By Jaime Polmateer
The fourth annual Man Tracker Invitational is taking place at the Wells Gray Golf Resort from Aug. 17—19, with the original man himself, Terry Grant, making a return to Clearwater for the event.
This year marks the second time Grant has been in attendance at the first-of-its-kind event inspired by his show and those interested can enter to win a game of golf with the man himself, with all proceeds going to the Clearwater River Cabin.
“This year we are raffling off tickets for a golf game with Terry so it’ll be a group of four including him,” said Candus Graffunder-Pelton, event coordinator with the Man Tracker Invitational committee.
“There will be three spots available and they get to do a game on Saturday, Aug. 18 from 9 a.m. until noon; it’ll be nine holes.”
Youth games have also been incorporated into the weekend. Though it’s always been a family event, age limits were previously imposed in the main tournament style game.
The game has a five team maximum for both tracker and prey teams, with trackers mounted on horseback whose goal is to eliminate as many prey as possible after prey are given a 10 minute head start to evade the opponents.
“The prey are on foot and they’re given a map about 15 minutes prior to the game—it’s basically a scavenger hunt for them,” said Graffunder-Pelton.
She added there are 10 items the prey have to find in the bush and the objective is to collect as many of the items as they can before being eliminated by the trackers.
During the two-hour long game the prey compete against fellow prey, seeing who can collect the most items without being caught, and the trackers compete against one another too see who can catch the most prey and at the end of three games each, the respective teams with the most points become the best trackers and best top prey of the tournament.
“We have a youth game going and how it works is we have two courses, each team will be playing on both those courses; then what they do have is a common area within the boundary, which is kind of an overlap, and that’s the camping area for everybody, it’s kind of the whole common area for the whole event,” Graffunder-Pelton said.
“So it’s really a good event for spectators as well and that’s basically the main area where the youth do their game and the spectators can watch as well.”
The youth also have a chance to meet with Grant before each game so he can give tracking tips and answer any other questions they might have; following the tournament, Grant will pass out the awards at a small ceremony.
Members of the Man Tracker Invitational committee will be setting up a stand at Buy-Low beginning this week to sell raffle tickets for the event.
For more information you can contact Graffunder-Pelton at (250) 674-1650
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