Denali, Alaska - At 6:59 PM on Thursday June 19th 2008, Jordan Romero of Big Bear Lake, California, summited one of the most difficult peaks in the world at the age of 11.  He is the youngest person to have ever stepped foot on the mountain, let alone summited.  Due to its northern latitudes, it ranks as one of the longest and most arduous climbs, weather often putting teams on hold for days and weeks at a time.  Team Jordan Romero, did the climb in record time.  We are still awaiting details of the amazing feat.

TrackMe360.com provided GPS safety and tracking gear to the expedition, and via periodic location messages sent via satellite, fans, family and friends all over the globe could follow Jordan’s adventure in real time at www.jordanromero.com.

A team of recreational (plus!) cyclists from Valley Presbyterian Church in Portola Valley, CA finished the gruelling RAAM 2008 on Thursday evening June 19th at 8 :15 PM, after over 3,000 miles of riding from San Diego, CA to Annapolis, MD.  TrackMe360.com provided GPS tracking for the team so that fans, friends and family could follow their journey online in real time.  Every 10 minutes, our satellite beacon would send the team’s location coordinates to an online tracking map, courtesy of TrackMe360.com.  Detailed team results are here, and the team’s web site is here.

A four-person team of everyday folks from Valley Presbyterian Church will ride in what is known as the “world’s toughest bike race.” They hope the drama generated by the coast-to-coast race and their own relative inexperience in the event will draw attention to a worthy cause: Peninsula Habitat for Humanity. The “ultra-distance” riders hope that their endurance will raise $50,000 for an eight-unit family complex on Lincoln Avenue in Redwood City. This project will provide affordable ownership homes for eight low income families.  Team web site is here.

Coast to coast in nine days from June 11-20, 2008, Race Across America’s 3,000-mile route begins in Oceanside, CA, and concludes in Annapolis, MD. Unlike a stage race, riders pedal twenty-four hours a day in a relay format that keeps one team member on the road while the others rest. None of the Team H4 riders are professional cyclists. The ultra marathon will test them physically and spiritually and serve as a two-wheeled vehicle for generating funds and awareness for Peninsula Habitat.

TrackMe360 is providing real-time tracking of this team along its journey.  Check out the live map at: http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?&glId=020phDI4p7QU3OyJdQelyRgTVzMJGh7cV

During the month of May 2008, twenty four bay area adventure racing, rogaine and orienteering teams embarked on the inaugural TrackMe360 Mountain-O Training Race at Mount Diablo.  Some encountered 95+ degree temps, some dense patches of poison oak, and others suffered empty water bladders a little longer than they had hoped, but all walked away with an appreciation for the remote and rugged terrain that can be found so close to home.  Here are some of the comments we received:

“This was  a blast. Looking forward to the next one. Hopefully we can fit it in before PQ. Otherwise well just do Julys.”

“We just wanted to thank you for putting together such a great event. We had a great time and enjoyed all of the varied terrain and route choice options. We chose to do a lot of bushwalking and it was a blast.”

“This was so much fun!  I can’t wait for the next one.”

“We had a great time yesterday, a fantastic course!…We had a blast, and a very full day. Lots of wildlife, plenty of bushwack, good times.”

Long course podium

1. Dirty Avocados (Adam Doti, Donato Polignone, Brian Schmitz) (5:19:14)
2. Aquan/RWG (Thomas Bastis) (5:38:47)
3. Dos Lobos (Phil Lovalenti) (5:50:02)

Short course podium

1. Saturday Warriors (Geoffrey Benton, David Parker, Curtis Pickering, Jared Peterson) (4:08:47)
2. VanderKitten & WanderDog (Chris Bark, Cindi Choi) (5:05:13)
3. Cumbria (Penny DeMoss, Mark Blair) (5:20:08)

Congrats to these teams and everyone else who finished these challenging courses.  Dirty Avocados earns a free race entry at a future training race.

GPS Tracks are online now!

All teams’ GPS tracks are now viewable at SleepMonsters at:

http://www.sleepmonsters.us/racereport.php?page_action=gps&race_id=6421

See how your route choice and route execution differed from those fast teams.  Dirty Avocados took a chance and grabbed CP4 before 5 and hoped they could find a way through the brush at the bottom of the spur - it paid off.

…and the winner is…

I consulted my 8-year old daughter Emma to do the official raffle draw, and it was team VanderKitten & WanderDog that walked away with a SPOT satellite messenger.  Congratulations - it will be mailed out shortly.

June race is on - 100 Lakes, near Yuba Gap off Hwy80

A few people have already tackled June’s Mountain-O, and race central will soon be up on SleepMonsters.  Learn more about this training race at:

http://trackme360.com/blog/?p=27

Your virtual race director…Mats

Race Central

Once the starting gun goes off, the racing is non-stop for up to 60-hours. Teams choose their own routes between race checkpoints — meaning teams are responsible for their own race. There are no official aid stations, no support crews, no specified “rest” periods; it’s just your team, totally self-sufficient, against the Untamed New England course.

The winning team is expected to complete the course in around 55 hours. There are mid-race cut offs where slower teams will be routed onto a shorter course, preventing them from being out on the course for 3 days or longer. The Untamed New England Adventure Race will be challenging for first time racers and experienced teams alike; with a course combining the outdoor disciplines of paddling, mountain biking, trekking, ropes, and orienteering we promise a race to remember!

The Untamed New England Adventure Race will feature a variety of disciplines to test the mettle of every team.

• Mountain Biking (100+ miles)
• Ropes (1-2 courses including rappelling, ascending, and traverses)
• Trekking (40+ miles)
• Paddling (30+ miles)
• Orienteering (throughout the race, including specific orienteering courses)

TrackMe360 is providing GPS tracking devices to Untamed New England.  For live coverage between June 12-15, turn to this link.

Registration is open! To register your team, click here.

Event Sponsors:  iRule and SleepMonsters

June 1, 2008 - Folsom, California. TrackMe360 today announced the second Mountain-O event in its quasi-series of “virtual races”.  The first event took place at Mount Diablo in May, and as the snow is melting in the Sierra, we are taking the June race to the sub-alpine area on the Western slopes of the Sierra near Emigrant Gap off Hwy 80.   I tried getting a permit here for a “normal event” two years ago, but got stuck in the National Forest red tape, so change of plans - here we go!

What is a TrackMe360 Training Race anyway?

Consider it an opportunity for a fun and challenging work-out in an amazingly scenic place – a place where you’d normally never get a permit approved for a race.  The course will bring out the best this area has to offer.  It’s a race, but not in the traditional sense.  The main difference is teams don’t race simultaneously, and that’s what allows us to race without permits, but a nice side benefit is that people can decide when they want to race (within the race month), to fit their busy schedules.  CP markers will be minimal, just a small piece of flagging.  No pre-race meeting, no finish banner - just you and the mountain.  Could it be any more authentic?

How it works

• -Register for the “race” online at TrackMe360.com
• -Receive the map and a GPS recording device before your chosen “race day”.  For safety and redundancy in CP marking, you also get a SPOT satellite tracker.
• -Receive CP coordinates by 5 PM the day before “race day” via e-mail – plot your map.
• -On race day, go race, and the GPS device records your route.
• -Next day, mail back the GPS device and SPOT to TrackMe360.com
• -As soon as the GPS device is received, your results will be posted on the SleepMonsters leader board, “ladder style”, meaning as other people race, the leader board will reflect the order from fastest to slowest teams.
• -After the last day the race is “active”, the winning team is crowned, and all teams’ routes will be posted online in Google Maps, for “post race analysis”.
• -This is all done under the “honor system”, and is considered a training race “with benefits”.

Race #2: 100 Lakes Mountain-O

Our second TrackMe360 Training Race takes place on the Western slopes of the Sierra, near Yuba Gap off Hwy 80 between Auburn and Truckee.  Two courses of varying degrees of challenge (short and long) have been designed to showcase the best the area has to offer, with moderate vertical gain and significant cross country travel.  The navigational challenge is less about route choice this time, and more about cross country navigation and efficient route finding across complicated terrain.  The venue is nothing short of spectacular.  It is not as alpine as the high Sierra, but is just about ideal for Mountain-O, with lots of intricate topographic features and many lakes sprinkled throughout the course - water will not be a problem here!  There is snow still on the course, but it will gradually disappear (except on north facing steep slopes) through the month of June, and it is totally dense and consolidated and easy to walk and run on without snow shoes.  In many cases, the snow makes for easier traveling  Both courses will feature some non-technical ridge traversing with stunning views.

-General Location: Near Yuba Gap off Hwy 80 between Auburn and Truckee, CA
-Race is active: Month of June, 2008
-Disciplines: Foot only.  Some trail, some cross country, non-technical ridge traverse
-Topo navigation on tear and water proof MyTopo maps - 1:24,000
-Approximate distance: 10 mi. (short course) and 16 mi. (long course)
-Approximate duration: 3.5-6.0 hrs (short course) and 6.0-11.0 hrs (long course)
-Approximate vertical gain: 2,500 ft. (short course) and 4,500 ft. (long course)
-Course designed and pre-run by: Mats Jansson (Aquan/RWG)
-Divisions: Mixed open (any combination of gender and age), team size 1-4
-Registration: $49/team ($39/team if you have your own SPOT)
-Prize: Post race raffle among all “finishers”: iRule inVest (a $120 value)

Parting comments - it is essential to be able to “stay found” by reading the terrain as you travel.  If you do this, the navigation is not difficult.  The lakes and topo lines provide ample assurance of where you are.  Altimeter is essential at times.  There will be some hiking up snow fields.  Ideally, your shoes should have “sticky” rubber, for safe travel across granite slabs and rock hopping (Salomon’s or notoriously non-sticky).
To register your team, click here.  If you have any questions, please e-mail mats@trackme360.com

May 24, 2008
New River Gorge, WV
The Wild Wonderful 24 will take place in the previous home of the Endorphin FIX: the New River Gorge. Teams of 1, 2,& 4 will trek with map and compass , ride mountain bikes up, over and around the Gorge, and whitewater raft!!! Racers will get to have a bit of class V fun as part of the Wild Wonderful 24. Class VI River Runners will be providing the boats, paddles, helmets and PFD’s and guides for this segment of the race. Teams will be assigned to guides and boats. Don’t think you will be going for a leisurely float down the river. This is part of the RACE! These guides will be “hammering” it out with you down the river for bragging rights. Details will be revealed at the race brief how teams will be placed in the rafts. Wetsuits are recommended (see gear list for details).

TrackMe360 will be providing SPOT trackers for safety and live tracking via CheckpointTracker.

Just a quick note to let you know that SleepMonsters is hosting the results page for the TrackMe360 Mount Diablo Training Race.  When the course closes, they will also publish team routes for all that “post race analysis” fun.  It’s up now, and you can see the results so far, and what teams are scheduled to go out next.  From the main page, click on “leaderboard” on the left.

http://www.sleepmonsters.us/racereport.php?race_id=6421&story_order=asc

Can you beat Thomas?  To register your own team, go to:

http://www.trackme360.com/shop/catalog/index.php?cPath=26

Have fun!

SleepMonsters and TrackMe360 are now working in partnership to maximize the benefits and potential of the new SPOT Satellite Messengers in tracking adventure racing.

After pioneering the first use of SPOT in an international race at the Baja Travesia last month, preparations are now underway for coverage of this month’s Florida Coast to Coast race and the Untamed New England
race in June, with live tracking maps and instant leader-board updates.

Until now race tracking via satellite was limited to a few big budget races a year, but the launch of the SPOT device heralds a revolutionary change in race management, safety and media coverage. SleepMonsters and
TrackMe360 are taking the lead on this, working closely with SPOT so that racers, supporters and Race Directors can now benefit from more accessible and affordable race tracking and live event reporting.

Mats Jansson quickly saw the potential of using SPOT in adventure racing and established TrackMe360 to rent out SPOTs to races, ensuring they didn’t have to subscribe to the annual satellite time contract,
which is the primary cost of the SPOT service.

“For racers the SPOT devices are easy to carry and use, and ensure their position is known and that they can call for help if needed. That safety cover is of vital importance to Race Directors, and there is the
added advantage of positional tracking for effective race management,” said Jansson.

The partnership with SleepMonsters began with the development of their existing race leaderboard to enable teams in Baja Travesia to signal their position on arrival at a checkpoint. The race leaderboard then updated … provided they were in the right location!

After recent work with SPOT this process is now more easily implemented for future races, and supported by positional mapping of teams, ensuring online race coverage is instantly updated.

“We’ve successfully used mobile phone networks to update leaderboards at every transition during our World Championship coverage,” said Rob Howard, Managing Editor of SleepMonsters, “but this was the first time we’ve been able to use satellite communication to mark a teams arrival at every checkpoint.

“The SPOT messengers are lighter and smaller than previous satellite trackers, and with TrackMe360 making them much more affordable we expect to see them used extensively for race tracking and timing on SleepMonsters in the future.

“This is great news for race followers and for everyone involved in adventure racing; teams, sponsors and race organisers. We already provide extensive race coverage, and our service and technical support are free to races. Now the partnership with TrackMe360 will add a new dimension to our race coverage.”

Coverage of the Florida Coast to Coast race runs from May 23-26th on www.SleepMonsters.us and Race Director Elias Jimenez is enthusiastic about the prospect.

“Live tracking was previously only in the realm of expedition races like Primal Quest. Now TrackMe360 and SleepMonsters have created an affordable safety and tracking solution for 24+ hour races. They have
certainly addressed an existing gap for AR promoters who want to implement this type of solution but were previously constrained by limited budget.”

About SleepMonsters: SleepMonsters is the world’s largest adventure racing community and publication, with websites in 13 countries and 8 languages. The site has led the way in online race reporting for many
years, and carries reports from over 200 races a year around the world.

About Trackme360; TrackMe360 is dedicated to providing affordable GPS tracking solutions to individuals, groups and events, worldwide. Primary markets include Adventure Racing and other outdoor pursuits.

To enquire about hiring SPOT messengers and race coverage on SleepMonsters, please contact; Mats Jansson at mats@trackme360.com and Rob Howard at Rob@SleepMonsters.com.

Well, tomorrow officially opens the course, so I thought I’d put out some additional information for those of you who intend to get out there and give it a go.

Navigation Tips

For those of you who are not seasoned navigators, and are taking this on as a navigational exercise, here are some tips and information that will help:

1. If you are accustomed to orienteering maps, this race is a little different in that you will be navigating on a “topo” map in scale 1:25,000.  At this scale, as a rule of thumb, one finger width is about a 1/4 mile, and so 4 finger widths = 1 mile.
2. Altitude plays a role in this race, and I would consider an altimeter “mandatory gear”.  There will be checkpoints placed where one of the clues is the elevation.  Remember to check/calibrate any barometer-based altimeters often, when you pass known altitudes.
3. You will be asked to plot the Start, finish and checkpoints, based on UTM coordinates.  It is not difficult, but you might want to read up on it beforehand - it is basically like plotting x and y coordinates.  If you don’t have plotting tools, I can highly recommend the plotting tools from ARNavSupplies.  Here is a list of their navigation supplies.  Look for the one that has scale 1:25,000.
4. I also highly recommend participating in this navigation clinic that Racing With Giants are putting on, with the help of Mark from ARNavSupplies.

 Mandatory and Recommended Gear

The following is a list of mandatory and recommended gear.  There will be no gear check of course, but the release waiver will ask you if you understand what gear is mandatory, and if you are bringing it.

Mandatory Gear

1. Map and clue sheet as provided by TrackMe360
2. Compass
3. Altimeter
4. GPS recording device as provided by TrackMe360, water-proofed
5. SPOT (provided by TrackMe360 or your own)
6. Suitable first aid kit
7. Water container

Recommended Gear

1. Gaiters
2. Gloves
3. Protective eyewear/sunglasses
4. Electrolyte tablets
5. Long pants
6. Sunglasses
7. Sun block / lip balm
8. Water treatment system.  Recommend Klear Water.

A few words about Water

At the end of April, I ran into several creeks with clear, running water, which if treated would be fine to drink.  Some of these may dry up though as summer arrives.  However, there are several water taps/fountains available.  The map identifies where drinkable water comes out of a tap or drinking fountain, with the letter “W”.  There is water at the start and finish.  Your race strategy may very well incorporate strategic stops at the letter “W”, in order to go light and fast.  Take the temperature forecast into account.  Much of the course has direct sun exposure, and it is only going to get hotter.  Start early in the day if you can.

Hazards on the course

You should be well aware of the standard things to consider when going out in California, but if you haven’t spent much time in areas like Mount Diablo, here some things to at least be aware of:

1. Rattlesnakes (I didn’t see a single snake there yet, but they are about)
2. Steep terrain (there are brief sections of the course where using your hands will be useful, hence gloves are recommended).
3. Beware of rock fall below you when you travel up the canyon as a team.
4. Poison Oak (PO) - PO is present on sections of the course, but you can avoid it if you pay attention.  I have tried to steer clear of PO to any extent possible.

Once you register, you’ll get some additional information.  That’s it for now.

Mats J. (mats@trackme360.com)