July 24th, 2009 by admin

After a bit of a hiatus, and following a couple of teaser episodes, the Rest of Everest has returned to our regularly scheduled programming by rejoining the Annapurna IV team as they continue up the mountain. Climbers Ben Clark and Josh Butson once again join podcast creator Jon Miller to discuss their attempt on the summit of Annapurna IV, as well as their plans to make the first ski descent of that mountain.

When last we heard from the boys, they were in the middle of a summit bid, climbing up to Camp 2 on the mountain, and that’s exactly where we begin Episode 108, entitled “Not Good, Not Bad”. Ben and Josh are in camp and discussing the challenges of the climb, which obviously include high altitude and challenging approaches, but in this case, there was a great deal of snow as well, which is seen quite clearly as the episode goes along.

As usual with the Rest of Everest, we get some amazing views of the Himalaya from a perspective that only high altitude mountaineers ever get to see. Armchair mountaineers will also enjoy watching Ben melt snow for water and other scenes of the climbers going about the business of living at altitude on the mountain. We all can appreciate the shots of them climbing with ice axes through a section that would normally have a fixed line, but in this case, none exists. You’ll have to tune in for yourself to discover what the “screaming barfies” actually are.

As always, you can find the podcast on the website by clicking here or subscribe to it directly in iTunes. Great to have the show back!

July 24th, 2009 by admin

It has been some time since I checked in on Roz Savage and Sarah Outen, each of whom are still out on an ocean, in pursuit of their dreams of a solo crossing.

We’ll start with Roz this time out. She’s continues to make great progress towards her goal of reaching Tuvalu on this, the second stage, of her trans-Pacific row, which began last year when she completed the first part of her journey by going from San Francisco to Hawaii under her own power. If everything stays on schedule, next summer she’ll finish the journey, going from Tuvalu to Australia.

Reading Roz’s dispatches from out on the water over the past few days have been brutal. Strong winds from the southwest have been blowing in her face and have prevented her from making much progress, and at times she’s dropped anchor just to hold her position or to limit her losses. In fact, earlier in the week, when she hit the dreaded “doldrums” she faced 15 miles of negative drift in one evening alone. Pretty disheartening to work all day to make progress, drop anchor at night, only to discover you’re further way from your destination when you get up the next morning. But to her credit, Roz always seems to keep a positive attitude, and the appearance of a beautiful sea turtle and a whale shark along side her boat this week have helped to bolster her spirits some.

According to the RozTracker, she is now 60 days out from Hawaii and has covered more than 1900 miles of her 2600 mile journey. She’s also taken approximately 805,000 storkes of the oars along the way.

Jumping over to the Indian Ocean, Sarah is plugging away, and inching ever closer to her destination of Mauritius off the coast of Africa. Over the past couple of weeks, Sarah has increased her hours at the oars each day, and as a result, her forward progress has been great. She now has less than 500 nautical miles to go before she hits the beach, and becomes the first woman and youngest person to solo row across the Indian Ocean. The weather report says that she should expect great weather for the next week or so, which means that her progress should be good.

You can follow Sarah’s progress on her own tracker, which currently has her closing in on the final destination. It seems that if everything stays on track, she should be coming home in the early part of August, which is good, because according to her blog, she’s running desperately low on chocolate bars.

Watch for more updates on these two very soon. It won’t be long before I’ll be announcing their return to land.

July 24th, 2009 by admin

Today’s stage of the Tour de France was the final individual time trial for 2009, and it promised to once again shake up the standings, as the climbers who took center stage the past few days were pushed aside in favor of the riders who specialize in putting their head down and attacking the course in as fast of a time as possible.

Heading into the day, Alberto Contador stayed in the Yellow Jersey, but climbing brothers Andy and Frank Schleck had pulled themselves up into second and third place following a brilliant ride in the Alps yesterday. Their performance in the time trial was going to go a long way towards determining their ultimate finishing position on the Champs Elysees on Sunday.

The gauntlet was thrown down early Fabian Cancellara and Mikhail Igantiev, both of which went out fast and had their times stand up throughout the day as other riders set out from the starting house. The riders faced a rather straight forward course that was mostly flat, although there was one 3km climb, and non-technical, which was a far cry from the twisty and demanding course that they started the Tour on back in Monaco.

As is traditional in the final time trial, the riders start in the reverse order of their standings in the General Classification. That meant that the top contenders wouldn’t hit the road until later in the morning, when guys like Lance Armstrong, Brad Wiggins, and Andreas Kloden would ride out just in front of Contador and the Schlecks. Armstrong was looking to gain time on Andy and hopefully knock Frank out of the top three, and he had a good right that eventually achieved both of those goals.

The star of the day was Contador though, as he once again showed that he is the strongest rider in the field, dominating the time trial and even riding the course faster than Cancellara. At the end of the day, Contador pulled away from his closest rivals, and tightened his grip on the Yellow Jersey. He now stands 4′11″ in front of Andy Schleck and 5′2″ ahead of Armstrong. Those are impossible gaps to close for any rider, barring any kind of unforeseen incident, and it now appears that Contador will coast into Paris in Yellow this Sunday.

The real battle now is for second and third place. Andy Schleck looks like he is in a good position to remain in the second spot, but third is wide open, with Lance Armstrong currently holding down that spot on the leaderboard, but Wiggins, Kloden, and Frank Schleck are all looming very close. With a final day of climbing on the horizon for Saturday, Armstrong is going to have a tough fight to stay on the podium.

Tomorrow, the Peloton returns to the road with a 178 km (110 mile) ride from Bourgoin-Jallieu to Aubenas. While the course has a few climbs, the largest being a Cat 2 late in the stage, it isn’t anything that should cause a shake-up on the leaderboard. There are even a couple of sprint sections for the points towards the Green Jersey, which looks to be heading to Paris with Thor Hushovd. Things will get really interesting on Saturday though, when the stage ends on a Beyond Category climb that will definitely have the contenders jousting once again.

So, the Tour really is beginning to wind down now. It ends Sunday of course, with the mostly ceremonial ride into Paris, where the Yellow Jersey winner looks to stay safe and sips champaign on the road. As mentioned, Hushovd now has a stranglehold on the Green Jersey and isn’t likely to give it up since he has a 30 point lead on Mark Cavendish. Italian rider Franco Pellizotti is way out in front in terms of the Polka Dot Jersey, and is in no danger of surrendering it either. And finally, the White Jersey seems to belong to Andy Schleck, who certainly isn’t going to be losing much time at all over the next few days in all likelihood.

July 24th, 2009 by admin

I wanted to share a couple of quick travel related notes that I wrote for Gadling.com today that may also be of interest here.

First, Keen Footwear is sponsoring a contest to give away a volunteer trip to South Africa. The winner will spend a week in Cape Town, volunteering at an animal shelter, while still having access to hike, surf, and explore your way around one of the world’s livliest cities. To enter the contest, simply go to this page and fill out the form Easy as that, and you could be on your way to Africa, where you’ll not only have a wonderful trip, you’ll be able to give a little back in the process.

Personally, I think the growing trend of “Voluntourism” is good one, and this is the first time that I’ve actually seen someone giving away such a trip. The vacation is valued at over $4000 and includes airfare and accommodations, although said accommodations are in a volunteer hostel at the animal shelter.

The other story of note that I posted over at Gadling is this one about some changes that were ratified by the International Association of Antarctica Tour Operators (IAATO) in an attempt to make travel in the Antarctic safer. You may recall that there have been several high profile incidences in the waters off the coast of the Antarctic Penninsula, including the sinking of the MS Explorer back in 2007, and two ships running aground more recently.

Fortunately, no one has been hurt or killed yet, and the IAATO wants to keep it that way. To that end, they’ve made it mandatory that all their members take part in a satellite tracking program, refit any open lifeboats so that they are partially or fully closed, and have put some requirements on the Captain and or pilot of the ships and their experience levels.

All of these are good steps, but as I said in my previous story, none of them would have helped prevent the recent accidents involving tourist ships. They would, however, go a long way towards making sure that travelers there are safer, and that’s a very good thing.

The IAATO also formed an exploratory committee to examine the effects of global climate change on the Antarctic, and help get the word out about it. The same group will be examining ways to reduce the carbon footprint of tourism to the region. This one is pretty self explanatory, but it’s great to see that they are taking these strides to make sure that they are protecting the fragile ecosystem that they are visiting. Thumbs up all around!

July 24th, 2009 by admin

It has been a rough season, as usual, in the Karakorum with weather woes, tragedy on several mountains, and avalanches, and conditions that are amongst the most harsh on Earth. But it can all be forgotten if the teams can just finish what they’ve started, and stand on top of those big peaks. A number of teams have begun to take the first steps to do just that today, with summit pushes currently underway on both K2 and the Gasherbrums.

On K2, the most dangerous mountain on the planet, we get word from Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner that today is the day that she and her climbing partners will begin their ascent, and Martin Ramos is projecting the same schedule. If the weather holds, and everything goes as expected, they should be standing on the summit on Saturday. The Field Touring Alpine Team is still in BC according to their latest update yesterday, but everyone is acclimatized, feeling good, and ready to go as well, so they will likely be following along this weekend too.

This comes on the heals of a report earlier in the week from ExWeb that Jorge Egocheaga claimed the first summit of the mountain last Sunday, following a solo climb in deep snow. Well done Jorge and congrats on the summit!

Similar stores are coming in from the Gasherbrums too, where ExWeb is also reporting that five climbers topped out on Gasherbrum II on Monday, just before a storm moved in an blanketed the area. But the weather window is expected to open again in time for the weekend, as apparently teams are spread out across the mountain, from C2 to C3 on both G1 and G2, including Veika Gustafsson and Kazuya Hiraide who hope to top out on G1 this weekend. They set off for C1 this morning with their eyes on the Gasherbrum 1 summit.

The teams on both of these mountains have been very patient and it looks like it is finally going to pay off. The weather seems to be improving and conditions high on the mountains are stabilizing, although there were reports a few days back about avalanches on K2. Hopefully the worst of those conditions are over, and the teams can climb high and safe. Especially on K2, where we are approaching the anniversary of the tragedy from last year.

July 24th, 2009 by admin

The 2009 Mongol Rally got underway on Tuesday, when 400 teams of drivers set out simultaneously from England, Spain, and Italy on a road race that will span more than 10,000 miles as they drive toward the finish line in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.

This is the sixth edition of the Mongol Rally, and each year it grows a bit in size and stature. The race is run for a variety of charities and the vehicles driven to Mongolia are donated to a charity there as well.

The rules of the race are simple:

1) Teams are on their own, there is no support of any kind.
2) The race is run for charity, and all teams need to raise a minimum of £1000 or roughly $1650.
3) Teams can only drive cars with an engine that is 1.2 liters or less.
4) The car must also be ten years old or less

In addition, teams are allowed to choose any route they want, and in the past they have ranged as far north as the Arctic Circle and as far south as Afghanistan. You can see some of the previous routes that have been taken on this map, which illustrates how free form the trip can be. You can also read updates on the teams as they travel on the Live Updates Page as well.

I’ve written about the Mongol Rally a few times in the past, and I remain intrigued by the “race”. It sounds like so much fun to me to hit the open road with good friends on an epic roadtrip across two continents. Talk about an adventure! Most teams will cross through a dozen countries along the way, and see some amazing things. Maybe next year I need to put together a team!

July 24th, 2009 by admin

Stage 17 of the 2009 Tour de France hit the French Alps with full force today, with a punishing stage that left the dreams of a few more contenders in tatters, while giving rise to the hopes of others.

The riders faced a tough 169.5 km (105 miles) stage that ran from Bourg-Saint-Maurice to Le Grand-Bornand and featured four Category 1 climbs with a Category 2 thrown in for good measure. That meant a long day in the saddle for most, with the majority of the Peloton giving away time to the top riders who have been waiting for the mountain stages to make their attacks.

Yesterday we saw a few attackers testing the water, only to be reeled back in by Team Astana, who have worked well together to ensure that race leader Alberto Contador hangs on to his Yellow Jersey. Today the attacks were expected to come from Saxo Bank, whose young rider Andy Scleck was amongst the pre-race contenders this year, but had been lurking back in the standings of the General Classification. With just two mountain stages to go, Schleck, who is a consummate climber, needed to make a move soon. That move came today.

But the early portions of the stage belonged to Thor Hushovd, who holds the Green Jersey as the top sprinter. Outspoken rival Mark Cavendish took shots at big Thor in the press by saying that Hushovd didn’t win the Jersey on the course, in reference to a controversial complaint filed against Cavendish that ended up costing him points in the competition and effectively ended his bid to ride into Paris in Green. Hushovd responded today with a solo attack that put him over the early mountains and collecting the sprint points for himself. It was the Norwegian rider’s way of telling Cav to shut the hell up, as Cavendish is not a climber and wouldn’t have been able to hang with Thor on those rides. In fact, Thor was so impressive today that he rode down the King of the Mountains Polka Dot Jersey, on the back of Franco Pellizotti, as well, finishing more than a minute ahead of him on the Col des Saisies.

The real action got underway later on the Col de Romme, with 37km (22 miles) left to race. Carlos Sastre, last year’s Tour winner, went out on an attack, and had to be reeled in by Contador, who was flanked by Andreas Kloden and Lance Armstrong. Sastre attempted to make another move, but was once again brought back into the fold, and while all of this was going on, Saxo Bank set up their two riders, Andy and his brother Frank Schleck, to make their move.

Andy was off like a shot, with Contador shadowing him all the way, while Frank, Brad Wiggins, Rigoberto Uran, and Armstrong gave pursuit further back. Christian Vande Velde, once considered an outside shot for the Tour win, faded away quickly, but teammate Dave Zabriskie helped him rejoin the group eventually. Frank picked up the pace, and the rest of the group were soon with Andy and Contador out in front and from there on, the Schlecks would drive the pace.

On the final climb of the day there were four riders out in front, the Schlecks, Contador and Kloden, with several riders, including Armstrong, in the first chase. With 2km to go to the finish, Contador put in an attack, which succeeded in dropping his own teammate in Kloden, but not the Schleck brothers, who hung with him every step of the way. The three raced to the finish line, with Frank getting the well earned stage win for his efforts in helping his brother move up in the GC standings. Not far behind, a group that included Armstrong, Kloden, and WIggens clawed there way to the finish.

The attacks today did scramble the top of the GC. While Contador still holds on to the Yellow Jersey, Andy Schleck is now in second, 2 minutes and 26 seconds back, and Frank is in third, nearly another minute behind. Armstrong dropped into fourth place overall, three minutes and fifty-five seconds behind. Andy also put a tighter grip on the White Jersey as the best young rider, and obviously Hushovd has the Green Jersey all but locked up. Pellizotti still looks good in the Polka Dots.

Tomorrow brings the final individual time trial which is a 40.5 km (25 miles) run through the streets of Annecy that should be interesting to watch. Contador is clearly the best time trialist at the top of the GC at the moment, and at this point it looks unlikely that he’ll be unseated. The question now is whether or not someone can crawl up and knock of the Schleck brothers. I think Armstrong can pass Frank with a good ride and get himself into a position to possibly get back on the Podium in Paris. Should be fun to watch, and the next few days are going to be great. It’s not quite over yet.

Unfortunately, it is over for Cadel Evans, who admitted that he is out of the race, at least as far as getting a podium finish. After finishing second the past two years, he was considered one of the top contenders again this year, but instead he has had the worst Tour of his five year career.

It is also over for Dutch rider Kenny van Hummel, a name that not many have heard of. van Hummel is consistently the last rider to cross the finish line, especially in the mountains, but his never-give-up attitude has endeared him to the rest of the Peloton, even as he struggled on to beat the time cut-offs each day. Yesterday for instance, he finished nearly 35 minutes behind the stage winner. He was also one of the fan favorites along the road as well, but he took a nasty fall today and was taken from the course by ambulance. Hopefully he’s okay and we’ll see him back riding again soon, as he is considered to be a promising young sprinter.

July 24th, 2009 by admin

National Geographic is preparing for a new television show, set to begin airing on Saturday, called Alone in the Wild. The premise of the show is not unlike Survivorman, but in this case, show host Ed Wardle is dropped into the Yukon Territory of Canada, and spends the show crossing the remote region on foot, trying to make it out alive.

The unique element of the show is that it is ongoing right now, and you can follow Ed’s adventure on the show’s website. He is currently 18 days into the journey, which is projected to take him three months to complete. Wardle has a background in shooting adventure films and has extensive experience in mountaineering and wilderness survival, and just like his Survivorman counterpart, Les Stroud, he’s shooting all the video himself. You can learn more about that process here.

The website not only keeps a running counter of how long Ed’s been out in the wild, but also has him using Twitter to send updates from the field. There is also more information about Ed’s background, as well as the dangers he is facing in the Yukon.

Lets hope this show is better than Expedition Africa, which turned out to be a big disappointment to me. While the scenery was great and the premise was sound, what we got was a reality show with Type-A personalities being argumentative while the hiked from Point A to Point B, while occasionally taking a ride in a Subaru Outback. (Was there worse product placement in a show ever?)

Set your DVR’s for Alone in the Wild. It gets started Saturday, July 25th at 9 PM EDT.

July 24th, 2009 by admin

The 2009 Summer Outdoor Retailer show is underway in Salt Lake City, Utah today. If you’re not familiar with OR, it is the twice yearly convention where all of the outdoor gear manufacturers gather to show off all the great new stuff they’re going to use to drain our wallets. Over the course of the next few days, you can expect to see a host of online reports that show off the latest trends in the gear industry and some hot new products that will be making it on to store shelves later this year.

You’ll find a number of reports coming from the floor of the show, but a few that I recommend you keep an eye on include TrailSpace.com, which always has a nice dedicated OR feed with first looks at the product lines. The Outside Blog is also on the scene, and already have some initial thoughts posted on a few products, such as the Vapor 15, the world’s lightest 15-degree sleeping bag, which comes from Sierra Designs and weighs just 30oz! And of course, the Gear Junkie is at OR and already sending back dispatches as part of his Daily Dose column. First up for the GJ is a look at the second generation SPOT Messengers due out later this year.

Expect lots more announcements over the next few days. Press releases will be flying and there will be plenty of good reports of new gadgets, gizmos, and gear. I’ll try to spotlight some of the bigger announcements, but I suspect we’ll mostly be seeing a continuation of the trend toward “green” gear that is environmentally sound.

July 24th, 2009 by admin

Coming off a rest day on Monday, the riders of the 2009 Tour de France were prepared for a long and challenging day in the mountains. Today’s stage 16 was a 159km (98 miles) jaunt from Martigny to Bourg-Saint-Maurice that featured two huge climbs, the first a beyond category beast and the second, a category 1 climb that provided fireworks at the top of the General Classification, but in the end resulted in no significant changes in the chase for the Yellow Jersey.

The stage got off to a busy start with a large breakaway on the slopes of the Col du Petit-Saint-Bernard, the first climb of the day that led the riders out of Switzerland and into Italy. While there were a number of riders in the break, none of them posed a real threat to the Yellow Jersey, currently on the back of Alberto Contator, so his Astana team didn’t have to chase down the pack.

Where things started to get a bit more interesting was on the second climb of the day, the Cat. 1 Col du Petit-Saint-Bernard. At that point in the race, there were a couple of riders still away on the break, but the real battle for standings in the GC began when Andy Schleck made a move to gain some time on Contador, with Schleck’s brother Frank close at hand to monitor the chase. The group that went after Schleck included Brad Wiggins, Vincenzo Nibali, Contador and teammate Andres Klöden. Conspiculously missing from the group was Lance Armstrong, who was sitting in second place coming into the day. Other big names that fell behind included Fabian Cancellara, Thor Hushovd, Denis Menchov and Tony Martin, who had surrendered his White Jersey to Andy Schleck on Sunday.

Schleck put in a major effort, setting a fast pace up the mountain in an effort to drop Contador and gain precious time over the top. But Alberto would have none of it, and hung on Schleck’s wheel like he was out for a ride in the park. At no time did it appear that Contador was in any danger or dropping, and much like Sunday’s big stage win, he looked like the strongest rider on road.

One of the more impressive displays came when Lance Armstrong decided he had had enough of pacing the chase group and wanted to get back to the Yellow Jersey group. Lance shot off, leaving riders in his wake and covering the distance in no time. The burst showed that the 37-year old Armstrong still has strong legs and is in great condition, and put to rest any doubts that he’s lost much of anything in his three year absence from the Tour. It was an impressive display of riding.

Once the riders reached the summit of the Col du Petit-Saint-Bernard, they faced a dizzying 18km descent at high speeds that saw a number of nasty crashes including one that put Jens Voight onto the tarmac. By that point, Spanish rider Mikel Astarloza had made a daring dash to the front and was holding on for dear life as he rocketed down the slopes with the other riders in pursuit. In the end, he would hold on for the stage win, with a chase group not far behind, and the pack of contenders about a minute back. That group was led in by Dave Zabriskie, who did most of the work on the descent, setting a blistering pace.

So, at the end of the day, not much has changed really, despite a few bold attacks. Contador is still in Yellow, Lance is in second place, and Brad Wiggins is looking great in third. Thor Hushovd is in Green, and looks to have completely shut down Mark Cavendish’s dreams of winning the sprint points. Andy Schleck has a solid grip on the White Jersey now, and doesn’t look like he’ll be relinquishing it before Paris, and Franco Pellizotti is wearing the Polka Dot Jersey of the King of the Mountains. The biggest loser of the day was Cadel Evans, who lost time to Contador and has now fallen to 17th place over all. A bit disappointing considering his expectations coming in.

Tomorrow the Peloton faces a 169.5km (105 mile) ride from Bourg-Saint-Maurice to Le Grand-Bornand that will once again test the climbers and most likely see attacks on the Yellow Jersey. The stage features no less than four Category 1 climbs, with a Cat 2 thrown in for good measure, so the presence of the mountains is likely to shed the field once again. I expect Andy Schleck to make another attack, and if Carlos Sastre is going to have his presence known, he needs to make a move soon too, although the way that Contador is riding, I’m not sure that it really matters. Fans of the Tour are going to love these next few days though, as they are all tough with big mountain climbs, before the final individual time trial on Saturday.