The Impromptu Reverse: 2016 Grand Traverse Recap

Max Taam and John Gaston of Aspen, Colo., were crowned winners of the 19th-annual GORE-TEX Grand Traverse. But they—and some 200 other teams—didn’t arrive in their hometown of Aspen after racing through the night from Crested Butte as expected. Instead, they completed the fourth-ever so-called Grand Reverse in a time of 6:30:18.

During Friday’s noontime, pre-race meeting, Race Director Andrew Arell proclaimed to resounding applause that the race—which begins at midnight in Crested Butte and traditionally travels 40 miles through the Elk Mountains to Aspen—would go on as planned. Earlier in the week, rumors had swirled of a reroute due to high winds and new snow, and those rumors kicked up again throughout Friday evening as snow in Crested Butte fell heavily.

Then, at around 9 p.m., a post on the Grand Traverse Facebook page confirmed the news—racers wouldn’t be heading to Aspen, instead turning around mid-route at the Friends Hut and reversing back toward, then around, Mt. Crested Butte. According the post, the forecast since Friday morning had proved to be “remarkably inaccurate,” with snow totals on the course doubling and tripling what had been forecasted.

“The Barnard Hut Field Team is reporting two feet of new snow and the Friends and Opa’s Teams are reporting significant snowfall as well,” the post stated. 

 Due to safety concerns of snow loading on avalanche paths on the north side of Star Pass and visibility on the race course, the Grand Traverse Team and Chief Snow Safety Officer Ben Pritchett saw no way to send people to Aspen that night.

The midnight start under a near-full moon and the looming peak of Mt. Crested Butte.

The midnight start under a near-full moon and the looming peak of Mt. Crested Butte.

Just after 6 a.m. on Saturday morning, as snow began to fall steadily on Mt. Crested Butte and the sky began to brighten, the headlamps of Taam and Gaston appeared, marking the beginning of the racers’ return to their starting place.

According to Gaston, he and Taam had skied closely with other competitors for much of the race. Those teams included J. Marshall Thomson and Rob Krar, who finished second (6:40:56), and brothers Ben and Nils Koons, who placed third (6:55:03) and completed the race on Nordic skis. The three-way race remained close over Strand Hill, near mile 30 on Mt. Crested Butte’s south side.

“It was super hard. It was a pretty night,” Taam said. “It was totally different from what we normally race. It was a lot of mileage in the dark, and you’re trying to carry momentum on the descents.”

“We’re psyched,” Gaston added. “It’s different than any other skimo race we normally do because you’re out there on your own, especially when you’ve never seen the whole back half of the course and you don’t know where to transition.”

“The skiing up at Star [Pass] was fantastic,” said J. Marshall Thomson.

“It was challenging,” added Krar, Thomson’s teammate. “I mean, mentally it’s tough doing the Reverse when you have your sights set on going to Aspen. But the skintrack was beautiful compared to last year.”

“It’s my third reverse and they’ve all been brutal except for this one,” said third-place Ben Koons, of Aspen, Colo., who has competed on the World Cup Nordic circuit along with his brother. “It was great skiing. Awesome course, I thought. And a beautiful night.”

Lindsay Plant and Jessie Young took home the win among the women with a time of 7:46:27, narrowly beating Nikki LaRochelle and Eva Hagan by three minutes. Last year’s winners Stevie Kremer and Jari Kirkland placed third.

“It was hard. It was really hard,” said Plant, of Carbondale. “We felt strong up until Star Pass,” added Young, of Aspen. Both Plant and Young raced last year at the Skimo World Championships in Verbier, Switzerland, and this was their first time racing as a team.

“We just held everything together pretty well,” said Young. “We ate a lot and drank a lot,” even in spite of Young’s food freezing mid-race. “We’re happy…we’re thrilled,” Plant added.

Among the coed teams, Brian Tinder and Kristi Knecht of Flagstaff, Ariz., won with a time of 8:38:22. Crested Butte-based husband and wife duo Jason and Sarah Stubbe took second place in the coed division, rounding out the top 20 overall and finishing fewer than 10 minutes behind Tinder and Knecht with a time of 8:45:05.

“The high point was the descent off of Porcupine. That was really fun…it was awesome,” said Knecht, who also won the coed division of this month’s Power of Four race in Aspen with Tinder. “And the low point was when his binding broke.”

“When we were skinning,” Tinder continued, “I couldn’t get my boot to stay in my bindings, so the last mile and a half, up and over that gnarly ridge, I had to bootpack and I was sinking through.”

In total, 225 two-person teams signed up for the 19th-annual GORE-TEX Grand Traverse. Of those, 168 teams completed the race, which covered roughly 35 miles and 7,500 vertical feet.

Find more results at webscorer.com and updates from throughout the race on Twitter and Instagram.

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