Musing and Errata on the world of Adventure Racing from the Yak
presented by MPGear.com

2006 was a busy year for Checkpoint Zero. Out of curiosity I took at look at the email that came and went...and you thought you had spam problem?

There is no way around publishing email addresses associated with the site...mine and a couple of catch all accounts for news and so on. When you do that you're asking the spammers to zero in and harsh your groove...they certainly did.

Sent: 5,155
Received: 72,238 (if I've ever not replied to your email this is why)
MB Sent: 1,816
MB Received: 511

Gravity Play Sports is coordinating a fundraising event in conjunction with the Moab Adventure Xstream 12hr Race to raise money to help Danelle Ballengee with her recovery expenses. The Moab Race has been the first stop on Nellie's spring racing schedule for many years.

Goal

To raise money for Danelle's recovery fund. She was rescued after spending 3 days and nights off a trail in Moab after falling over 60 feet. She has undergone surgery to repair a broken pelvis but she still has up to a year for recovery and physical therapy time. All the money raised will go to the Fund established in her name at the First Bank in Silverthorne, Colorado. Danelle always raced in the Moab AXS Race(and usually won it!). Let's get her back on her feet so she can race again in 2008!

How You Can Help

Buy Raffle Tickets for your chance to win great prizes! See Below. All proceeds from the sale of raffle tickets will go to Danelle! You do not need to be present at the race to win (prizes will be mailed to winners who are not present). Each ticket purchased will be inserted into the raffle with your name on it and will be drawn live during the awards presentation at the Moab Adventure Xstream Race on March 24th.

Raffle Items: Currently Over $3000.00 in Raffle Prizes

* Two Person Team Entry into the 2007 Xstream Expedition - $800 Value

* Aire Tomcat Solo Inflatable Kayak - $550 Value

* 1 Night Stay at Red Cliffs Lodge and a Desert Highlights Canyoneering Trip for Two- $350.00 Value

* 2 Night Stay at Moab Big Horn Lodge and a Rim Tours Mountain Bike Day Tour - $350.00 Value

* Durango Ski Weekend, 1 Nights Lodging, Purgatory Lift Tickets - $200.00 Value

* (2) $75 Adventure Xstream Race Gift Certificate - $75.00 Value Each

* Free AR Training/Coaching Session from Danny Suter at Boulder Performance Network - $100.00 Value

* (3) Smartwool Adventure Racing Clothing Package - $100.00+ Value

* GoLite AR Gear Package - $200.00 Value

* (12) Power Blast Energy Fuel, Pack of 24 - $40.00 Value Each

More Raffle Prizes to be Added....Stay Tuned!

Please call or email if you wish to make a product donation to this raffle! 1-970-259-7771

For more information or to purchase Raffle Tickets please visit www.GravityPlay.com

Michele Hobson, Brandon Patterson, Scott Pleban and Pete Spagnoli brought home the team's first win of 2007 at the Odyssey One Day Extreme (Checkpoint Tracker) in Natural Bridge, VA this past weekend.

After a cold, wet start (they swamped their Canoe at CP2) that set them back from the lead by about 30 minutes, the team quickly caught up with the front of the pack and remained out front for the rest of the race.

The highlight for Checkpoint Zero/GoLite would have to be the blistering pace they set for the orienteering section of the course. The team hit all points in 4 hours and 15 minutes. The second fastest time came from Berlin Bike who finished the section in 5 hours and 58 minutes and went on to take 2nd place at the Finish.

Congratulations team. What a way to start the season. Nice work.

We'll have a race report later in the week. Odyssey's photographer, Will Ramos, was sick and unable to shoot the race so we won't have pics this time around.

Hope you're feeling better Will!

Got an email last night from Lisa Jhung. Lisa's covered the sport for quite a while and was a regular contributor to ASM:

Danelle was released from the hospital on December 31, after a successful pelvis surgery and blood transfusions. She is now staying at her parents' house in Evergreen, Colorado, taking things day by day. She says she's been super appreciative of all the support she's received from friends and strangers alike -- people in the adventure racing community and beyond who have reached out to her. She says that it's overwhelming and amazing to have such support, and she is extremely grateful. (Taz is there too, keeping a close eye on her.)

She's on the road to recovery, but it's certain to be a long journey. She will need continued support to keep improving.

For anyone who's been wondering about her insurance situation, this is the short of it: She has insurance, but it's a policy that has a fairly low limit, one that she's already exceeded due to surgeries, blood transfusions and a lengthy hospital stay. Her policy will not cover the helicopter and plane transports incurred during her rescue.

Pam Minard, a longtime friend of Danelleâ??s, has established a fund for her through First Bank of Colorado. The branch that holds Danelle's account is in Silverthorne, Colorado. There are currently two ways to contribute to the fund, called the Danelle Ballengee Fund:

1. Go to any First Bank of Colorado or First Bank of California and fill out a deposit slip made out to the Danelle Ballengee Fund, or go to the teller and say you'd like to contribute to the Danelle Ballengee Fund. The teller should be able to pull up the account number and help you make a contribution.

2. Mail a check made out to the Danelle Ballengee Fund: First Bank of Colorado, Silverthorne Branch, P.O. Box 347, Silverthorne, CO 80498.

Danelle is reticent to ask her friends for money, despite the fact that she's going to need help. I'm sending this message because I know people have been wondering how they can contribute to her recovery.

For anyone who hasnâ??t heard about Danelle's accident or wants to know more, hereâ??s a link to a story by Brian Metzler on espn.com:

http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/general/news/story?id=2704879

The Green Mountain Adventure Racing Association wants to get your adventure racing year started early with The Frigid Infliction - the northeast's first adventure race of 2007. Get away from the average winter crowds and put your cold-weather skills to a true test in some of the gnarliest terrain Vermont has to offer.

What: Navigation, snowshoeing, cross-country skiing, postholing, ropes work
When: Saturday, March 3rd, 2007
Who: Teams of 2 or 3, coed or single-sex
Cost: $240 for 2, $330 for 3 - $20 discount per GMARA member

USARA sanctioned this year...start earning points early!

As always, we'll be holding a navigation clinic at registration the night before and don't forget our famous post-race party: food, drink, massages, hottub, and prizes prizes prizes!

More info at http://www.gmara.org/frigid

Checkpoint Zero needs volunteers for the upcoming Checkpoint Zero Adventure Race presented by GoLite. The race is scheduled for March 23-25 in Helen, GA. All new recruits provided lodging, a ticket to attend the catered pre-race briefing and will be issued a dead sexy, black Checkpoint Zero t-shirt.

There are a variety of duties to be performed ranging from assisting with team check-in to manning CPs and TAs. We also need medical and water safety personnel.

If you're curious about the sport, want to follow the action right from the course or just want to have a great time in the woods then this is your ticket.

Volunteer Registration Form

WeCeFAR's annual Swamp Stomp, to be held in Tampa, FL, is widely known as one of the best and most challenging 24-hour races in the nation. Now, in its fourth year, the racing group that's known for challenging its racers is challenging itself. In conjunction with Adventure Racers for the Environment and its title sponsor, SmartWool, WeCeFAR will create the nation's first-ever entirely green adventure race.

As part of ARFE's sweeping movement to green up Racing, WeCeFAR's race incorporates ARFE's Ten Commandments of Green Racing. At the 2007 SmartWool Swamp Stomp you'll find:

• No carbon footprint, with offsets generously donated by LEKI


• 100% sustainable Merino Wool race t-shirts from SmartWool


• Recycling stations at every checkpoint


• ARFE's Treats for Trash and Best Garbage programs, with prizes sponsored by SmartWool and LaraBar


• Leave No Trace Awareness training for all race participants and volunteers


• Biodegradable Swag bags


• An environmental project within the race


• The providing of disposable Pack It In, Pack It Out bags for human waste from Restop


• Vetting of the race by an ARFE-certified environmental specialist


• T-shirt, water-bottle, and sneaker re-use projects at race check-in

For more information about what makes a green race really green, write to Shawn Dietrich, WeCeFAR's race director, at shawn@wecefar.com, or ARFE's executive director, Yi Shun Lai, at yishun@arfe.org.

Ok, Nike PowerBlast was never really his house, but the title is pithy so I went with it.

According to an interview posted on that other, orange AR site, Richard Ussher is leaving Nike PowerBlast to captain a new Kiwi team.

This is no real surprise. When you stack a team with the best in any sport at some point someone is going to feel that they're being overshadowed or held back. In the end I say the sport is best off if the best racers out there act as the cornerstones to their own teams rather than taking turns winning everything on one team together. There's been a lack of serious competition at the top end of this sport for far too long.

With Ian retiring on top of Richard leaving, Nike won't be the team we've come to know in 2007. It'll be interesting to see if "the terminator" can keep up the teams' winning streak with whatever fresh blood he's going to have to add to his roster.

This series joins the Wicked AR series, the Rattlesnake racing series, the Cal Eco series, Primal Quest, the Mighty MO, the Beast of the East, the Raid World Cup and no doubt several other events I already can't remember...on the wooden cart of dead races presently being pushed through the middle of the sport.




THUD...Bring out your dead...THUD...Bring out your dead

Do not despair. The circle of life is unbreakable. The sport is changing and the market will decide what adventure racing looks like in the future. Right now the market seems to be saying it won't look like what it did last year.

Hey...check out the ALL NEW Checkpoint Zero Adventure Race presented by GoLite. Registration has been extended until January 31st. There are 63 teams signed up and the limit has been raised to 70 so there are 7 slots left. The prize purse has been doubled to $6,000 and the entry fee includes lodging and a catered pre-race briefing on Friday night.

Was that shameless? I don't think so :-)

A comprehensive and well written article about Reba at mtexpress.com. On her plans for 2007:

This coming year, 2007, Rusch will try to be smarter with her scheduling.

She said, "I'll look at a couple of the best adventure races and focus on 24-hour solo nationals and worlds again. I'll look at all of it, and try to find the rest time I need."

Excited about winning two 2006 national championships in two things that haven't been her main sportsâ??mountain biking and orienteeringâ??Rusch is excited about the new year, if only because she would like to take first instead of second in solo worlds.

And she's excited about putting a new stamp on her crowded passport when she travels to the adventure racing world championships May 24-June 2 in the Lochaber region on the west coast of Scotland.

It's no secret that news on the future of Primal Quest has been scarce ever since the conclusion of the 2006 event. I was told by a high level insider to look for an announcement shortly after the TV special in October, but it never materialized. That tip was predicated on the expectation of high TV ratings which I'm sure fell short of what was hoped for. The race was epic, but the TV special left a lot to be desired.

Well it's a new year and the rumor mill is in full effect. The whispering all seems to point in the same direction...Primal Quest needs a big money sponsor. The Watkins have been eating the cost (or at least the lion's share of it) year in and year out and that just can't continue indefinitely.

In lieu of a corporate backer it looks like Primal Quest, LLC is getting creative when it comes to funding the next edition by putting the venue up for auction.

The location for the 2008 Primal Quest is listed alongside the 2007 NRA Junior Air Gun Championship, the NCAA 2009 Dvision 1 Women's Golf Championships and 2007 US Figure Skating's Skate America tournament in the SportsTravelMagazine.com Bid Bowl.

Hopefully a bona fide corporate sponsor will emerge to provide the funding needed for race management to produce the event when, where and how they see fit so they are not forced to settle for whichever venue comes along with the highest offer.

From a December 23rd article by Brian Metzler (former editor of Adventure Sports Magazine) in the Rocky Mountain News:

Boulder's Ian Adamson, a three-time winner of Eco-Challenge and Primal Quest, recently announced his retirement after more than 15 years in the sport. He's the only athlete to win all the world's major races in the past 10 years, but a few, including Eco-Challenge, China's Outdoor Quest and the ESPN X Games race, are extinct.