|
After trading tele skis for an Alpine Touring set-up and becoming moderately proficient at turning with her heels locked down, Dina Mishev did 21,000-feet of vertical to help her Duo Pro/Expert team to a first-place finish in their category at the second annual 24 Hours of Sunlight randonee race. Together she and teammate Brian Harder skied up and then down just under 50,000 vertical feet (almost two Mount Everests). Most often the duo did two laps each at a time, although sometime around 3 in the morning, Dina slacked and asked Brian to do three to her two. Dina’s last time on the course was a single lap. A complete lap took Dina between 40 and 54 minutes. Out of the 58 total teams – there were teams of four and five as well as of two – Dina and Brian placed 5th with 33 total laps. For their first-place category finish, they were presented with a giant check Dina actually tried to cash at a local bank.
Starting at 11 a.m. Saturday, 24 Hours of Sunlight competitors skinned, snowshoed or bootpacked up a groomed ski run closed to everyone but racers. At the resort’s 9,895-foot summit, racers ripped their skins or strapped into their snowboards for a high-speed schuss down another of the resort’s intermediate-friendly runs. Dina reports that this year’s downhill course was so full of whoop-de-doos and high speed turns the uphill was worth it even in the wee hours of the morning. The race ended at 11:00 Sunday morning. By 1:30 Sunday afternoon Dina couldn’t keep her eyes open. When she awoke from her stupor the next morning – there is no doubt that night’s sleep was among the best of her life -- the only thing that was sore were her feet. (Evidently riding indoors on a trainer is good preparation for rando racing … albeit much more boring than actually getting out and skinning in the Jackson Hole backcountry.)
This was Dina’s first randonee race and, her blistered feet now nearly healed, she already has plans to compete in the solo division at Sunlight next year with the goal of setting the women’s world record for most up-and-down vertical in 24 hours (which currently stands at 31,000 vertical feet). First she has some bike racing to do though.
|
