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Update 10/2/04: Sad, tragic and difficult times at Primal Quest this year. Nigel Alyott from Team AROC (Australia) died in an accident high on a mountain. Together with Team Montrail, AROC was leading  21/2 days into the race. They were on an Orienteering loop placed amongst jagged peaks. As the teams made there way down a steep chute, rocks came loose, narrowly missing teammates, but killing Nigel. For those who were there I can't imagine the emotional impact. All the athletes eventually gathered back at the last TA.  AROC teammates, Matt, Elena, and Tom shared powerful words and spontaneous tributes to Nigel. Race director Dan Barger and Team Seagate also contributed moving tributes. 

     Other than prerace greetings and paddling side by side early in the race my memories of Nigel are from meeting him at last years Primal Quest, hanging out afterwards and seeing him briefly at this year's Rogaining World Championships. He was one of the few people Mike and I knew at the Rogaine race. We didn't see him until mid morning when Mike and I were heading back towards the finish hoping we had time to get just few more check points before time was up. Nigel came running around the corner heading the opposite direction. "Hi Nigel" I yelled, but he was too focused to recognize me. 50 yards behind him was his teammate trying to keep up and looking worked over. 'What on earth was he thinking heading out to a remote section of the course? He'll never make it back in time, I thought.' He didn't. Like Tom and I joked before Primal Quest he's an optimist, always thinking it can be done and setting out to prove it. 


Update 8/8/04: Raid the North Extreme hosted the 2004 Adventure Racing World Championships in Newfoundland Canada last week. Among the top teams joining us were Nokia (Finland), Merill (US, NZ), Montrail (US), Go-Lite (US), Cross (Sweden), Mazda (South Africa). All of us enjoyed the true wilderness venue. Our opening 80k hike for example saw not one trail, road, light, town or car. I hope to find some time to write a blow by blow but suffice it to say at times we raced phenomenally only to let up impromptu to allow for a sprint finish. We did win though, by 20 seconds, edging out the impressive come back by Team Cross of  Sweden. For more check out the team site: Team Nike ACG/Balance Bar.

Update 7/28/04: Nike ACG/Balance Bar wins the the first round of the Balance Bar 24 Hour Adventure Race Series in Beaver Creek, Colorado July 20th.

Update 6/22/04: Three weekends in a row of racing. June 6th Mike, Danelle and I raced the GNC Sprint Adventure Race as part of the Vail Teva Games. Starting on mountain bike and foot we chased our sister team "Nike ACG" (Dan Weiland, Jay Henry and Rebecca Hodgetts) through a variety of checkpoints on Vail mountain. We made up ground and passed them on the inline skate up the Vail valley. A fun and unique tubing section followed down Gore creek. It began for us with a popped inner tube. Fortunately we had tied an extra one on to our tube raft and replaced it within a minute. We had tied three inner tubes together and strapped an 8 foot piece of plywood over them to create a "tube raft." We paddled it like a three person kayak. Our practice paid off and we navigated Gore creek perfectly. The final leg was mountain bike orienteering on Vail mountain with a Tyrolean traverse thrown in. We built on our lead and took home the win. 

     The following weekend, Ian Adamson joined us for the US Raid Series event in Bend Oregon. A really fun format where three of the four person team race each section, one person switches out. The early morning start took us up and over the hard packed snow of Bachelor mountain. We stayed in the lead until we got back into the woods. The Euro teams superior GPS and bushwacking skills landed them a frustratingly big lead of 14 minutes. The following multiple mountain bike, paddling, and skating legs allowed us to pull into a slight lead by the evening just before the second on foot orienteering section. We raced with now our co-leaders Salomon Swiss into the night, but they successfully dropped us in the woods and we lost another dozen minutes to them. We got a few hours sleep before the mornings final four sections, a mountain bike, skating and long on snow orienteering section with a rappel along  Tumalo Falls and a final fun single track mountain bike ride to the finish. We raced well and had a great time but I made enough small navigating errors to keep us in second. 

     Finally, this past weekend, June 20th, Mike Kloser and I joined former teammate Mike Freeburn and paragliding champ Othar Lawrence  for the Red Bull Divide and Conquer team relay. After we stocked up with sandwiches, bread and cookies from the best Bakery in the west  simply called "Bread"* in Durango Colorado we camped at the race start in stunning Silverton Colorado. I had the first leg at 6am around and up Kendal Mountain, a run, scramble and crawl from 9200 feet to over 13, 000! The runner for the Czech Republic team, winners of the Austrian adventure relay, The Dolomite Man (after which this race was modeled), led me out to the base of the climb. We went back and forth pushing one another on the edge of our aerobic capacities over the snow and scree. He, Robert, sprinted by me to take the $500 prime for each fastest leg. We handed off our Silver nugget batons to our paragliders. Othar Lawrence out hiked the Czech glider on the 20 minute climb to the launching point. He quick launched in perfect conditions sailed towards Silverton and stunned the crowd with a final one minute and 2000 foot spiral decent to land under the transition banner. Mike Freeburn then began the daunting task of paddling 27 miles down the class four and five Animas river. Less than five minutes behind him was the Czech paddler, Kamil Mruzek, winner of the last Kayak World Cup and ranked number three in the World! Freeburn, no slouch himself, had spent years on the US Kayak team.  An hour into the kayak we heard a report that the Czech had closed within 2 minutes, but, the serious whitewater was just beginning. Mike nailed each line with only two eddy outs and arrived at the take out in less than three hours. He then hiked the 10 minutes up out of the canyon with his boat on his shoulder, handed Mike Kloser the silver nugget and took home the $500 fastest kayak prime! Kloser had a brutal mountain bike ahead, starting with a three thousand foot loose, dusty and steep climb. With a 6 1/2 minute lead on the to us unknown Czech mountain bike pro, Mike paced himself just right to bring home the win. 

     All three of the last events will be televised and I'll pass on the dates as soon as they're confirmed. 

*Bread, besides baking the finest breads, uses all local Colorado wheat and much of  the profits from the baked goods he doesn't give away to his costumers go to children's charities around the world. 

Update 5/10/04: Kloser and Tobin win 24 Hour Orienteering World Championships!

       On the weekend of May 8-9th Mike Kloser and Michael Tobin of Team Nike ACG/Balance Bar traveled to the high desert of eastern Arizona for the "Rogaining World Championships". Nothing to do with hair loss, Rogaining is the Aussie word for the sport of 24 hour orienteering. Mike and Michael thought this event would be ideal training for the every increasing presence of orienteering in adventure races. 64 control points, each given it's own point value, were spread out over 300 square kilometers high in the Apache National Forest. Michael writes:

       "We received our maps with the control points several hours prior to the 11am start. We did our best, despite never having done such an event, to plan a route that took advantage of daylight hours and maximum points. Over 400 athletes in teams of 2-5 took off at 11am in all directions. It only took a few hours until we were all alone and alone with our own strategy. We were on a roll, making only minor mistakes and moving efficiently well into the night. The terrain was often very rocky and lumpy; we stumbled and tripped repeatedly. Mike said he felt, and I know he looked, like a drunk walking down the street. By 2am or so I had some pretty painful blisters. I had tried using thinner socks than usual, a mistake. The race headquarters from which we started is called the Hash House. Racers can stop in any time they want. Hot food, hot chocolate and cookies are provided. We were ready to refuel. I changed socks added Sportslick, we woofed down some food and took off. The next few control points were tough ones.  We'd be tramping through the forest on a baring and if we were off at all we'd miss the point. Mike nailed them."

       "The coldest hour is just before the dawn. Frost covered the grasses especially along the creek beds. When the sun came up we were at the far southwestern part of the course. It was beautiful. We didn't see a sole for the next few hours. We took advantage of some long gradual downhill's and to our surprise were still able to jog. Heading back towards the finish now we only had a few hours left until the 11am finish. For every minute a team arrives after 11 they are penalized 10 points. We had hoped to still have time to do a number of control points near the center of the course and the hash house. But time was slipping away and we had to settle for only a few.

      “We felt like we floundered a bit in the late morning hours but all in all we were really satisfied with our effort, navigation and strategy. It wasn't until we got home two days later that we saw on the Internet that we'd won, a total surprise to us. There were experienced teams from all over the world there. "Are you sure?" wrote Mike to the race organizer. We did win and by a mere 10 points! I wrote a narrative for their Website, http://rogaine.tucsonorienteering.org/index.htm, that’s really only of interest to fellow competitors with their maps in hand. I'm looking forward to reading narratives from the other top teams to see how our strategy compared. I also added up the control points we hit and noticed we actually had gone to 55 not 54. Likely we forgot to punch one on our control sheet. It matters not. We had such a good time I'm already searching for more Rogaine competitions and would love to put one on myself."

Update 5/1/04: 2004 Race Schedule posted.

Update 3/15/04: Danelle, Mike and I win Extreme Adventure Hidalgo. More later.

 Team Highlights
-June 7, Balance Bar Sprint, Soldier Hollow, Salt Lake 1st
-June 13, Wild Onion, NYC 2nd
-July 19-20, Balance Bar 24 Hours, Beaver Creek, Colorado 1st & 2nd
-August 2-3, Balance Bar Sprint Portland, OR 1st & 3rd
-August 9-10, Salomon X-Adventure, Idaho 1st
-August 16-17, Balance Bar Sprint, Sacramento, CA 2nd
-September 5-12, Primal Quest 1st
-September 19, Balance Bar, New York 1st
-October 16. Balance Bar Sprint Finals, LA 1st
-November 14-16, Balance Bar 24 Hour Finals, LA 2nd
-December, MSOQ, Borneo

2002 Team Highlights 
-Eco Challenge Fiji Oct. 11th 2nd
-Balance Bar 24 Hour National Champions 1st
-Balance Bar Final Los Angeles 2nd
-Subaru Primal Quest Telluride, Colorado 1st
-Balance Bar Gorge Games Hood River, Oregon 2nd
-Salomon X Adventure Kirkwood, California 4th
-MSOQ Borneo 3rd
-Balance Bar 24 hour Race, Boston 1st
-The Wild Onion, Chicago 2nd
-Balance Bar 24 hour Race, Phoenix 1st
-Extreme Adventure Hidalgo, Mexico 1st

Michael Tobin

Professional Triathlete, Duathlete, Mt. Biker, Cat 1 Cyclist

2001 Eco-Challenge New Zealand Champion

2000 Nissan Xterra World Champion
1999 & 2000 Nissan Xterra Series Champion
16 Xterra Victories
2 x Powerman Duathlon Series Winner
14 International Powerman Victories
2 x Triathlete's "Duathlete of the Year"
’91 Coors Light Duathlon Series & National Champion
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  
   
   

Profile

Age 40

    Michael considers himself the luckiest of athletes. Perhaps it’s his genes, his family includes four Olympians. Perhaps, it’s his background, he grew up in Sun Valley, Idaho, a ski town that’s very existence is built on athletics. He both Alpine and Nordic ski raced, competed in hockey, tennis and many years of soccer. Or, perhaps, it’s that his passions always found a sport.

    Michael developed his athletic endurance with his passion for exploring the mountains of central Idaho. He set hill climbing records, won the Pikes Peak accent in Colorado and excelled in 10k’s and marathons around the country. His Olympic cyclist sister, Katrin, got him cycling. Michael combined cycling with his running to win the Coors Light Duathlon Series in 1991. He then added mountain biking to his athletic skills, raced professionally, and won 6 Wild Rockies Mt. Bike titles.

    In 1993, the advent of the international Powerman Duathlon Series gave Michael an opportunity to travel the World to compete. From South Africa to Chicago, Finland to Spain, he won 14 Powermans and the series title twice. He celebrated his successes by traveling to Ecuador to climb its 8 highest volcanoes.

    Back home to Idaho, Michael was ready to call it an athletic career. But his girlfriend, now wife, Jenny, challenged him to learn to swim. In 1997, she dragged him to an off-road triathlon called Xterra in the Sierras: another athletic career was born. Xterras proved to be an ideal athletic challenge. On trails and mountains he could now train and compete.

    In 1999, Michael won the Xterra America Tour with 9 victories. He threw in the stateside Powerman Alabama title and filled in for the Nutra-Fig professional cycling team. In 2000, Michael added to his Xterra victories, now at 16, won the series title and the Xterra World Championships. How, he wondered, could he be more fortunate?

            In 2001 Michael got a call from Eco Internet, the winningest Adventure Racing Team of all time.  He was asked to fill in for an injured team member., first in Utah, then in Switzerland and finally at the Eco Challenge in New Zealand. The Team won. Now, motivated to pursue yet another athletic passion, Adventure Racing with his new Team, who knows where 2002 will take him.