Trip, race & hunt reports

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How I’m training for a 50-mile ultra marathon trail race

By Andrew Skurka / October 22, 2014 /
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Six weeks from this Saturday, I’m racing The North Face Endurance Challenge GORE-TEX 50-Mile in California’s stunning Marin Headlands. I ran this same race in 2010, a few months after the Alaska-Yukon Expedition, and it will be my first ultra marathon since. With $30,000 in prize money for the top 3 male and female finishers, this…

Elk 1, Skurka 0: Lessons Learned and Relearned

By Andrew Skurka / October 16, 2014 /
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What lessons did I learn and relearn on my Colorado elk hunt last week? Here are the big three: 1. In order to shoot them, you must find them It’s called “hunting” for a reason — it’s not as simple as just shooting and processing. While many hunters have filled their tags on the first…

Trip Report: First Season Elk “Hunt,” if I dare call it that

By Andrew Skurka / October 14, 2014 /
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I returned to Boulder on Sunday evening, a mere 48 hours after leaving for my long-awaited and much talked about Colorado elk hunt, and still with 3 days left to go in the season. Ouch. I’m fine, just emotionally deflated. More on that later. Here, I’ll just recap the events. Pre-Season On Friday evening Noel…

Three mistakes on the Wind River Range High Route, Attempt #1

By Andrew Skurka / August 8, 2014 /
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Last week I was in Wyoming’s Wind River Range with Buzz Burrell and Peter Bakwin, trying to complete a route that we’ve been eyeing for years and plotting for months. In short, we failed, due to an oversight in our gear selection and route planning. Perhaps inspired by the increasingly popular Sierra High Route, there…

Alaska, on a scale of its own

By Andrew Skurka / February 26, 2014 /
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Earlier this winter I was awestruck by the enormous avalanche near Valdez, Alaska, that covered the highway with 40 feet of debris and blocked up the Lowe River, creating a lake upstream. I saw another similar story yesterday, courtesy of the Yale’s environment360 blog. Recent images from a NASA Landsat satellite showed a landslide in…

A first-timer’s perspective on Alaskan adventure

By Krishna Dayanidhi / November 1, 2013 /
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My name is Krishna Dayanidhi and I’ve gone on two trips with Skurka — one in the Yosemite high country and the most recent this past June in the Eastern Alaska Range. Both trips were out-of-this-world. Fantastic. If you haven’t signed up for any of his trips, drop what you are doing, including reading this…

Coolest thru-hike of the year? Interview with Colorado 14’ers thru-hikers, Junaid & Luke

By Andrew Skurka / October 8, 2013 /
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Last week, Junaid Duwad and Luke DeMuth completed a 1300+ mile thru-hike that entailed summits of all of the Colorado 14’ers. In a stroke of serendipity, Andrew and I ran into Junaid and Luke on Guanella Pass, just after they had bagged Evans and Bierstadt, and Andrew saw them again on his way into Rocky…

Why the Leadville Trail 100 felt like Lollapalooza — is Lifetime Fitness a friend or foe?

By Andrew Skurka / August 27, 2013 /
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I had been seriously contemplating running the Leadville 100 next year –- I mean, I’d have one of the best coaches by way of my (new) husband—and heck, it’s practically in our backyard. I no longer plan to run the Leadville 100 next year. We had headed up to Leadville this year because I’d been…

Bugs, blisters, and bears: Video documentary of 7-day Alaska Adventure

By Andrew Skurka / July 29, 2013 /
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Albert and Ashley stitched this video together with photos and videos from the second Alaska Adventure session, June 24-30. It’s a rough production, but it documents the trip well and gives a sense of what it was like. Enjoy.

Pre-Alaska water cooler conversation with a co-worker

By Andrew Skurka / July 25, 2013 /
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Albert Kim, who joined me last month for a 7-day backpacking and packrafting trip in Alaska, put this video together using xtranormal. If you’ve ever tried to talk with a skeptical co-worker about your adventurous backpacking plans, you’ll especially enjoy this one!