Locals suffer through elements to podium at Power of Four

“It was terrifying”

The Power of Four ski mountaineering (skimo) race in Aspen seems long and hard, but relatively benign. Find a partner and climb up and down the four ski resorts in the Roaring Fork Valley for a total of 12,000 feet over 26 miles. Like I said, long and hard, but it’s almost predominantly on ski resorts.
“I’d say about 90 percent of the course is on-piste,” explains Bryan Wickenhauser.
On Saturday, March 1, Mother Nature added a huge variable to the Power of Four race that ended up testing the resolve of some of the top skimo racers involved.
By the time the race was over, several teams had never made it to the top of Highlands Bowl, while those who did were met with winds of 50 to 70 miles per hour and white-out conditions.
Stevie Kremer teamed up with Sari Anderson out of Carbondale to win the women’s title, while Marshall Thomson joined with Scott Simmons to place second among the men. Bryan Wickenhauser and Brian Smith placed third and an Aspen local team of Max Taam and John Gaston defended their valley to take the men’s title.
With snow starting at about 4 a.m. racers kicked off at 6:30 a.m. into four inches of snow for the first climb up Snowmass Mountain. The conditions resulted in a long line of teams as participants opted to stay in line rather than try to break trail and pass teams on the climb.
“There was a huge line of people and the leaders were creating the track so it was hard to decide if you wanted to branch off and pass people and break trail,” says Kremer. “It was snowing so hard.”
By the time the racers hit the base of Aspen Highlands and started climbing, three men’s teams were off the front, but when the course hit the ridge above Highlands Bowl, everything was turned upside-down for the leaders.
“It was a Himalayan experience on Highlands above treeline,” says Wickenhauser. “We were soaking wet from sweat and snow and just getting pummeled in a white-out. We both were ready to throw in the towel but where were we gonna go? So we just kept racing.”
“It was insane,” adds Kremer. “You didn’t know if you went one inch to the side if you’d fall. It was terrifying.”
Once done with the climb along the ridge in white-out conditions, the teams then had to drop into Highlands Bowl with deep snow and no visibility.
“It’s like trying to ski Red Lady Bowl in a white-out,” says Wickenhauser. “There’s just no definition.”
That’s where the difference was made in the men’s race. Taam and Gaston are very familiar with their home ski area and built a gap on the decent and held it to the finish line, completing the race in 5 hours, 20 minutes and 56 seconds. Thomson and Simmons came through 12 minutes later, with Smith and Wickenhauser finishing third in a time of 5:38:14.
“Having the home field advantage really helped skiing down Highlands Bowl,” says Wickenhauser.
Ultimately the race was diverted from the Highlands Ridge for a majority of the remaining teams but Kremer and Anderson did summit, and finished the race in a time of 6 hours, 29 minutes and 23 seconds for the women’s title.
“It was the hardest race I’ve ever competed in, mentally and physically,” says Kremer.
The Power of Four is just the start of skimo March Madness as the same roster of skimo racers and then some come to Crested Butte for the U.S. National Ski Mountaineering Championships Friday through Sunday, March 14-16. They then get a break, and perhaps return to their roots to race in the Al Johnson uphill/downhill telemark race on Sunday, March 23, before rigging back up to head out into the dark of night on Friday, March 28 for the Gore-Tex Grand Traverse race from Crested Butte to Aspen.