Saab Alps Power
LA THUILE, Italy: In automotive terms, the members of Canada's entry in the world championships of adventure sports are like LeMans endurance sportscars. They're lean and strong and capable of going all out for a very, very long time.
The members of EnduranceAventure.com (that's the exact team name) are the kind of young people who operate a body fat deficit because they run, cycle, swim, paddle, climb, and dangle (over water and cliff edges) more in a month than your average couch potato waddles in a year, or eight.
It was instructive, then, to watch the ultra-fit athletes from the eastern townships of Quebec struggle so much on the second day of the X-Adventure Raid Series in this town where the Italian army trains its Alpine troops.
The Canadians' problems were all the result of altitude, you see, since they were trying to cope with the lack of oxygen at this distance above sea level.
As well as adding points to their team score so they can go on to the X-Adventure Raid series finals in the Argentine Andes this fall, the Quebecois athletes are also giving their bodies a chance to get used to the altitude so they can perform better the next time.
Experience with altitude is not, however, going to help most of the cars who live in or visit the Alps, or the Rockies, come to that. Unlike world class athletes, the world's fastest cars cannot adapt to the altitude and regain their maximum performance levels.
Without all that oxygen to gulp, big-time, big-tickets sportscars lose a significant amount of their power, and the higher the altitude the more they lose.
The exceptions to this situation are cars that use turbochargers, which explains why Saab has carted me here to watch this event. Every one of the Swedish automaker's cars use turbos, and Saab is the only company that guarantees that their engines will supply full power to 3,048 metres (or 10,000 feet).
On top of that, Saab sponsors the X-Adventure Raid Series along with Salomon, which makes skis, surfboards and various adventure footwear. There is also a marketing and product development relationship between the two companies, but let's leave that for another time.
Before we travel back to the first day of the event, which included a stage at the Col du Petit St. Bernard, near the dividing line between France and Italy, let's consider what turbos do to maintain power.
Essentially, a turbo force-feeds air into the engine, and the electronic management system compensates for the lack of oxygen. So your engine has maximum power no matter what.
Without a turbo stuffing air into the combustion chambers, your vehicle will lose approximately three percent of its power for every 300 metres you go above sea level.