Gnarrows race was a grand success

Thank you to everyone involved. We had 35 racers, 15ish safety boaters, 20 or so volunteers for timing and shore safety, and who knows how many other boaters there to enjoy the release. Huge thanks to the prize sponsors. I am pretty sure I haven't been to a race that was so heavily fortified with awesome loot.
Nathan Pacham finally got to run the release that he has been working to get for years. Awesome. Thanks Nate for keeping them coming.
Also, huge props to Alan Clark, the hardest working man at that Race. Once again, the barefoot tubing mobile made everything run smoothly.

Please patron your local paddle shops and businesses. They continue to support you.

With any luck we can keep this event running!

See y'all at Hobag's halloween huckfest on the 16th!
C

Huge thanks to you Craig for taking the reins. Also to Andy, Becky, Jeff, Leslie and all others that made it go so well. The dam people of Ogden shared their goodies nicely.

I had a great time. Thank you for all the work Craig, Jeff, Alan, and Andy. There seemed to be a huge number of shore safety that deserve a huge thanks for sitting there watching us have all the fun. Thank you all for the time and energy spent making it fun for the rest of us.

Highlights for me

• Helping with a boat extraction at 9:30 am
  
• Ramming a sidesurfing competitor which took me from 4th to 3rd place in my heat
  
• Seeing the huge network of ropes at poison-ivy, set up by Bill.
  
• Chatting in the shuttle van
  

I hope everybody else had a good time. If you did, here are some email addresses.

Ogden City Events Coordinator (Helped secure signage, acts as the contact with Ogden City)
CarolynBrierley@ci.ogden.ut.us

Weber Basin Water Coordinator
chogge@weberbasin.com (Chris Hogge) Arranged the water release from their end

Yeah, next year maybe focus some more safety at the demon, supposedly more carnage happened down there. We were pretty bored at Poison Ivy...
Good times though, thanks everyone who put this on!`

We only had one rescue at the demon. I saw two people flip 50 yards downstream from the demon though.

Who won?

Aaron Pruzan won it for the second year in a row! Would like to see the full results.

I was also going to mention the notable lack of swimmers at the Poison Ivy / wall drop hole, especially compared to last year, and the close call downstream from there. Perhaps the mass start format results in more solid entrants?

I was glad to see you guys on the south side of the Poison Ivy hole Brian, that makes sense to me. Assuming I'm around for this next year, I would like to focus on more safety downstream from there. It is much harder to set strong swimmer safety down there, since its so rocky, but the safety is definitely needed down there, since all (afaik) the swimmers this year were below the wall drop. One boater flipped, had his helmet knocked off (I heard it was a cheaper Pro Tec), then took some more shots to the head that almost knocked him unconscious.

On a related note, if anyone wants to practice some more rescue setups at the wall drop, I would be up for that any day this week. Its a great place to practice; the best pool in the Narrows for swimming; great anchors now, etc. Thinking about a run today actually, its hot out!!
Bill

Safety was good this year. I am more than willing to help with future safety training efforts, once I catch my breath.

The Winners, please excuse any miss spellings(its from memory)
Mens
1 AP Won $280 and Tech 40 watch via the ASK
2 Snug Won $150 an H2o paddle via Cold Water company
3Ben Booth Won a hat via cold water(gotta get that fixed next year)
Womens
Sara Kemper Won 60 dollars and Thule racks via Thule
Kids
Teague Manley Won $60 dollars and a drybag via Wasatch touring

The other 32 prize winners via raffle got everything else.

I think...

Bill, mostly the same folks with some stepping up.

If anyone has Ben's email have him contact me via email craigwaddellatlivedotcom

Nate, next time I see you hit me up for the 30 bones I owe you.

Awesome time! Thanks everyone for doing what you did and what you do. clap clap clap

I had a great time. I got six laps in and was even able to help recover a boat. Many thanks to Craig, Andy, Jeff, and anyone else who helped organize this. I just wrote a thank-you email to Chris Hogge and Carolyn Brierley (thanks for the addresses, Nate) and encourage everyone else who enjoyed the event to do the same.

Yup, writing them a thank you note would be great! FYI Carolyn was actually at last years race helping out, she couldn't make it this year but she is THAT cool about helping us with this event.

Another email address to CC on your emails is: amartin@co.weber.ut.us
She is the permit coordinator for Weber Co. Big thanks to her too.

some race day pics