Lorenzo Semple:
"Last weekend the Aspen Skiing Co. successfully held the second Power of Four ski mountaineering race. My partner, Roger Marolt, and I completed it in just less than nine hours. It was nothing short of brutal. If you’re at all interested in doing the race next year, which I would highly recommend, go buy the super light gear now and get used to it. Without it you’re dead. Oh yeah, and bring your wallet.
The race itself is actually more like the power of three. There are basically three different geological features: Snowmass/Burnt Mountain/Buttermilk, Aspen Highlands and Ajax. We budgeted three hours for each leg and finished roughly just under that.
The pack started extremely fast for a 22-mile race with 10,000 feet of climbing. Within one minute of the start, there were a total of five people behind me. In retrospect, if I had started any faster I probably wouldn’t have finished. I was struggling just to keep up with my partner all day.
The fun parts of the course are the leg from the top of Burnt Mountain to the top of West Buttermilk, and the mysterious Congo trail. By the time we got there, approximately 100 people on lightweight mountaineering skis had passed over the terrain and it was absolutely butchered. There were huge deformed moguls and skinny trench ruts leading to narrow high-speed double tracks into thick wooded sections. When you entered the timber, there were pine needles all over the ground telling a harrowing tale of racers passing dangerously close...." (Read more? Click title)
"Unapologetically pursuing and tracking patterns within the news others make since 2010."
Showing posts with label Aspen Power of Four Race. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Aspen Power of Four Race. Show all posts
March 5, 2012
SandBoxBlogs: Aspen Daily News "Power of Four Ski Mountaineering Race"
And the moment the world has been waiting for has finally arrived.
How did Lo Semple and Ro Marolt finish in the Power of Four race this past weekend? Exactly, how.
Aspen Daily News:
37 27 Mens 12 Lo Semple 8:46:34 8:46:36
37 27 Mens 12 Ro Marolt 8:46:36 8:46:36
"Unapologetically pursuing and tracking patterns within the news others make since 2010."
How did Lo Semple and Ro Marolt finish in the Power of Four race this past weekend? Exactly, how.
Aspen Daily News:
37 27 Mens 12 Lo Semple 8:46:34 8:46:36
37 27 Mens 12 Ro Marolt 8:46:36 8:46:36
"Unapologetically pursuing and tracking patterns within the news others make since 2010."
March 2, 2012
SandBoxBlogs: Aspen Times "Aspen Power of Four race returns to test athletes' endurance"
Jon Maletz:
"ASPEN — Pain coursed through Chris Klug's legs, stinging his quads like electric shocks as he trudged toward the summit of Highland Bowl.
“After every step, I kept thinking, ‘How am I going to do another?'” he said. “When I clipped into my snowboard and dropped into Full Curl, my legs seized up on every turn. If I crashed, I would've tomahawked all the way to the bottom — I had these visions of cartwheeling through the snow. The cramps were so bad that I could barely hit the brakes; it's a little disconcerting when you're flying down a 45-degree slope and you can't stop.”
Klug managed to descend without incident and then, somewhat surprisingly, caught a second wind for the final stretches of last season's inaugural Power of Four Ski Mountaineering Race.
After 9 hours, 49 minutes, 3 seconds — and a trek that covered 25 miles across four ski areas and about 11,000 unforgiving feet of vertical gain — the former Olympian and partner Jon Gibans, an emergency-room doctor at the Snowmass Clinic, crossed the finish line at the base of Aspen Mountain's Lift 1A in 24th place.
“I was pretty psyched to arrive at the bottom. It was a bit unceremonious — I think my wife, my mom and a friend were the only ones out there,” Klug jokingly recalled. “We started (early in the morning) at Snowmass Village, and it was damn near dark by the time we finished. What a long, long day.
“It was a little more hard-core than I realized. For me, it was one of the harder races I've ever done — harder than the Elk Mountains Grand Traverse and the Leadville Trail 100. … I'm starting to wonder myself why I'm doing it again....”
(Read more? Can't wait to see how Roger Marolt fares? Click title and stay tuned)
"Unapologetically pursuing and tracking patterns within the news others make since 2010."
"ASPEN — Pain coursed through Chris Klug's legs, stinging his quads like electric shocks as he trudged toward the summit of Highland Bowl.
“After every step, I kept thinking, ‘How am I going to do another?'” he said. “When I clipped into my snowboard and dropped into Full Curl, my legs seized up on every turn. If I crashed, I would've tomahawked all the way to the bottom — I had these visions of cartwheeling through the snow. The cramps were so bad that I could barely hit the brakes; it's a little disconcerting when you're flying down a 45-degree slope and you can't stop.”
Klug managed to descend without incident and then, somewhat surprisingly, caught a second wind for the final stretches of last season's inaugural Power of Four Ski Mountaineering Race.
After 9 hours, 49 minutes, 3 seconds — and a trek that covered 25 miles across four ski areas and about 11,000 unforgiving feet of vertical gain — the former Olympian and partner Jon Gibans, an emergency-room doctor at the Snowmass Clinic, crossed the finish line at the base of Aspen Mountain's Lift 1A in 24th place.
“I was pretty psyched to arrive at the bottom. It was a bit unceremonious — I think my wife, my mom and a friend were the only ones out there,” Klug jokingly recalled. “We started (early in the morning) at Snowmass Village, and it was damn near dark by the time we finished. What a long, long day.
“It was a little more hard-core than I realized. For me, it was one of the harder races I've ever done — harder than the Elk Mountains Grand Traverse and the Leadville Trail 100. … I'm starting to wonder myself why I'm doing it again....”
(Read more? Can't wait to see how Roger Marolt fares? Click title and stay tuned)
"Unapologetically pursuing and tracking patterns within the news others make since 2010."
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)