Local skiers take on Endurance Challenge

Billy Laird takes second at Sunlight

Crested Butte residents Billy Laird and Pat O’Neill and pit crew Butch Hegeman and Allen Hadley headed over to Glenwood Springs last weekend to compete in the Endurance Challenge at Sunlight Sunday, February 28.
The Endurance Challenge is a 12-hour uphill/downhill race on Sunlight ski area. The race is part mental, part physical and entirely psychotic as participants must climb up and ski down the same run for 12 hours straight.
O’Neill went into the event hoping to hit 20 laps for a total of 30,000 vertical feet of climbing over the course of 12 hours and received some sound advice from friend Bryan Wickenhauser prior to the race.
“I heard Chris Kroeger was going to be fast so Wick said, ‘stay close to him’,” says O’Neill.
Laird, on the other hand, had no pre-race goal in mind except to come home with some cash.
“I just thought 15 to 20 laps might get me some prize money,” says Laird.
He, too, received some pre-race advice.
“A friend said to go out at a good pace and to trust that pace,” says Laird. “My wife told me, ‘if you’re going to do this, go as hard as you can’.”
With Hadley working in O’Neill’s pit and Hegeman in Laird’s, the two established a pace that had O’Neill in second place and Laird in third with Michael Hagen leading the charge.
Laird climbed into second place somewhere around lap 12 or 13 and the pace never let up for the two skiers.
“The top seven skiers were so strong that if you hung out too long, you’d lose a place,” says O’Neill. “I thought it would spread out but it was fairly relentless the entire 12 hours.”
By lap 14, Laird pulled away to secure second place but the leader remained out of reach.
“I never felt like I could reel that guy in after lap 13,” says Laird. “I was just hoping he would cave but he never did.”
Laird finished the race with 19 laps, climbing a total of 28,500 vertical feet.
O’Neill was in third place and appeared there for good, feeling strong through the ninth hour of the race.
“I felt in a way that I couldn’t catch Billy for second but I felt I had third sealed up,” explains O’Neill. “I didn’t realize I was being pursued like an aging and wounded wildebeest by Travis Macey.”
Macey ultimately passed O’Neill to take third place and O’Neill came across in fourth with 18 laps for a total of 27,000 feet.
Despite falling short of his pre-race goal, O’Neill was psyched just to be there thanks in large part to a surge of local support as Jack Huckins Construction, GKR Imaging, True Value, Tom Pulaski, Alison Gannett, Jason Trimm and Aduard Oliemans all chipped in to get O’Neill to the start line.
“I was pretty in awe of the generosity of local people and businesses,” says O’Neill.
Both O’Neill and Laird tout their pitmen Hegeman and Hadley as a big part of their success in Sunlight.
“Butch was a total bad ass, he had it dialed,” says Laird.
“We got to go out and ski all day and these guys were in the pits,” adds O’Neill. “They put in a ton of effort.”