Traditional 4th of July weekend festivities don’t include enough epic for the Seattle-based trio of Apex Racing teammates Travis Biechele, Jason Connell, and Chris Ragsdale. Their plan: ride bikes from Seattle to Paradise via Longmire, summit Mt. Rainier via the standard/Disappointment Cleaver route (with Bill Booth joining them as a 4th on the rope team), then cycle back to Seattle. in under 24 hours.
They started at the Space Needle today at around noon. You can follow their live tracker status here.
Their cycling route between Seattle and Paradise will cover approximately 108 miles. They started on road bikes to navigate through Seattle, then switched to time trial bikes and will be riding in team time trial mode until they reach the Nisqually entrance of Mt. Rainier National Park. There they will get back on road bikes for the ~18 mile climb to Paradise. They expect to arrive at Paradise around 6PM tonight.
At Paradise, they have a crew waiting for them and will switch to hiking gear for the ascent to Camp Muir.
Meanwhile, as they pedal to Paradise, a climbing support team is headed up to Camp Muir to set up an advanced base camp. Led by Boealps instructor and fellow Apex Racing teammate Bill Booth, Carmi Schulman, Jason Cemanski, and Matt Smith will sherpa the team’s climbing gear and get everything prepped for the technical portion of the climb. If all goes as planned the trio will grab some water and food, clip into a rope set up by Bill, and head for the summit.
Jason estimates they should get to Camp Muir between 9-9:30 this evening and be headed for the summit by 10PM. The trio will be joined by Bill for the summit attempt to make a 4-man rope team. Everyone has climbing experience and has summited Rainier except Travis. This morning while they did gear organization in Chris’ back yard Jason asked Travis whether he had a prusik. Travis: “What’s that?” Let’s hope he doesn’t actually have to use it! In anticipation of any potential issues while climbing they have Jason at the sharp end of the rope followed by Travis, then Chris, and Bill the mountaineering instructor bringing up the rear.
The plan is to summit around 2AM, but the weather is less than ideal at the moment, so they will make a go/no-go decision when they get to Camp Muir. As I write this the wind at Camp Muir (10,000′) is 40mph, and this could very well be a deal-breaker.
Assuming they are able summit, they should be back at Camp Muir around 4-4:30AM, back to Paradise at 6AM, and back at the Space Needle at noon tomorrow Sunday July 6 with an elapsed time of of under 24 hours.
For the return trip they will be sagged by Bill, Matt Smith, and Peter Senter who will be at Paradise at 4:30AM tomorrow with a van.
Additional support includes Jason’s wife Lynn, her brother Phal (pronounced “Paul”), and Travis’ girlfriend Lindsay Tennant-Moore. Chris’ wife Lara and sons Caden and Chase are supporting from the Ragsdale family home base in Ballard. As he was pouring a final cup of coffee, Chris told me that pulling off an epic like this is as much about the planning and crew as the folks attempting the feat, and he is genuinely thankful to the folks who have stepped up to help out.
I’ve asked around and done some web searches to see whether there had been any previous attempts. As far as I can tell, this particular adventure has not yet been done. Here’s what I can find:
–On Jul 30, 2012 a pair cycled 77.3 miles from Steilacoom in an adventure they called “Sea to Summit“.
–An out and back from Tolmie State Park by Randall Nordfors in 2008 with an elapsed time of 19:57:30.
—In July 2013 Lyle Haugsven and his friend Dan cycled from the Magnolia neighborhood to Paradise hauling their climbing gear, had dinner and a nap at the Paradise Inn, summited Mt. Rainier, then pedaled back to Magnolia in about 41 hours. (Added August 16, 2014)
–And I’ve heard about an adventure that involved cycling to Mt. Rainier National Park and running the Wonderland Trail, but can’t find an entry about it.
Seattle bicycle racer emeritus Jerry Baker said: “Sounds crazy to me and I don’t think it ever has been attempted.”
We would all like to know about similar successful adventures–let me know! (Edited August 16, 2014)
The epic was Jason Connell’s idea, and has been brewing in his disturbed mind for more than 10 years. Jason has a mountaineering resume that consists of what he describes as “intermediate” routes: 4 trips to the Andes, a Denali summit, and a handful of summits and attempts on Rainier.
