PORT ANGELES — The first Peninsula Adventure Sports series race of the year is coming this weekend with the Frosty Moss Team Relay, which has moved back to a winter event.
The Frosty Moss is a team endurance 80-mile, 15-leg race that goes along both paved and unpaved legs along the Olympic Discovery Trail Adventure Route and the Olympic Discovery trail all the way from the Sol Duc Valley near to Blyn. It begins early Saturday morning with members of teams taking on different 3- to 11-mile legs that can climb as much as 1,300 feet.
Each team can have two to five members. There is also a 30-mile-long “Mini Moss” that goes from Ediz Hook in Port Angeles to Blyn. Also new this year is a 50K Mini Moss solo race along the same route.
There are 64 teams with 260 runners signed up so far. Several of the teams are from the Olympic Peninsula, but others are from Seattle, Minnesota, Portland, Ore., Olympia, Mount Vernon, Tacoma and Kitsap County.
The Frosty Moss began as a mid-winter race but had to be moved to the spring last year because of a landslide along the Olympic Discovery trail north of Lake Crescent.
Competitors could see snow during the event, especially in some of the higher elevations, as snow and rain showers are forecast Saturday.
While the competition is fierce, the Frosty Moss is also a fun run, with teams dressing up in costumes and decorating their support vehicles, as well as themes for exchange zones. There are prizes for first-place teams in both races, last place, mediocrity (the team that finishes exactly in the middle), plus best team theme/costumes/car decorations.
Peninsula Adventure Sports thanks its exchange zone sponsors — Forks Young Life, YMCA Youth and Government, AmeriCorps, Port Angeles High School Key Club, Back Country Horsemen-Peninsula Chapter (Two-time winners of best exchange zone), U.S. Coast Guard, LDS Young Women and Young Men, Sequim High School Cross Country Team, Field Arts and Events Center and the Peninsula Trails Coalition.
There is no race day registration but registrations will be taken as late as midnight Friday. Cost is $100 per Frosty Moss team, $80 for the Mini-Moss and $85 for the 50K solo. People can register at www.tinyurl.com/FrostyMoss2022.
The Frosty Moss is the first of multiple races during the year organized by Peninsula Adventure Sports. The next race is the Olympic Adventure Trail run in April, then the Gravel Unravel gravel bike races from May to July and the GOAT run and Big Hurt in September.
Last year, the group also organized its first Extreme Cyclocross Port Angeles event at the Extreme Sports Park.
