Chatting with John Jacoby...

Jacqueline Windh / 03.10.2007

John Jacoby has been on the AR scene for 20 years, entering his first race, the New Zealand Coast to Coast back in 1987. Since then, he has raced with many of the sport’s legendary figures, including Mike Kloser, Ian Adamson, Keith Murray, Steve Gurney, Rebecca Rusch, Jane Hall, Robyn Benincasa, Cathy Sassin, Pete James, Alina McMaster, and Novak Thompson.

The list of races in which John Jacoby has competed reads more like a history of the sport. He has logged numerous podium finishes in pretty much every major competition including: several Eco-Challenges, Southern Traverse, Raid Gauloises, Primal Quest, Bull of Africa, ARWS Sweden, and Raid World Cup.

These days, John divides his time up between racing, organizing races (including the Keen Adventure Race coming up this April) through his company Rapid Ascent, and being the main carer for his two young sons Fergus and Harry (while his wife, Bridget, who he calls his “number one sponsor”, works full-time).

John updates us on his life and his racing in this exclusive interview with SleepMonsters.

Didn’t you used to be a banker?
I resigned from the bank two and a half years ago, after taking two and a half years of paternity leave, unpaid leave, career breaks etc. And I don’t miss it at all!
Banking has similiarities to the event organizing that I’m doing now, in that you constantly have to deal and negotiate with large bureaucracies, which is extremely frustrating and is the worst part of the job.
Banking is largely a “people” type job – in that respect not a lot different to organizing adventure races ... lots of different personalities to deal with, and impossible to keep everyone happy.

So what’s inspired you to actually start organizing races?

My main motivation is to put on enjoyable adventure races for competitors in pleasant environments, while still providing tough physical challenges.

I think a lot of races these days are organized for the wrong reasons, people putting on races that are just pure suffer-fests. There is no need for this. You can still have a hard tough race that is enjoyable and spectacular. It is a matter of getting the balance and location right.