Summit locals test endurance at The Grand Traverse ski race
[ad_1]
Uphill Athlete/Courtesy image
More than the weekend, various Summit County locals competed in The Grand Traverse ski race, climbing around 6,800 vertical toes all through the 40-mile trek throughout the Elk Mountain array from Crested Butte to Aspen.
This year’s discipline was manufactured up of 250 teams of two. Competition started out lining up in the late hours of Saturday, April 2, and commenced their journey in direction of Aspen at midnight in buy to mitigate any doable avalanche hazard.
“This race is a classic Colorado function, and this 12 months was the 25th version,” Breckenridge community Nikki LaRochelle said in an e mail. “I like our crazy mountain culture.”
LaRochelle took aspect in the motion herself, racing with her husband, Brad.
The duo had an remarkable race. They picked up a 1st place finish in the co-ed classification and a fourth put end overall with a time of 7 hrs, 56 minutes, 25.1 seconds.
What made the LaRochelles’ effectiveness even much more remarkable was the fact that the duo was only defeat out by teams substantially more youthful than them. The LaRochelles were in the 36-45 typical age division, but the a few groups that beat them in the total standings were being all in the 26-35 average age division.
Next the LaRochelle workforce was a different Summit community, John O’Neil, who was a member of the Cinderella Tale Strikes Back Once more group.
O’Neil aided his group to a fifth place all round complete and a fourth position finish in the 26-35 age division, crossing the complete line in a time of 8:10:19.3.
Frisco resident Eugenio Perez raced for team Burros, Birras y Barbas, encouraging his teammates to a 31st general putting and sixth in the 36-45 ordinary age division. Perez’s group concluded in a time of 10:37.17.
The race was topped by longtime Aspen community and experienced ski mountaineering athlete, John Gaston, and his husband or wife Cam Smith. The duo completed the training course in a time of 6:13:15.4, nearly 40 minutes in advance of 2nd spot.
[ad_2]
Resource link