I am an avid off-road four-wheel drive enthusiast that loves remote travel and adventure. Participating in this recreation with my family meant that I needed to be self-sufficient in every way!

In addition to seat time in my trusty Toyota Land Cruiser, this led me to do a frame-off build of my current Land Cruiser. What is an IT guy doing building a truck from the frame up? For me, it was to completely understand my vehicle and every system within as there are no mechanics in the backcountry. I learned a ton about my vehicle and how it works and what is required to maintain it but it also opened the door to understanding vehicles in general.

Many years of adventure helped build my competence in off-road driving and recovery as the nature of this recreation exposes you and your vehicle to many challenging situations.

Our organization, the 4WDABC, sought to revive our off-road education program that was developed in the early '80s and did so in 2018 when we brought in the International Four Wheel Drive Trainers Association (I4WDTA) to teach a select group of our members to become trainers. I participated in an intensive week-long training program with 16 others. 6 of us then participated in Testing for Certification with the I4WDTA in Arizona in early 2019.

This training was intense and was very impactful for me! I thought I had a fairly thorough understanding of off-road recovery and driving but was very pleasantly surprised to add so much more fact, logic and understanding to my knowledge base!

Over the past year and a half, I have assisted with the development and launching our first off-road course.

I am now committed to bringing this knowledge and experience to our membership to improve our skills and make our members a little bit safer when recreating in our backcountry.