Cooped Up? Get Uncooped.

Alaska Ultra Sport's Iditarod Trail Invitational is the world's longest human powered winter ultra-marathon. Crossing 350 to 1100 miles of frozen Alaskan wilderness, it is a brutal contest that few enter and only about half finish. This year 50 riders and skiers have signed up to take their places at the start line in March 2009. See for yourself in this video from the New York Times. Insanity on wheels. You gotta love it!  

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Some of my best moments on the trail have been when I've seen a golden eagle soaring overhead or a Rocky Mountain Goat scrabbling down a cliff or a moose grazing in the willows. I live for this stuff! But I also recognize that wildlife = wild creatures. No matter how much these awe-inspiring creatures seem to tolerate humans: wild is wild. Be prepared for encounters with wildlife and know what to do the next...

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We've had a weird snow year here in the West: unusual and dangerous. Several resorts started out the season with in-bounds avalanches, at places like Jackson Hole Mountain Resort and Snowbird. Unfortunately these stories ended tragically. The snow fall and combined conditions of temperature gradient, winds, and slope direction have created an unpredictable snowpack this year, and many people are opting to steer clear of avalanche prone slopes in the backcountry. But what to do?...

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Get off that indoor trainer and put your wheels to something solid. Check out Ray's, the indoor mountain bike park that has started a revolution! No need to hang up your knobbys for the winter or your road bike for that matter: the indoor biking craze has just begun. Indoor tracks are cropping up all over: Boulder just opened it's own velodrome and will soon expand to a track for mountain bikers. Cleveland has The...

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There are many ways to schuss: backcountry touring, skinny skiing, and skate skiing. Whoever suggested skate skiing should be done on a boring, groomed track with no obstacles was not the person that Klas the Swede learned from! Check out his style of skate skiing and see if you're not inspired to try something a little more daring the next time you hit the track!

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Alot of folks head South-South for winter. All that warm weather, I suppose. For those of you who prefer colder climes and spaces, go to Southern Utah for your next winter vacation, even past Moab! You're in for a feast - for the eyes and senses. Bryce Canyon National Park is one of  those gems of our national parks systems that just doesn't get enough big-name recognition, but is absolutely stunning. Strangely it has become...

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What the heck is a Quinzee? A quinzhee or quinzee is simply a shelter made by hollowing out a pile of settled snow. This is in contrast to an igloo, which is made from blocks of snow. Take a Saturday, find some snow, shoulder a few six packs and build yourself a quinzee. Because you can actually use them in the backcountry for shelter, not only are you hanging with your friends having an outdoor...

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The MSR Reactor was years in the making and followed on the heels of the JetBoil craze which hit in 2006. The JetBoil idea was basically: make a compact, lightweight stove system that was an integrated pot, stove, and canister. All three pieces are assembled quickly and then can be tucked away like a babushka doll - one inside the other. With built-in heat exchange "wings", the stove heats, to a rolling boil, a liter...

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Here's the bacon on the beacons: buy one that you can actually use! A lot of folks think bigger (i.e. more features) is always better. In the case of beacons, this is not really true. Your best buy in a beacon is one you can confidently and knowledgeably use. If a beacon is difficult to use and has more features than you're willing to learn about, you can translate that into even more practice time...

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Snowshoes rock as a way to explore the wintertime places in your life. Use them for touring the local golfcourse to climbing peaks; they cover the gamut. Simple to use and maneuver, they are a fantastic introductory sport for anyone who can walk and who has baseline fitness. How do I pick the snowshoes that are right for me? The basics: What type of terrain will you be on, ie. golf courses, easy backcountry trails,...

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