Ship some of that two feet of NEW snow to destinations East as the drought of snow has crippled some national qualifiers and state championships. But not the X-Dog Event flagged off the line at beautiful Mt. Hood’s White River West Sno Park. Racing through the White River Canyon, one understands why this, the oldest snowshoe event in the region, remains so popular.
Overall Winner, Dan Prahl pushes through the winteresque conditions (photo courtesy Gina Williams)
Young Dan Prahl (24) dug through the deep snow-turf to take a 9:31 minute average overall win in the 8 km followed 91 seconds later by Michael Burke at age 31.
Prahl notably bicycled cross-country, Seattle to New York, two years ago with a friend, a true test of endurance and quadricep work.
Christy Runde, a young 43, won the women’s group and took third overall in a remarkable showing. In a light snow, light air, and gorgeous conditions, she snowed the other 84 finishers with this remarkable performance. Runde is no stranger to snowshoe racing; she amazed with a fifth place overall women’s finish at 2010’s World Snowshoe Championships, Grouse Mountain, BC, that equated to a bronze medal age-group finish. She also races the Team Lizard Cross Country Courses and in October, 2011, finished 11 in that hotly tested group of 48; three seconds separated her from the higher spot and a lower rank.
Cross Country Racer, Christy Runde, races snowshoes to the women’s overall win in deep snow (photo courtesy Gina Williams)
Frank Mungeam, 50, won his class and secured the third male overall, edging Kevin Cooper by seconds for that bronze; Cooper captured No. 1 Top Master.
In the Women’s ranks, Myra Klettke, 51, showed her strength with a second in the group as Angela Favre passed the line for third.
The hour-timer also marked the top ten finishers, too, as Harlan Brock snuck in at 59:30 while Chuck Ryan tallied 11 in the totals just 45 seconds later: 1:15.
Kudos to Tracie and Justin Sipple, Melanie Hopkes and Gina Leckband for their courageous finishes at 2:03 for the Sipples and 22 seconds later for Leckband and Hopkes. For snowshoeing, that is a lot of work in deep snow.
In the Junior Qualifying race of 4 Km, 14-year-old Justin Miller burned snow with a 31:56 overall win. Silvia Reyes won the women’s overall as 15-year-old Lucy Defillipis took the Junior Girls Class at 36:36. A special note in the results for 61-year-old Brian Grier as oldest finisher in 40:46 of the day in EITHER class.
Photos courtesy Gina Williams, community blogger for www.OregonLive.com. Read her reports detailing state-wide reports with unique commentary and photos unavailable elsewhere.
See X-Dog Events: http://xdogevents.com/
USSSA: www.snowshoeracing.com
Write Phillipgary@snowshoemag.com
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