Yes, this is a story about physical feats, about mountaineers and ultra-runners and the sort of elite athletes who think, “I will climb to the top of Mt. Whitney in the snow”—and then they do.

But this is also a story about so much more than that—about how, at the heart of a passion, is a form of strength, strength of mind and strength of character; about the sort of drive that pushes a person outside of what they thought was possible… to create new boundaries that exhilarate and inspire others.

And this is a story about Mark Macy. Perhaps you know him from his early days as an adventure racer, competing in Eco-Challenges and other competitions around the world. You might recognize him from the revived Eco-Challenge series, “The World’s Toughest Race,” recently aired on Prime Video. Maybe you just know him from the trails in Evergreen, the town’s friendliest man, always on the lookout to brighten someone else’s day.

“He takes an interest in other people,” Marshall Ulrich told me, a man who himself has a number of titles and world records under his belt, but spoke with me about Mark just because they’re friends.

“We all have chances to lead and to help each other,” said Mark’s son, Travis Macy, something that he says he learned from both his father and Marshall over the years.

To get to the bottom of this life philosophizing, we need to go back to the 1990s, and the world’s first Eco-Challenge. Dubbed “The World’s Toughest Race,” Eco-Challenge was an adventure race series taking place all over the world, sometimes for more than a week at a time. In essence, adventure racing is a team sport—usually a coed team of four—that requires a variety of skills and disciplines, all demanding supreme athleticism. Teams engage in trekking, biking, paddling or sailing and fixed ropes to navigate an unmarked course—and hope to finish first.

In 1995, after meeting Mark at a small triathlon a few years earlier, Marshall was looking for another team member for the first Eco-Challenge. “I thought of Mark right away because he had a reputation as an ultra runner. I invited him to be on the team,” said Marshall. Mark accepted and from there, the two built a relationship of adventure, along with the other members of their team, the Stray Dogs. “Marshall and I have been all around the world together—deserts and mountains and jungles,” Mark said. “And we were okay. We didn’t win any races typically. Actually,” Mark laughed, “we never won one of them, but we got to be the best of friends.”

Considering the quick bonds formed through less harrowing circumstances, it makes sense that traveling to unknown lands and co-attempting exhausting and death-defying acts is likely to draw people together. “Something like the Eco-Challenge fast-forwards relationships because it’s this microcosm of life and its difficulties. You learn what a person is really about,” Marshall said. “It shows how much character a person has.”

There isn’t space enough in this article to list the winning character traits of Mark Macy, not the least of which is that he is always putting others first. In essence, he’s the very best friend a person could ask for. Marshall said, “I used to kid, ‘Mark, I probably know more about you than your wife does.’ I think that is what Eco-Challenges did for us. We decided we could depend on each other, lean on each other and that deepened our relationship.”

So Travis Macy grew up watching his father tackle super-human challenges while simultaneously modeling that people are the most important thing. In 2005, after finishing college, Travis determined to follow in his father’s footsteps and was himself a member of elite adventure racing teams. When rumors started buzzing about the revival of the Eco-Challenge, Stray Dogs jumped to apply to race.

“It’s a reality TV casting system,” explained Travis. “So they’re looking for experienced teams and they’re also looking for ‘story’ teams. Stray Dogs had all of the experience and they have a cool story. Not only have they been racing together for decades, the average age was over 60. They got in—no surprise there. I also put together my own team.” Travis’s team was also accepted to compete.

As both teams began to train, they confronted an obstacle sooner than they might have expected.

“A diagnosis like Alzheimer’s hits you really hard,” said Travis. But they all—father, son, friends—recalled one of their favorite ‘Mark-isms:’ It’s all good mental training. “All those years, Dad would call the tough stuff ‘mental training.’ Of course, we didn’t know Alzheimer’s was coming, but you know something is going to come. That’s life.”

Mark, who had for years had a relationship with Mark Burnett, creator of Eco-Challenge, along with Travis as advocate, appealed to the organization.

“Travis was very instrumental in helping plead Mark’s case to the selection committee, and that went a long way,” said Marshall. “[Stray Dogs] was, by far, the oldest team out there, which was a great selling point. But with that, we knew we would have our own age-related challenges. Travis was the go-to guy who could keep them going, and the father-son relationship made perfect sense for Mark to jump to Travis’s team.”

“And most importantly to me,” said Travis, “I realized, I wanted to race with my dad.” Travis enlisted Evergreen natives Shane Sigle and Danelle Ballengee, as well as Andrew Speers, who teaches at Evergreen High School, as Team Endure’s support person. The entire team was focused on making Eco-Challenge attainable for Mark. True to character, while everyone worked to rearrange the teams and earn both teams a spot in the race, Mark’s concern was everyone else. When Travis asked his dad to join his team, his first response was, “What are my teammates going to do?”

In the end, another Stray Dog, affectionately called “Dr. Bob,” joined forces on Marshall’s team, and Mark was permitted to compete with Travis.

Mark told me, “I was always excited for Eco-Challenge, and so this race was no different—even though it was kind of different. I’m surprised they let me into the race, and once we knew I was going to get in, I was very excited to get there and see what happened.”