JUNE 5,2018 PORT TOWNSEND, WA— Race to Alaska, now in its 4th year, just closed its registration and 47 teams will be at the start line. “This is when we start looking at our field on racers for who we think might win and who is going to make a really good story,” says Race Boss Daniel Evans. It’s his belief that it will be a slower paced year than in the past. “We don’t have the concentration of larger multi-hulls we’ve had in prior years. They’ll be some fast boats, but the average boat size has gone down.”
In the burgeoning tradition of the race, there are those teams that are pushing the boundaries. For the first time ever there is a prone paddler attempting the race. Team Extreme Sobriety will attempt to complete the race laying on his stomach and paddling the board with his hands all the way to Ketchikan. “Yeah, and he intends to ride a bicycle from Ketchikan back home on Bainbridge Island.” Daniel added, “We also have a 40’ international offshore racing boat from the 80’s (Superfriends), a team trying to be the first to complete the race by pedal power alone (Take me to the Volcano), 2 teams returning (PT Watercraft and Trak Kayaks) are trying to beat the world records they set for fastest solo and fastest kayak with no sail and another Stand up Paddler (Torrent) who is using the race to fuel a documentary to raise awareness about Traumatic Brain Injury and PTSD in veterans. There is no end to the stories this year. And the tracker is a good place to start” The tracker is a free to view map that allows online viewers to follow each team and even connects viewers to team social media pages.
Daniel and the media film crew will follow the race on a variety of power boats recording and interviewing the teams as they find their own way to make it to Ketchikan. “We kind of make it up as we go,” said Zach Carver, the creative mind behind most of R2AKs videos. “We go where we have to to get the shots and stay up editing and cutting while the boat moves to the next location. It’s a kind of 24 hours a day operation. And it’s during that time that we start to see the stories of the race grow and become tangible.” All of the video clips and well as daily updates and the tracker can be found online for free.
Like with the question of who will win, it’s anybody’s guess what stories will emerge from the brave fleet of racers as they move northward. “One thing is for sure,” says the Race Boss. “As these teams sail into the forgotten reaches of our coastal wilderness, the story that does come out will be incredible.”
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