Scott Zagarino has learned a lot from his multisport life. Lately, it’s been showing him what a guy he is—as in, what a white, straight guy he is, and how that affects his perception of the outdoors.

Three years ago, Zagarino began offering training camps aimed at teaching women basic outdoor skills. The camps grew out of conversations he had with his daughter as they explored the outdoors together. She showed him that there was a difference between the way guys look at the outdoors and the way girls do.

"I have always loved being outside," he said. "I never stopped to think that it might not be as easy for everyone else to live this way. When I started teaching my older daughter, Sara, about the outdoors, I suddenly realized what a white, male view of the world I really held."

As he and his daughter spent time paddling, hiking or exploring, he began to realize how different Sara's experiences were from his. "We started to talk about it, and the more we talked, the more I realized that there was an obstacle Sara faced that I never even considered: I was supposed to kayak, ride mountain bikes and all of this other stuff. After all, I was a boy.

"On the other hand, she was not supposed to get dirty, scratched up and lost. She was a girl. The problem? She really wanted to, but she didn’t think she could do something I had always thought I was born to."

So Girl Teams Adventure Training was born to give women a way to learn outdoor skills while enjoying the same sense of belonging in the woods that Zagarino had enjoyed all his life. The camps provide professional instruction in open-water kayaking, mountain biking, rock climbing, camping skills and the use of map and compass.

Interestingly, when Zagarino began the program, Girl Teams could find only two women who were qualified and willing to teach. Now, he said, almost every one of their instructors is a woman, with nearly all of them trained to replace their male instructors by Girl Teams staffers.

Now, after running the Girl Teams camps for three years, Zagarino has gotten interest from another group: gay men. What challenges could gay men face in the woods, you might wonder. Zagarino tells it this way:

"One day not long ago, I was having a conversation with a gay friend of mine. He was telling me that he wanted to get together a group of his friends and have us put on a Girl Teams-type camp for them. I asked him why he didn’t just go on a rafting or climbing trip. After all, there are hundreds of outfitters in the West.

"He explained to me something that once again awakened me once again to the fact that I have lived my whole life in the bubble of being a white male—a straight, white male at that! He said how would I like it if I were gay, went on trip to learn outdoor skills, and by about the middle of the first day someone shouted, ‘Hey, get off that rappel, what are you, a fag?’ No one ever said, ‘Hey get off that rappel, what are you, a straight, white, male?’"

So Zagarino is inaugurating Boys in the Wood, a three-day adventure training and empowerment weekend for gay men.

The camp will spend two days teaching a complete curriculum in rock climbing, mountain biking, kayaking and land navigation. On day three participants will take all of their newfound knowledge and apply it to an exercise requiring not only technical skill and mental strength, but also that they work together as a team to accomplish their goal.

For Zagarino, it’s all about learning to see things through another’s eyes.

"The most important thing I am reminded of every day by my children and the over 300 people who have participated in our programs is that the best way to be of use in this life is to try to put yourself in other people’s shoes and walk around a little bit," he said. "Once you do, there is no telling what is possible, or what you might accomplish yourself."

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Zagarino's intersection with triathlon includes serving on USAT's board of directors; founding IFET, the precursor to the AAC, the body which represents pro triathletes in USAT; and founding the impactful Pioneer Team in the 1980's, which included Erin Baker, Mike Pigg, Brad Kearns, Andrew MacNaughton, Colleen Cannon, and others.