2013 - Page 4 of 5 - ActiveSteve

One Final Mad Dash for Winter Race Season

Huzzah! One last race to write about for my winter race season. It’s been a very busy February, with 6 races in the past 5 weeks! With all the racing, I hardly had time to update my website, as a result of all the videos that I had to put together, coupled with the training I had to to do prepare for those races! Luckily for me, I have a little bit of a breather now. In fact, I have no events on the calendar at the moment until the first weekend of May. Of course, in the meantime, I’ll be keeping busy with wedding planning, and a little road trip to Las Vegas for my bachelor party! But of course, that’ll not be blogged about. However, the Mad Trapper Finale of 2013 will be! And if you are here reading this, you came to the right place. No re-cap video this time, but plenty of pictures for you to check out! Once you’ve had a look, read on for the story of this challenging final race!

Race Reports

Racing with an International Flair

As you have all seen from the flurry of recent race reports that I’ve finally got around to posting, the winter racing season has been in full swing on my end! Luckily, things are starting to wind down, and I’ll soon be turning my mind to spring and summer active pursuits. However, I’ve still got a couple events to knock out here and write about. For this post, I’ll give you a little colour around the 35th Annual Gatineau Loppet that I took part in on February 16th. As the title implies, this event draws an International crowd. With over 2000 racers from 17 different countries taking part in this years offerings, it was a very cool event. The Loppet is a whole weekend of races, ranging from 5 to 55km, and in both classic and freestyle categories. For my part, I was taking on the 55km classic race, which was on Saturday. I also lugged cameras and did filming for Get Out There Magazine, so stay tuned for the video below, and don’t forget to also Check out the pictures that Deanna and I snapped.

Race Reports

Chasing Silver in the Hills

Now, normally, people chase gold when they head into the hills. But if you’re me, and the event in question is the Canadian Ski Marathon, you chase silver! At least this year. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, don’t worry, it will all become pretty clear, and it’s pretty simple really. This blog post will be all about my quest to complete the CSM for the second year in a row. CSM has a progression if you are trying to complete the whole event as what is known as a Coureur des Bois. The first time, you need to just finish, that gives you bronze. The 2nd time, you must ski the entire length AND carry a packing weighing a minimum of 5kg, giving you silver. The 3rd time, you must ski the entire length, carry a pack AND sleep outside overnight on a hay bale. Doing so gets you a gold pin. As this was my second year, I was trying for silver. Deanna was also with me, and going for bronze. I was there to ski, as well as document the trip for Get Out There and produce some videos, which I’ve embedded further below. You can also check out some pictures we took before reading the whole story.

Race Reports Race Review Videos

One More Tri During Winterlude

Hello friends and fellow outdoor lovers. I’m happy to bring you another rapid race report on another of my recurring winter races. This time, I’m talking about the 35th annual Winterlude triathlon. This event is each year not only a challenge to participants, but also seemingly to the organizers, as the weather always seems to wreak havoc on what they have in store. This year was no different, as you will learn about shortly! For my part, I was once again covering the event for Get Out There, so I had cameras on hand, and filming duties. As such, I didn’t get too many actual race shots, but did manage to nab this sweet picture of Mike at the finish line. There’s something epic and so ‘Canadian’ about seeing a frozen beard at the end of a cold race, isn’t there? At any rate, check out the limited pictures I did take, the click through to read the rest of the story and see the video.

Race Reports Race Review Videos

Chasing the Snowman… 2 Races in 1 Day!

Hello all. It should come to no surprise to anyone who knows me that I will often enter and be interested in new and interesting races / challenges to keep me motivated to train and race. Well, recently, there was a new challenge unveiled at a Mad Trapper race (started as a mere suggestion, but ‘snowballed’ into the real deal). The challenge was that on January 26th, a ‘Snowman’ and ‘Snowwoman’ would be crowned. How so? Well, the fastest time combined in the Frost and Fire Winter Triathlon from the morning and the Mad Trapper Night Race in the evening. I do fairly well at the snowshoe races, and I also dabble in multi-sport, and most importantly, I have the energy reserves to race twice in one day :-). I was registered in both, so the stage was set to see if I could become the first winner of this mostly symbolic award. How did I do? Well, read on for both race reports (and videos!) and the conclusion. I didn’t take too many photos (was focused on fliming), but you can see them here and here before reading on.