It was a spectacular experience, brutal and joyful in equal measure. I had not planned to race this year but have been training with Robin for months so when his partner, Warren, had to drop out, I was honoured and more than delighted to step in. I do not know about ritual purification (Misogi) but I can say the world shifts when you hit Lake Laberge, and by day five something inside you will be changed forever. Knowing what is to come does not make it any easier……