La Ruta de Conquistadores

Trading training ultra miles with a paddle back to pedals in recent years refueled a fire within Jim to step up the self-challenging, epic endurance adventure levels a notch through testing himself in new and unusual ways- like racing across foreign countries through extreme conditions!  So in October of 2013 we flew to Costa Rica for the race experience of a lifetime! La Ruta de Conquistadores, dubbed one of the toughest races on earth.

 Read about it here in the Anacortes American
Cyclist follows path of conquistadores in 3-day Costa Rican endurance race - goanacortes: Sports

Capitol Forest Classic 2013's BEST Pre-Race Meeting EVER!!

Capitol Forest Classic 2013's BEST Pre-Race Meeting EVER!! from Island Paddlers on Vimeo.

Early one Sunday morning an unsuspecting singletracking crowd gathered deep in the woods for the mandatory pre race Super D meeting start of Day 2.... when Race MC Lee Peterson surprised us all with what will go down in history as the MOST EPIC PRE-RACE *RAP* EVER!!:)

~Cheers to Lee and all our friends who make the trails, make the stoke, make the races and make us all Friends of Capitol Forest.

Capitol Forest Classic 2012

Capitol Forest Classic 2012 from Island Paddlers on Vimeo.

If you only attend ONE mountain bike race a year in the Pacific Northwest, this is THE ONE to be at!  For the second year in a row we had a blast ripping it up with 2 days of EPIC singletrack racing at Washington State's ultimate XC and Super D mountain bike festival, The Capitol Forest Classic.

Capitol Punishment 12 hour Relay Race

12 hour Capitol Punishment Race from Island Paddlers on Vimeo.
3 friends spend 12 hours mountain bike relay racing nearly 100 miles together between 10 laps over a super fun, flowy and steeply sweet technical single track course to finish 1st (and only;) in the 3 person, co-ed class. With 20 miles of 'hard time' put in by Nadja, 30 from Jesse and 50 ridden by ironman Jim... 
Lap after lap Team 'A-town Pirates' raged on, super pumped as they continued to happily escape crash and injuries in their first group endurance race together on this unusually hot fall day. 
Challenges instead came in the form of a chest cold for Nadja, a loose wheel for Jesse, and a light failure for Jim to deal with- which left him stranded alone in the dark forest for about 30 minutes after he was bombing down a super steep section of the rooty trail at speeds near 20 mph, took a jump and middair before he landed his new bright light suddenly went out!...
*Thank goodness for the kindness of strangers who come along and share their extra lights!  And great event organizers and volunteers...We're looking forward to next year's  12 & 6 hours of Capitol Punishment Relay Race race already! :)

Mountains to Sound Relay 2011

           Mountains to Sound Relay 2011 from Island Paddlers on Vimeo.

One man, One day, One hundred miles!!

Pacific Northwest native and adventure sport expert Jimmy Z. earned himself some impressive bragging rights as he dug deep for a good cause, doing what he does best from Cascade Mountain trails to Puget Sound waterways...

While racing in Seattle's 6th annual Mountains to Sound Relay, an event which has "contributed over $50,000 towards improving trails and recreation along the Mountains to Sound Greenway, for the I-90 Corridor from Thorpe to the shores of Seattle."

In a 17 mile mountain bike, 46 mile road bike, 12 mile kayak leg, 13.1 mile/ half marathon run and a final 10 km 'sprint' race to the finish...

With many liters of water, Gatorade, Gel Shots & caffeinated power gummies later...

Through leg cramps and into the pukes...

He surprised himself (but not us supporters:) with a strong, 1st place IRONMAN finish at 8 hours and 20 minutes in Seattle's finest fundraising, multisport relay race!

WAY TO GO JIM!!!

Bavarian Bike & Brew 2011

We rose at 4am to depart our Fidalgo island home by sunrise

and head East over the Cascade mountains to our favorite lil' Bavarian town of Leavenworth for Jim's second year in a row of participating in a grueling, 24 mile mountain bike race...

To give it all on an incredible race course that starts off with 1800 feet of elevation gain in the first 4 miles, grinding racers up to the top of a high alpine ridge

with rewarding spectacular craggy-peaked views, before bombing it back down into the forest through creeks and over rollers to the finish line far below.

At last years race just months after having back-to-back spinal surgeries for a rough water paddling injury, it was difficult and painful for me to even walk up the hill to where the start line was to watch Jim's race...

So this year at the last minute I decided to also compete in the 14th annual Bavarian Bike & Brew ,  in the 8 mile (1 lap) beginner class race simply for my own personal, huge sense of feel goooood accomplishment of  being able to cross the finish line on my bike instead of in a back brace and a cane...

(Who knows what next year's race will bring:)

Jim loves this course because it reminds him of the kind of terrain he grew up riding back on his home alpine slopes of Mount Rainier.

With temperatures in the 80's, it just kept getting better ane better when we went exploring for a place to set up camp and found more than we hoped for down Icicle Creek Road...

*Not pictured are the 4 foot long snake and young bear that I saw close up, but fumbled with my camera in excitement and missed taking pics of either!

All in all another great weekend playing with friends in our adventure sport paradise home o' the Pacific Northwest. 

Mt. bike racing on Whidbey island

Our "What did you do this weekend?" adventure

includes a tale of 4 friends who

camped on nearby beautiful

*windy* Whidbey island

under a rainshadow & backdropped

by spectacular shows of Nature,

to giggle,

hike & bike

 along Fort Ebey State Park trails one day,

 be met by more friends the next

to spend another awesome day together racing...

(*A first race in a new sport for 2 of us, who'd
only planned on being spousal chearleaders :)