Night Mt Bike Session "Secret Location"

Expedition Date: July 20th

Crew: Ryan DeVesty, Morgan Kavanaugh

Distance: 10 miles

Summits: 0

Elevation Gain and loss: Couple hundred feet

Average Temperature: 80 degrees
Completion Time: 2 hours

Don't try this without professional help.

 Lights and gear are ready. Lets get some. First night ride of the summer. Yewww!

 1 Watt bike light plus head lamps equals night time fun on wheels! For advanced humans only.

Morgan starts the ride in front and navigates us through the darkness. This was definitely one of the raddest things I've done all summer! Cant wait to go again. Watch out for the eyes in the darkness!

New Blance, Reach The Beach Relay a 200 mile Race!

Expedition Date: May 21st-22nd

Crew: Ryan DeVesty, Jim, Andrew, Justin, Peter, and Hector

Distance: 200 miles

Summits:0

Elevation Gain and loss: unknown but extremely hilly

Average Temperature: 50-70 degrees
Completion Time: 25 hours
Place: 8th Overall out of 160 Teams, 3rd Overall out of Ultra Teams

Let the story begin. So I received an email that was forwarded to me from my girlfriend Elizabeth's best friend Kira on Sunday May 15th asking for my contact information.  Kinda weird, but ok.  Elizabeth soon filled me in that a man named Hector, that I briefly met at a NJ Winter Trail Series race, was wondering if I would be interested in joining his Ultra Team for a 200 mile relay race. Soon after I was filled in, my phone rang and who was on the other line - Hector. After receiving all his information I told him I was very interested, but I would have to talk to my loved ones and get back to him. 2 hours later I had spoken to my family and Elizabeth when I had decided to commit and take part in this epic challenge. I had to immediately prepare for  this race considering we were leaving Thursday morning for Massachusetts and it was Sunday late afternoon. 

I had been training through the winter for my summer tri season, but when an IT Band injury in February hit me, I took a few months off. It was in May when I had slowly started to get back into my running and biking routines feeling about 75% healthy at best. Now,  in just  5 days, I will  be running my longest mileage to date. What was I thinking? I  just locked myself into a 200 mile relay blowout of a race, with my 6 legs totaling up to 34 miles. This soon started to make me very nervous considering I had never run a half or whole marathon.  The rest of my team had planned  and trained  for almost a year and were very prepared.  You can see our team vans below on the wet gray Massachusetts morning when we started the race.

Team Photo at Wachusett Mountain before our 2:30pm start time. The 160 teams started in 10 team increments, 30 minutes apart. Our team went off in the second to last wave of teams who were all ranked the fasted. You can see Hector below started us off.

My 3rd leg started and night began to fall. All dusk through dawn legs have mandatory headlamps, 2 blinkers and a reflective vest. Let me give you a brief breakdown on how this race works.  As you race your leg your teammates have to drive the van while reading directions and navigating to the next transition zone. We had 3 team members in each van and continued to leap frog each other as everyone ran their legs.

15 hours into this epic race we found our selves in a state park where teams were tryin to get any rest they could. I don't think I slept throughout the whole race. I felt sick most of the time just knowing I had to run again. It started to become literally torture around my 4th leg. I needed to eat  for fuel but didn't have an appetite in the slightest. I hardly ate at all during the 25 hour race span.

Night turns into day and there's only 2 legs left for each of our team members. I kept having to talk to myself to push through and just get it done. My muscles were fully torn apart  by now. I had taken 4 ibuprofen and coated my legs twice with icy hot right before my last leg. I can honestly say I didn't know what pain was till this race. Its amazing what you can put your body through if you focus and stay motivated.

In the end we all pushed ourselves to the limit and came together for an 8th overall win and 3rd overall out of ultra teams. Finishing in 25 hours with a 7:30 pace throughout the whole 200 miles. We also were the 25th team to cross the finish line which means we passed some 140 teams from start to finish. Wachusett Mountain to Westport Beach, what an amazing experience! These guys are the real deal and I'm honored I got to be apart of it.

New Balance Reach the Beach Relay

 TEAM VINE SWINGER'S GEAR PICKS OF THE TRIP!
Look for the Asics Men's Gel-Noosa Tri 6 Running!

Mt. Marcy, High Peaks-Adirondacks, NY

Expedition Date: Presidents Day weekend- February 19-21 2011

Crew: Dylan DeVesty, Jeremy Herman, Ryan Devesty

Distance: 20 miles

Summits:1

Elevation Gain and loss: 6,000 feet

Average Temperature: 15 degrees
Completion Time: 3 days

We had been preparing and discussing this trip for weeks, so our stoke-a-meters were mad amped.  Many plans had been kicked around, but when the dust settled we planned to set up a base camp and summit Mt. Marcy, then snowboard down.  We also planned an optional summit of Mt. Colden via the Trap Dike route. 

This was the first true winter camping experience for the Brothers DeVesty and my first true winter alpine ascent.  We geared up like never before for this trip, grabbing all sorts of new and borrowed toys. 

We jam packed our vehicle the night before the trip and left bright and early at 5AM on Saturday morning.  The trip up was great and went very quickly.  We were talking this expedition up the entire way and were so excited we had some trouble finding the trailhead.  Ryan also got a little too excited and slammed the car into a huge snowbank before we got there.  We were absolutely frothing by the time we finally got to our jumping off point.

As we unpacked the car and prepped in the trailhead lodge, we encountered a local hero who was picking apart everything we were doing.  After listening to this guy tell us everything we were about to do wrong, the team morale was totally wavering.  We dropped our ambitious goals and left the harnesses, ropes and technical ascent gear in the car so we could focus on Marcy. 

After finally getting the enormous bags on our backs, we started on our journey.  The hike in was short but difficult with all the gear on.  Ryan found it a little difficult to walk in his ginormous snowshoes and gear.  He ended up taking two headers into the woods.  He got the hang of it shortly after and we cruised the rest of the hike. 

 We found a nice tent site a mile or so past Marcy Dam.  It looked like we were the first to use the site this winter.  We had to completely pack it out with our snowshoes and dig our kitchen.  After making our little nook into a completely bomber campsite, we took a break and soon turned into human popsicles.

 The first lesson we learned this trip is to never stop moving.  We decided to take a hike to warm up and we headed over to avalanche lake.  It was a fun little trip to keep us busy and we were able to check out the Trap Dike route that we were scoping before the trip. We went back to camp, cooked dinner and went to bed.

We woke up to a perfect blue bird day, although it was absolutely freezing.  After cooking breakfast, we threw on our summit packs and boards and headed out to bag Marcy.

The hike to Marcy was gorgeous.  The sun was reflecting off of everything and the air was crisp and fresh, just like the snow under our feet.  As we neared the summit the trees became shorter and our views became clearer.  We had our eyes on the prize.  We threw on the crampons just before breaking the tree line and went straight up for the summit.  It was extremely windy and cold on the summit, but you could see everything.  After snapping some summit pics, we dropped off the far side for our snowboard descent.

We rode the hiking trail down and were beelining through the trees.  It was totally cramped and insane.  We rode down to the four corners and hiked out.  On the way back Ryan and Dylan made the best use of their boards and were sledding down the mountain.  As we neared our camp, they strapped on their boards and were ripping down the trails in the dark.

After getting back to camp, we cooked a quick meal and went to bed.  The next morning we decided to hike back up a little ways and get some last turns before heading home.  We warmed up and had some fun before having breakfast and breaking down camp.

On the way out we figured out a more efficient way to lug our gear.  By strapping our big packs to our snowboards we could drag the gear as a sled.  The ingenious idea saved our backs and cut our hike time in half.

Overall we had a lot of fun and learned a lot about ourselves.  It was a great experience and a building block in our adventure experience.  Get Some!

TEAM VINE SWINGER'S GEAR PICKS OF THE TRIP!
















Posted By, Jeremy Herman

3rd NJ Winter Trail Series Race @ Lewis Morris Park NJ

Race Date: Feb. 5th
Team: Ryan DeVesty, Dylan DeVesty
Distance: 5 Mile and 10 Mile Course
Completion time: varies

       With weather giving us the worst conditions possible, we showed up for our 3rd trail race of the 2010/2011 winter season. The trails were covered in a snow/ice mixture (a solid inch of ice that was covering several inches of snow). Breaking through this ice happened more often than not, was horrible on the ankles, and made the yaktrax slip to the side of our shoes several times making it necessary for timely adjustments.

       I participated in the 5 mile race consisting of roughly 80+ runners and finished in 2nd place overall. Ryan participated in the 10mile race consisting of roughly 70+ runners and finished in 4th place overall. I was completely toast after my race! I was awarded with a pint glass (w/ the nj trail series logo on it) and headed straight to the cooler to reward myself with a victory beer out of my new glass while I waited for my brother to finish his race. And for Ryan, doing the 10mile course, was wayyyyy more shot than I was. Im sure his legs will be feeling that race for a while...Anywho,  I am stoked on both of our performances. The 4th and final race of the NJ Winter Trail Series hosted at Lewis-Morris Park is on February 26th and has 5k, 10k, and half marathon (13.1miles) options.

2010/2011 winter trail race standings thus far:

Race #1:
Dylan(5k): 3rd place overall 21:35
Ryan(10k): 2nd place overall 43:40

Race#2:
Dylan(5mile): 4th place overall 46:11
Ryan(10mile): 9th place overall 1:35:12

Race#3:
Dylan(5mile): 2nd place overall 46:55
Ryan(10mile): 4th place overall 1:34:25

-Posted by Dylan.

Colorado Heli Boarding Trip

Expedition Date: Jan. 4th-11th 2011
Crew: Ryan DeVesty, Evan Pescatore, Sal Martelli, Matt Arentsen
Distance: The State of Colorado
Summits: 5
Elevation Gain and loss: to much to count
Completion time: 7 days

The Start of it all. Denver Colorado on our way to Arapahoe Basin Ski & Snowboard Area. The first of 5 mountains we plan on riding within the next 7 days.

 Abasin's summit 11,000 ft. This gives you 2,270 ft of vertical skiing area.

Next stop on the Colorado tour Silverton Mt. in the San Juan Mountains. This Mountain rage is extremely rugged and located in the southwestern part of Colorado. Its an old mining town surrounded by 14,000ft mountains as far as you can see. What you see in the picture below is Silverton's base camp resort. In this tent you sign your life away to go ride the lines of your life!

In the picture above you see people waiting on line for the rentals which were handed out in that school bus buried in 9 ft of snow. You also can see the Heli in the background which for a small fee you can be dropped on any of these peaks below and more. This place was the real deal. I had never seen or ridden anything like it up to this point. These slopes were only for experts! The pitch was anywhere from 40 to 50 degrees.

Hiking was a big part of the day. You would take the super sketchy 2 person chair lift from 10,000ft to 12,000ft then hike up depending on your riding level. The summit was about a 45 minute hike from the lift which topped you off at 13,500ft of elevation. The air was thinner up there and made everything more difficult. Once you picked your line you would stop hiking take a 10 minute break and descend the ride of your life!

 

If you look close directly in the center of the picture below you will see the Heli dropping our friend Sal off on that peak. This was our second day at Silverton Mt. and we all decided to go Heli Boarding. The Trip just kept getting better and better. What an EPIC mountain.

After our totally mental Heli drop we decided to take a monster hike to the summit and find some gnarly chute to drop into. These hikes were taxing on our legs and just straight scary at times where you knew that if you fell over the rocks it wasn't gonna be good. Just take a look at the photo below. One step to the right is a free fall to a most certain death. At the same time,  looking out at the mountains in the distance gave you a view of a life time.

Ouray Colorado: Home of the Craziest Ice Climbing I've ever seen. These guys and girls were ice picking their hearts out on 300ft ice waterfalls. We happened to be just passing through on our way to Aspen, so we stopped for a few photos.

In the picture below I captured a guy tight roping over this monster gorge as ice climbers below him are making their way to the top. I mean c'mon, really people?

Aspen Snowmass Resort and Ski area and our 3rd mountain on the list. This mountain has to be one of the largest as far as ski able acres in the country. It snowed like 6 inches over night so we got pretty ridiculous conditions all day. As it continued to snow all day and into the night.

As you can see we got puked on all night with snow accumulating about a foot or more. We really couldn't have asked for better conditions the whole time we were there. It was either blue bird perfection or snowing which both were fine with me.

So we were off to Aspen Mt for a morning of ridding fresh pow pow in the glades. We only road Aspen for the morning hours getting about 3 runs in before heading to Highlands for the remainder of the day.

Highlands and the famous Highlands Bowl! So at this point I thought we had road the most difficult and demanding terrain at Silverton Mt. I quickly found out I was wrong. 2 lifts later and we were standing at 10,000ft elevation and in for an hour hike up to Highland Bowl at 12,300 ft.

 Above is a sink hole. One of many I saw on the hike up to the Highland Bowl summit.

The summit at Highland Bowl was Spectacular. We decided to ride "G8" down the Bowl which was the longest most technical decent. What a ride it was and what a trip! This one was for the record books! Trying to make the Silverton Heli a once a year thing!