During his high school years, Kyle Halliday thoroughly enjoyed watching a television reality series that popularized the sport of adventure racing.

As he watched some of the early episodes of the 1990’s Eco Challenge television show, Halliday thought that competing in adventure racing would be an amazing thing, but that it was something simply out of reach for him.

He was wrong—as he learned about 10 years later.

"You go places where almost no one would ever go."

In 2005, two developments launched Halliday, a computer scientist and project leader in Global Security’s Computing Application Division, into the sport of adventure racing.

One day as he was talking with a family friend, she told him: “You like to mountain bike, you like to trek and you enjoy the outdoors, you ought to try adventure racing.”

Later, Halliday learned that there are adventure racing events of one day or less, shorter than the typical five-day, expedition-length races. Soon, he was off to the races.

In 2005, Halliday competed in his first adventure race, undertaking the four-hour Big Blue Tahoe event with his future wife, Rachel.

“We had a great time and at the end I thought we should have done the longer version of the race (there are also 8-hour and 12-hour races),” Halliday said. “The combination of navigation, teamwork and multisport was something special and drew me in immediately.”

“I love adventure racing. It’s challenging in a lot of ways. The courses are completely unmarked except for the checkpoint flags. A big part of being successful is planning the most efficient route between checkpoints,” Halliday said.

“You go places where almost no one would ever go. Getting to explore the wilderness with a map and compass is a unique experience every time.”

To date, Halliday and his teammates have competed in three five-day, expedition-length races – twice in the Expedition Oregon/America’s Toughest Race, in 2019 and 2021, and once in the Endless Mountains Adventure Race in Pennsylvania in 2022.

He and his teammates also have competed in about 30 shorter races, including Big Blue Tahoe (4–12 hours), Gold Rush in the Sierra foothills (8–30 hours), Dawn to Dusk in Central California (12 hours) and the Maine Summer Adventure Race (24 hours). 

Something of a niche sport, adventure racing is a multisport navigation race where teams of one-to-four participants find checkpoints placed throughout an unmarked course using a map and compass. The races typically involve mountain biking, trekking and paddling, using kayaks, canoes and/or pack-rafts, depending on the course. The teams travel together for the entire race, so adventure races are not relay-type events. 

A typical expedition race can range from 200–300 miles, with about 50 checkpoints. Entry fees for these races run from $1,000 to $2,000 per person.

“It’s well worth the cost for the work the race organizations put into setting up the course and the logistics.

“Every race is different. Even if the course is in the same area, every course can have a different layout or emphasis. A lot of thought goes into how to make these courses interesting and to take advantage of the natural features of the terrain.”

There are challenges for adventure racers like Halliday even before the race starts, as they have to figure out the gear they’ll need, their food and their sleep strategy for the competition.

About a week before the race, the competitors receive an overview that describes the course from a high level, such as that the race will start with 80 miles of mountain biking, 20 miles of pack-rafting, a trek of 50 miles, another pack-raft of 30 miles and 30 miles more of mountain biking.

“Expedition adventure racing is like doing the longest mountain bike ride you’ve ever done, followed by the longest hike you’ve ever done, followed by the longest canoe paddle you’ve ever done. And then you get three hours of sleep. And then you get up and do it again.”

Once an expedition race is under way, Halliday and his team usually employ a strategy of pushing through the first night of the competition without sleep and then sleeping for about three hours the next night.

“Eating and sleeping are all done on the clock, so deciding when and where to stop for a sleep is often part of the race strategy. One of my favorite parts of adventure racing is doing navigation at night because it’s hard to do,” Halliday said. “It’s difficult to stay awake and the area you can see is only a small bubble.”

Once the adventure races are underway, the competitors might go 30–100 miles on a leg to reach a transition area, where there are boxes. The participants disassemble their bikes and place them in the boxes, which are then moved to the next stage of the race where the bikes are needed. At another transition area, canoes or pack-rafts would be available for crossing a lake or river.

“Some of the races have a climbing or ropes section that may involve rock climbing or rappelling. And one even had Tyrolian traverse somewhat similar to a zip line.”

The adventure racers usually carry backpacks of 20–30 pounds, hauling food, water, a whistle, a head lamp and batteries, layers of clothing, including rain jackets, and sleeping bags.

To fuel their bodies as they bike, trek and paddle on the 200- to 300-mile journeys through the wilderness, Halliday and his team often carry a wide variety of food—energy bars, trail mix, nuts, dried fruit, junk food, snacks like Cheetos, Pringles and gummy bears, pickles and even leftover pizza.

Some of the elite adventure-racing teams travel unbelievably fast and beat the average teams by a full day, according to Halliday, who has worked at the Laboratory for 22 years. Some teams travel around the world competing in expedition-level races.

“Two of the attractions of adventure racing for me are the teamwork and camaraderie we develop and organizing the logistics. I’ve learned to be adaptable with the options for our routes because what you see on the ground may not be what you were expecting.”

“Some of my favorite moments have featured wildlife sightings, such as a swimming wild boar, a beaver slapping its tail to chase us away, sea otters and seals swimming nearby, an owl staring us down in the middle of the night, rattlesnake startles and countless eyes staring at us through the trees, their eyes glowing with the reflection of our headlamps,” Halliday said.

On all three of his expedition-level adventure races, Halliday has teamed up with Ivan Lopez, who lives in the East Bay area and hails from Colombia. 

“Ivan is something of a pack mule; he’s very strong.  If one of us is having trouble with our load, we can hand it off to him,” Halliday said.

Lopez works in the information-technology industry and is a “mountain-biking powerhouse” in Halliday’s view.

“We met through the Bay Area adventure racing community at a training event back in 2014 or 2015.  We had both been planning on competing in the Big Blue Tahoe race in September, but it had been canceled due to wildfire smoke.

“We showed up to the training event separately as solos, chatted for a few minutes and decided to partner up for the day. We turned out to be very compatible in terms of speed and overall racing goals. We teamed up for a Dawn to Dusk race the next year and have been racing together ever since,” Halliday said.

Through the years in their three major expedition races, Halliday, Lopez and their team have turned in improved finishes – securing 13th out of 17 teams in the 2019 Expedition Oregon race, 15th out of 36 teams in the 2021 Expedition Oregon race and 11th place out of 32 teams in the Pennsylvania Endless Mountains race.

The Sierra foothills Gold Rush races have been centered in three California counties – Calaveras, Tuolumne and Mariposa – and have been staged near Arnold, Pinecrest, New Melones Reservoir, Lake McClure and Beardsley Lake. One of the shorter races, the Dawn to Dusk race, was held in Central California near San Luis Obispo.

“One of my favorite things about adventure races is that every race is different, and I have had the opportunity to visit some amazing places that are way off the beaten path.”

During their expedition races and even shorter races, Halliday and his team have temporarily found themselves lost a few times, but never for a long period or really lost.

“We generally have a very good idea of where we are. Once, we were within a half-mile of a checkpoint but we didn’t go far enough.”

In 2024, adventure racing hit the big screen with the movie, “Arthur the King,” depicting the true story of a Swedish team that picked up a canine hitchhiker who eventually became a fifth teammate during a race.

“The team tossed a meatball to a stray dog and the dog followed them for 50-100 miles. When they started kayaking, intending to leave the dog behind, he jumped into the water and followed them. They then put him in the kayak,” Halliday said.

Halliday and his family, including his wife, Rachel, his daughter Annie and his son Ben, have competed in an event called orienteering that is similar to adventure racing. Orienteering races are shorter and only on foot, with no mountain biking or water paddling sections.

“My daughter Annie and I have competed together in the Nav-X Challenge orienteering race series the past two years and we ended up winning the mixed-gender short course series (runs last between two and four hours) for the 2023 and 2024 seasons,” he said, adding that he is “extraordinarily grateful” for his wife’s support of his adventure racing. 

In 2023, Halliday and his daughter competed in Nav-X orienteering races at Sunol, Cache Creek and Briones, and last year they took part in races at Black Diamond Mines, Mt. Tamalpais and Shell Ridge (Walnut Creek).

More recently, in July, Halliday and Annie raced in the eight-hour Maine Summer Adventure Race. “It was her first adventure race, and we had a blast. We cleared the course in just under six hours and finished in second place among co-ed teams, 6th overall out of 50 teams,” he said.

“I have greatly improved my navigation skills by participating in orienteering events.  Both the Bay Area Orienteering Club and the Nav-X Challenge organizations host local events and are a great way to get started,” Halliday said.

While he doesn’t have plans to compete in another expedition-length adventure race at this point, Halliday expects to continue competing in shorter races.

“Adventure racing has opened the door for me to enjoy some very cool adventures. I still really enjoy exploring new places and I plan to continue adventure racing for the camaraderie and adventure.”