Inhaltsverzeichnis für July 2013 in Outside

KRISTOFFER SZILAS Szilas was a few minutes into his third day of climbing Alaska’s 8,520-foot Citadel, in the Kichatna Range, when he snapped this photo of his two partners ascending the final couloir. “We’d just endured an extremely cold night, sitting on a tiny ice ledge that we’d chopped out of a 70-degree face,” says the Danish photographer, who lives in New York City. Szilas wasn’t sure they were going to make the summit, until he saw the dawn light on the Kichatna Spire. “It was a magical moment. The weather was clear, and I knew we could push through the last section to the top.” THE TOOLS: Ricoh GR Digital III, ISO 64, f/4, 1/1,070 second JOSH SMITH Last summer, Smith was driving home across Australia’s Great Dividing Range…

In our annual Adventure Issue (May), we chose the greatest athletes and adventurers of the year for “Superfreaks.” Our picks—along with the other stories in the issue—both inspired and infuriated readers. Lakpa Rita (“The Savior”) represents mountaineering at its finest. I had the privilege to climb with him on Aconcagua, and I can personally attest to his willingness to aid a climber in distress. My husband had a grand mal seizure at high camp, and Lakpa was instrumental in getting him through some tricky territory on the way down. CHRISTINA MUEDEKING WASHINGTON, D.C. I could’ve done without the stories devoted to record-breaking nutters like Kilian Jornet (“The Hybrid”), who ran over Mont Blanc in spandex tights. He may not have known that the merest whiff of a snow squall could…

IT WAS DESIGNED expressly to destroy bodies and spirits. Henri Desgrange, the onetime cyclist and newspaper editor who organized the first Tour de France, in 1903, once described his ideal race as having only one finisher. The Tour has, at times, come close to that: in 1919, only 11 of 69 riders made it to Paris. Over the years, three have died and thousands have either given up or been removed after failing to meet a cutoff time. Indeed, the three-week Tour tests riders like no other contest, which may explain why so many of them will do damn near anything to survive, let alone win. They’ll throw elbows at 55 mile per hour. They’ll ride with broken bones. They’ll ingest anything and lie about everything. Only at Le Tour…

Stage 1: Porto-Vecchio to Bastia The Tour rolls through Corsica for the first time ever. PAIR IT WITH: Ajaccio Cuvée Faustine Blanc ($23). Winemaker Jean Charles Abbatucci fits perfectly into the Corsican tradition of offbeat thinkers: he plays classic Corsican songs to his grapes over loudspeakers mounted on his tractor. Stage 4: Nice to Nice The team time trial will offer an early indication of which squad has the most firepower. PAIR IT WITH: Van Volxem Goldberg Riesling Erste Lage ($25). Team-timetrial star Tony Martin, who rides for Omega Pharma–Quick-Step, is an East German native. What better way to watch than with a great German Riesling? Stage 13: Tours to Saint-Amand-Montrond This ride through the Loire river valley is flat, so sprinters have the advantage. Watch for gusty crosswinds that…

IN 2010, DESIGNERS at Trek decided to create a new road bike for pro cycling’s spring classics. A key feature they envisioned was a suspension system that would allow the seat tube to flex independently of the frame, so riders wouldn’t bounce around on cobblestone streets. At their Waterloo, Wisconsin, headquarters, the development team drafted a three-dimensional model on a computer, then used an Objet500 Connex printer to print—yes, print—a working prototype. Notes were taken, tweaks were made. Over the next few months, additional prototypes were printed and tested, until a successful design was cast in carbon. A process that would have taken a year using traditional manufacturing methods instead took a few months. The result, the popular Domane 6 series bike, debuted last spring and was the first to…

When science writer Jon Mooallem took a hard look at his daughter’s world, he noticed that his four-year-old brushed her teeth with a whale-shaped toothbrush and her hair with a fish-shaped comb. Kids, he realized, live in a world of idealized animals. The adult world, of course, is more complex. In Wild Ones: A Sometimes Dismaying, Weirdly Reassuring Story About Looking at People Looking at Animals in America (Penguin Press, $28), Mooallem examines the disconnect between our arcadian animal love and the shameful ways we treat real critters. In Churchill, Manitoba, he witnesses climate change’s effect on polar bears—and sees the absurdity of media-driven conservation when he finds himself trapped with a gang of scientists in a tundra buggy chasing Martha Stewart, who’s there shooting a segment. At a California…

Alaska is inherently intimidating, which is why so many people are willing to cough up a small fortune to see the state’s greatest landscapes by bush plane. But if you fly into Anchorage and rent a four-wheel-drive vehicle, you can put together a two-week, life-list-worthy itinerary complete with epic wilderness hiking, remote lodges, and heart-stopping raft trips. Much of the route presented here follows main arteries, with plenty of roadhouses for supplies or car repairs. But you should still know how to change a flat. And bring bear spray. Days 1–2: Talkeetna DRIVE TIME: 2 HOURS 40 MINUTES The jagged Talkeetna Mountains make for great photos and even better hiking. Get the best views on a portion of the 36.2-mile Kesugi Ridge Trail, and scan the horizon for brown bears.…

The Gaspé Peninsula has rolling coastal mountains, small seaside villages, and 510 miles of bike lanes lined with cyclist-friendly hotels (read: bike storage, on-site mechanics). Best of all, temperatures hover around 70 degrees—perfect for a weeklong tour. Day 1: Mont-Joli to Causapscal, 52 miles Fly with your bike—rentals are scarce—into Mont-Joli from Montreal (from US$360 round-trip; aircanada.com), then ride southeast on Route 132 through the forested Mata pédia and Restigouche River corridors to Causapscal, a quaint town at the convergence of two rivers. Stay at La Coulée Douce (doubles from US$105; lacouleedouce.com) on a hill overlooking the pristine rivers. Day 2: Causapscal to Pointe-à-la-Croix, 49 miles Recover with a descent to Pointe-à-la-Croix, a harbor town at the mouth of the Restigouche. Stay at La Maison Verte B&B (doubles from US$77;…

BEST FOR OVERALL HEALTH BOOST Jawbone UP: Wear the wristband to monitor activity and sleep. Use the software—or sync with apps like RunKeeper—to parse the data and spur a healthier lifestyle. $130; jawbone.com Fitbit Flex: The wristband logs distance, calories burned, and hours slept, among others. Upload the data to your PC or smartphone to chart activity over time. $100; fitbit.com BEST FOR FUELING YOUR COMPETITIVE FIRE Under Armour Armour39: A chest strap measures heart rate, calories burned, and movement to calculate a “willpower” score. Compare your efforts over time and post them online. $150; underarmour.com Adidas MiCoach Speed Cell: Attach the device to your shoe to collect pace, distance, and acceleration data, then compare with friends and online leaderboards. $70; micoach.com BEST FOR MAXIMIZING YOUR TRAINING Omegawave: The device…

AGE 25 5 FEET 9 INCHES 195 POUNDS COOKEVILLE, TENNESSEE WITH BACK-TO-BACK victories at the CrossFit Games, a strongman-style competition among some of the world’s fittest athletes, Rich Froning has become the de facto face of the CrossFit movement, which now encompasses some 4,500 affiliated gyms across the country and millions of devotees. This July 26–28, in Carson, California, the former college baseball player’s preternatural strength—he can back-squat 445 pounds and do 75 pull-ups in one set—will once again be on display as he goes for his third straight title. >“I work out anywhere from two to five times a day, but I don’t walk into the gym with a schedule. I just make it up as I go, listening to my body and doing what I think I need…

AT FIRST, THE JELLYFISH were easy to negotiate. I swam through them, maneuvering like the Millennium Falcon in an underwater asteroid belt. Other swimmers occasionally came up for air, talking and laughing, and at one point I saw our coach, Ned Denison, holding a jelly in the palm of his immense hand, pretending to eat it. Then we hit the wall, and there was nowhere to go but through it. That’s when people started screaming. It was day two of Cork Distance Week, Denison’s grueling training camp for openwater marathon swimmers. Every year, 50 masochistic souls show up to dunk themselves in County Cork’s numerous lakes, reservoirs, and rivers, as well as the cold North Atlantic. June in southern Ireland means cloudy skies and icy oceanic winds, with water and…

Hotshots dig firebreaks, called lines, to starve a blaze of fuel. Their signature tool is the Pulaski (1), which has a steel head combining an ax and an adze, so it’s equally suitable for chopping wood and displacing soil. It was named after Forest Service legend Ed Pulaski, who saved 36 firefighters’ lives in 1910, leading them to shelter in a mine shaft and threatening to shoot anyone who left. Each hotshot carries line gear (2)—a canvas pack containing flares, rations, water, chainsaw oil and gas, an emergency fire shelter, and a warm layer—everything needed for a night on the line. The packs weigh 30 to 50 pounds. Clothes woven from heatresistant Nomex (3), a lightweight version of Kevlar introduced in 1967, can withstand 900-degree temperatures without charring or melting.…

The best websites for targeted weather info—M.B. OpenSnow Tracks snowstorms for skiers and boarders. Cost: Basic membership is free. Pro accounts, $20 or $45 a year, get you add-ons like access to meteorologists and powder alerts for resorts you pick. opensnow.com Chance of Weather Select an activity—from biking to barbecuing—and plug in a zip code for hourly forecasts, along with rankings that grade the potential enjoyment of your chosen pursuit based on conditions. Cost: Free. chanceofweather.com WindAlert Gives kiteboarders, sailors, and windsurfers minute-by-minute wind reports and hourly forecasts at more than 50,000 locations worldwide. Cost: Free to view forecasts. Pro memberships—$3 to $10 monthly—feature real-time wind observations, daily meteorologist briefings, and unlimited e-mail or SMS alerts. windalert.com Washington Online Weather Offers high-altitude mountain forecasts for the Himalayas, the Alps, Denali,…

BEST FOR: BEATING THE SUN 1. There’s no betterlooking sun protection than Brent Black Panama Hat’s Classic fedora (made to order, $525; brentblack.com). The three-inch brim provides tons of shade, and the hand-woven jipijapa palm reed is breathable and stylish. BEST FOR: POWERFUL THIRSTS 2. Oral I.V. hydration solution ($11 for four; oraliv.com) is drinkable saline—11 minerals and purified water in a vial smaller than a Bic lighter. Each one-ounce shot is equivalent to 16 ounces of water. BEST FOR: APOCALYPTIC STORMS 3. Not only is Nuu’s sweet Splash portable speaker ($100; gonuu.com) water-resistant, but it runs for seven hours on a charge. BEST FOR: BLISTERING HIKES 4. Stiff aluminum rods in Deuter’s AC Lite 22 pack ($100; deuter.com) keep a trampoline of mesh between the pack and your back,…

Last winter I found myself at Newark International Airport in New Jersey, waiting anxiously at my departure gate as my chances of getting home to Santa Fe suddenly fell into jeopardy. It was 7 A.M. On February 8, Winter Storm Nemo had the region in a panic, and the first giant snowflakes were beginning to land on the runway. In the span of half an hour, the ground crew made three announcements warning that our flight could be canceled, each dire bulletin followed by groans from my fellow passengers. Then, suddenly, we were told to line up for boarding. Thirty minutes later we were in the air, and the captain announced that we were the last flight out of Newark. LaGuardia, he said, had already shut down. The entire cabin…

“It’s a strange body type that excels at open-water swimming,” says novelist Matt Bondurant, who wrote “Give Us Your Tired, Your Sore, Your Shriveled Masses” (page 72), about his experience at Cork Distance Week, a training camp where masochists in Speedos log up to ten miles a day in the frigid Atlantic. Under those conditions, girth is an advantage. The top performers are as fit as marathoners but look like overfed wrestlers. Here, we compare the swimmers’ body types with that of an elite distance runner.…

The Comeback: 1958 During the final stage in the Alps, some 15 minutes down on leader Raphael Geminiani, Charly Gaul launched what seemed like a suicide attack at the beginning of a mountain stage. It was pouring rain and bitter cold—exactly the kind of conditions the Luxembourg rider preferred. He led the peloton over three climbs, then shredded the day’s breakaway; one defeated rider wept before being picked up by an ambulance. Gaul crossed the finish at Aix-les-Bains ten minutes ahead of the next racer, putting him only 28 seconds behind Geminiani. Two days later, he would capture the yellow jersey for good. The Casualty: 1967 Mont Ventoux is perhaps the Tour’s most feared climb—because it’s steep, long, and barren as the moon. But mostly because it killed a man.…

Federico Martín Bahamontes A dominant climber in the 1950s, the Spanish rider had a notoriously hot temper—in the 1956 Tour, he threw his bike into a ravine during a poor showing—and an intense fear of fast descents. After leading a breakaway in the 1954 Tour, he waited at the top of a mountain pass for the peloton to catch up so he wouldn’t have to go down alone, famously killing time by eating an ice cream cone. Gerhard Schönbacher In 1979, Austrian Schönbacher found himself in a pitched battle with Frenchman Philippe Tesnière for the lanterne rouge, an unofficial—and, in some circles, highly coveted—honor awarded to the lastplace rider. When Tesniere stopped to pee, so would Schönbacher. The Austrian won (by losing), then repeated in 1980. In retirement he set…

IT’S EASY TO GET caught up in appearances. Bold designs and fancy accessories are certainly to be appreciated. But that doesn’t mean they’re practical. So when Garrett Finney decided to build a pop-up trailer that was closer to a tent than an RV to tote his family around, he leaned on a decade of experience working for NASA. As senior architect for the Habitability Design Center, which helped devise the International Space Station’s interiors, Finney was intimately familiar with close quarters. “Most architects and designers don’t know what they’re doing when a space gets really small,” says Finney. “They don’t know the difference between a 36-inch wheelchair-accessible doorway and a 22-or a 21-inch one.” So he built a mock-up of the trailer in his offices, then spent days bumping into…

IN HER LATEST documentary, The Crash Reel, which airs on HBO in July, two-time Academy Award nominee Lucy Walker opens a door into the life of former pro snowboarder Kevin Pearce as he recovers from traumatic brain injury (TBI). Think of it as the rise, fall, and brutally slow reinvention of a sweet kid who could be your son, nephew, brother, or best Frend (as Pearce’s crew referred to one another). If you can watch it without tearing up, you’re a harder man than I. Pearce’s long recovery after a 2009, pre–Vancouver Olympics training accident (in the same Utah superpipe where freeskier Sarah Burke was later fatally injured) is a story of unbridled dedication and courage that’s both uplifting and utterly deflating. The Crash Reel forcefully swipes away the energy-drink…

Make Base Camp Skip the capital city of Oslo and fly straight to Bergen (pop. 265,000), which serves as the gateway to the fjordlands from its spot on a series of peninsulas that jut into the North Sea. Stay at the ultramodern Clarion Collection Havnekontoret ($275; clarion hotel.com), on the ancient Bryggen wharf, where locals hawk fresh scallops and king crab beside wooden skiffs. Then take the rail car from downtown to the top of 1,050-foot Mount Floyen ($7). From there it’s a fourplus-hour hike through tussock to the summit of Mount Ulriken, where the cliffside restaurant Sky:Skraperen has mouth-watering scallops and stellar views of the Hardangerfjord and Boknafjords (www.skyskraperen.no). Thrill Yourself In a country dedicated to adventure, the city of Voss (pop. 14,000) still stands out. It’s less than…

Lake Winnipesaukee, New Hampshire There are over 275 islands and 20 beaches to explore within spring-fed Lake Winnie’s 44,586 acres. STAY: Classic northeastern cottages. We found a three-bedroom on the water, with kayaks included, for under $2,500 per week (www.baysiderentalsnh.com). Flathead Lake, Montana Twenty-seven miles long and 15 miles wide, the West’s largest freshwater lake is clear, cold, and rimmed by the Mission Mountains. STAY: Log cabins and secluded lodges, like a two-bedroom with a big yard, mountain views, and a private boardwalk for $1,750 per week (montanasbestvacationhomes.com). Crane Lake, Minnesota Blueberries grow wild along the shore, moose wade the shallows, and loons call at dawn—it doesn’t look much different than it did 300 years ago. STAY: Rustic homes on granite shorelines, including a two-bedroom cottage with screened-in porch bordering…

IN NEARLY A DECADE of competitive freediving, 34-year-old Hanli Prinsloo set 11 South African records, including a dive in the Red Sea to 207 feet on one breath. She did it through mental training and a strict regimen of chest stretches that increased her lung capacity from four to six liters. Now she’s teaching her hard-earned lessons to athletes from a range of backgrounds, from big-wave surfers like Greg Long—who need to endure crushing hold-downs after wiping out—to rugby players and cyclists looking to gain a competitive aerobic edge. Ultramarathoner Ryan Sandes credits Prinsloo’s training with helping his body use oxygen more efficiently. “Even if it makes me only 2 percent better,” Sandes says, “it’s worth it.” In her courses, Prinsloo focuses on yoga-like poses and breathing techniques. The results,…

FIRST CELEBRATED in chiropractor Douglas Graham’s 2006 book The 80/10/10 Diet, the all-fruit diet has long had a cult following: Steve Jobs, among others, was an adherent. But the endurance world took notice after long-distance runner and fruitarian Michael Arnstein, 36, won last year’s Javelina Jundred ultramarathon and placed third at the USA 50 Mile Road Championships. Other athletes who follow some version of a fruit-heavy diet include USA Masters 50K champion Tim VanOrden and world champion Jamaican sprinter Yohan Blake, who credits his success to a daily dose of 16 bananas. “Since I started eating this way,” Arnstein says, “I only get better and better.” Of course, there are lots of reasons not to jump on the trend. It would cost you almost $200 a day to fuel exclusively…

THE WEATHER IS CHANGING IN WAYS THAT CAN BE STRANGE AND FRIGHTENING, FASCINATING AND WILD. OUTSIDE’S GUIDE HELPS YOU NAVIGATE THIS WEIRD NEW WORLD, FROM THE CUTTING EDGE OF STORM PREDICTION TO THE BIZARRE PHENOMENA THAT MAKE BEING ALIVE IN THE ELEMENTS A PERPETUAL THRILL. THE LONG-RANGE OUTLOOK WE’VE COME a long way with the science of weather predic-tion. A five-day forecast today is as accurate as a one-day forecast was in the 1970s. Heavy snowfall predicted 12 hours in advance back then can now be called five days ahead of time. And the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Ad-min istration’s margin of error when tracking hurricanes three days out has fallen by 70 percent since 1990. Yet, as Hurricane Sandy starkly highlighted last fall, U.S. govern ment forecasting isn’t where…

There’s no single factor to explain changing fire behavior. Variables differ by region, and researchers disagree on everything from historical fire patterns to the effects of bark beetles on fuel loads. On two points, however, there is broad consensus. Climate change is making forests more flammable. The combination of higher temperatures and lower moisture tends to produce larger and more frequent fires. Earlier snowmelt ex tends the fire season, which in parts of the West is already two months longer than it was 15 years ago. Drought patterns are still governed by complex atmospheric and oceanic cycles, but in the coming decades even our comparatively cool and rainy phases will probably be a degree or two warmer than they were in the past. As climatology researcher Park Williams, of Los…

FINALLY, WATERPROOF GADGETS no longer look like Playskool toys. It all started last year when a Santa Ana, California, company called Liquipel announced that for $60 it would dunk your smartphone or tablet in an invisible, waterproofing chemical soup. The stuff works unbelievably well—and makes you wonder why most electronics aren’t waterproof straight out of the box. Sony’s Xperia Tablet Z is. The 10.1-inch device comes coated in a proprietary nanotechnology that keeps it running while submerged up to three feet below the water’s surface. It’s also among the best tablets on the market. The sound from its stereo speakers is crisp and loud, and the Xperia is both slimmer and lighter than the iPad. Plus, its screen features the same technology found in Sony’s flatscreen TVs, which display 16…

IN THE PAST BAROMETER In 1643, Italian physicist Evangelista Torricelli created the first barometer, a 35-foot-tall tube filled with water that rose and fell as air pressure changed (low meant clouds, high meant clear). WATERPROOF CAMERA In 1856, British natural historian William Thompson lowered a plate-glass camera into Waymouth Bay, near Dorset, and tripped the shutter by pulling a string. He captured the first underwater photo—and flooded his camera in the process. RAIN HAT During the 19th century, a sailor from Gloucester, England, stitched a widebrimmed, elongated cap out of oiled canvas—the sou’wester. SOLAR PANEL In 1883, American electrician Charles Fritts used selenium and gold to make the first solar cell. It couldn’t generate power, but it was used in early cameras as a light meter. IN YOUR PACK BAROMETER…

The Boulder, Colorado, writer, who profiled professional powder forecaster Joel Gratz in “Snowstradamus” (page 96), has always been a weather nerd. He studied meteorology at the University of Washington but switched majors after failing calculus (multiple times). He still keeps a copy of the Oxford Dictionary of Weatherby his bed. “I really understand Joel’s obsession,” says Behar. The pair, who met on Valentine’s Day, plan to continue sharing their hobby. “This spring we made a pact to drop everything and go tornado chasing in the plains. Now, that I can’t wait to see,” says Behar.…

Associate editor Kyle Dickman got his hands dirty while writing and photographing “Life On the Line” (page 86), the story of the Tahoe Hotshots, an elite wildland firefighting team battling the third-biggest fire season on record. Over the year he spent reporting the story, Dickman, who was a Tahoe Hotshot in 2006, took four trips to California to work with his former crew—running a chainsaw, lighting backfires, and wading into burning fields of poison oak. Above, the crew gathers after a day setting fire to slash piles in California’s Sierra Nevada. The 2012 Tahoe Hotshots 1. Rick Cowell: Crew boss; firefighter since 1977 2. Andrew Arriaga: Iraq veteran; joined helicopter crew at end of season 3. Dickman: The author 4. Saeid Sinnukrot: Collected bull semen in college for class credit…

—BRIAN ALEXANDER 1. BLOOD DOPING: The old standby—extracting red-bloodcell-rich plasma pre-Tour, storing it, and then transfusing it before key stages. It’s one of the most potent cheats available and the hardest to detect. 2. EPO: In Lance Armstrong’s Oprah confession, he admitted to using erythropoietin, which boosts red-blood-cell counts. It’s still popular in the peloton, because it can be flushed from the bloodstream by drinking large quantities of water. 3. HIF: Early adopters will experiment with banned hypoxiainducible-factor (HIF) regulators, naturally occurring proteins that help oxygen-depleted muscles perform better. FibroGen, a Bay Area company, began late-stage testing of an HIF pill for anemia in December 2012.…

European Feeds Eurosport (eurosport player.com) offers subscriptions from five euros (about $6.50) a month, and Italy’s Rai.tv has free streams. Both require an IP address originating in Europe, available from Witopia (witopia.net) for $6 per month. PRO TIP: If you opt for NBC, mute Phil and Paul and listen to the free Euro sport audio broadcast, with commentary from retired racers. Pirated Streams Cyclingfans.com and Steephill.tv post links to streams from European broadcasters. Most are illegal, but you’re unlikely to get fined just for watching. More annoying, they can cut out at any time. PRO TIP: Watching at work? Use antivirus software like AVG (avg.com), or your IT department will think you’re downloading porn. Smartphone Apps NBC’s Tour de France Live Mobile ($5; nbc sports.com) displays riders on a real-time…

Ben Hewitt made his name writing paeans to rural food systems and the iconoclasts who create them. Now, in Saved: How I Quit Worrying About Money and Became the Richest Guy in the World (Rodale, $25), Hewitt covers his efforts to step away from the American financial machine, with the help of a 28-year-old wilderness-skills tutor named Erik Gillard, who survives on a four-digit income, lives in a handmade shack, and wears “McEnroe-era tennis shoes,” Hewitt writes. Occasionally, Gillard is heavier on platitudes than depth, but he’s a fun guy, and so is Hewitt. FLORENCE WILLIAMS talked with the author about the modern-day back-to-the-land movement. OUTSIDE: When did you realize Erik might be onto something? HEWITT: One thing that interested me was his enviable lifestyle. He surrounds himself with people…

NEW ZEALAND: OPPOSITE ATTRACTS OUR SUMMER IS THE PERFECT TIME TO MIGRATE SOUTH TO NEW ZEALAND, WHERE JULY MEANS TREKKING-PERFECT TEMPERATURES AND NO CROWDS Wanaka, a town of 5,000 in the heart of New Zealand’s South Island, is where in-theknow Kiwis go for serious adventure. The town is the gateway to 74-square-mile Lake Wanaka, the 10,000-foot Southern Alps, and Mount Aspiring National Park, the training ground for New Zealand’s mountaineers. The best way to take advantage: fly into Queenstown via Christchurch (from US$130; jetstar.co.nz), then rent a car and drive an hour to Wanaka (US$90 per day; hertz.co.nz). Stay at the Whare Kea Lodge, a glass and aluminum structure on the shores of glittering Lake Wanaka (rooms from US$1,170; whare kealodge.com). The days are cool during New Zealand’s winter—expect highs…

Colorado River, Grand Canyon, Arizona JUNE 1–AUGUST 20 The Grand has unreal views and Class IV rapids and gets you away from it all for more than three weeks. Permits are tough, but your odds go up each time you apply and when you apply for the off-season. GUIDED: Go with OARS ($2,271; oars.com). DIY: Rent everything from Flagstaff’s Pro River ($265 per five days; proriver.com). John Day River, Oregon MAY 20–JULY 10 This five-day float takes you through 71 miles of northern Oregon’s rugged desert canyons on mostly Class II water. Plus, the permits are free, and you get some of the country’s best smallmouth bass fishing along the way. GUIDED: Ouzel Outfitters in Bend does guided trips ($850; oregonrafting.com). DIY: Or it will set you up with the…

IN THE FORMER Soviet Union, global sports domination was so vital to the propaganda machine that the regime employed an army of 5,500 elite sports doctors to analyze every aspect of their athletes, from heart rates to sleep cycles to cortisone levels. “It was very complicated,” says Val Nasedkin, a Russian track-and-field athlete during the 1980s. Nasedkin, who went on to study sports science and became a coach with the Ukrainian Olympic development team, recalls dreading the testing process. “You had to go to the lab, where you’d exercise almost to exhaustion while they took muscle-tissue samples, blood samples, hormone panels, and so on.” Of course, the system was rudimentary at best. It took weeks to get results, and the data was hard to interpret. Wouldn’t it be great, Nasedkin…

SPORTS DRINKS ARE a $4 billion industry—and for good reason. An athlete’s power and speed begin dropping significantly with just a 3 to 4 percent decrease in body fluid, which is not uncommon during a long race. Most athletes turn to energy drinks to rehydrate, knowing that water alone can’t replace lost sodium and carbs, but it turns out that the added fuel and electrolytes found in most sports beverages could be slowing you down. In a 2009 study at the University of Birmingham, researchers found that drinks with just a 3 percent concentration of carbohydrates—significantly less than what you’ll find in, say, the original Gatorade or Powerade—provided faster fluid absorption for athletes than both water alone and highsugar beverages. Additional studies have since backed the less-is-more conclusion. Here, we…

ON MONDAY AFTERNOON, October 29, 2012, Jim Cantore, the 49-year-old stormchaser from the Weather Channel, stands on the esplanade in Robert F. Wagner Jr. Park, near Manhattan’s Battery Park City, while his camera team establishes a shot with New York Harbor and the Statue of Liberty framed patriotically in the background. Conditions are whippy and gray. CNN and some other news crews have set up nearby, preparing for the hell that’s about to break loose. A hundred miles or so out in the Atlantic, the eponymous “Frankenstorm,” the “Nor’easter cane,” the “Hurriween”—a.k.a. Superstorm Sandy—is bearing down fast and about to bowl over the most populous metropolitan region in North America. “Right now the water’s here,” Cantore barks into his handheld mic, pointing to the tide lapping a few feet below…

I ROLL OUT OF MY sleeping bag at 5 A.M., waking to the smell of dry grass and woodsmoke. I spent last night in the open, camped on rodeo grounds in the tiny Northern California town of Stonyford. Flames are visible on a ridge half a mile away. Time to go to work. It’s July 12, 2012, and I’m about to be sent to my first forest fire of the season. I arrived yesterday to meet up with the Tahoe Hot-shots, an elite group of wilderness fire fighters based about 120 miles east of here, in a Sierra foothills town called Camptonville. The Tahoe team is part of a sprawling, multifaceted army: 177 federal, state, and county crews who must try and stop a fast-moving, 17,000-acre blaze before it spreads…

JOEL GRATZ IS MAKING me nervous. It’s midmorning on a snowy Colorado day in March, and we’re riding the Sun Up triple chair in Vail’s Back Bowls. Gratz has scooched his butt to the very edge of the seat, and now he’s thrashing his right arm to and fro, determined to capture a few flakes with his mittened fist. Whenever Gratz talks about the weather—snow especially—the 31-year-old meteorologist can forget where he is, speaking in a nonstop stream. “I usually just tune it out,” says his girlfriend, Lauren Alweis, who is skiing with us. “These flakes are pretty sweet!” Gratz shouts. “And look at the way they’re falling—from northwest to southeast. That’s good! But the moisture layer is thin.” Gratz, a lifelong skier who lives in Boulder, loves nailing a…

Myth: Lugs give you traction Busted: Lugs shrink a shoe’s contact area, so they tend to slip on firm surfaces. Get big-lugged shoes only if you’re running on wet or muddy trails. 1. SAUCONY XODUS 4 BEST FOR: Midfooters on steep terrain The Xodus 4’s quarterinch lugs and ample forefoot foam make it about as close to a mud tire as you’ll find. But the main reason this midfoot shoe is ideal for big-mountain terrain has to do with the locked-down fit that kept it from sloshing around on slick downhills. 11.2 oz; $110; saucony.com 2. SALOMON XR SHIFT BEST FOR: Going from blacktop to singletrack The XR Shift has a split personality: the secure fit, toe protection, and debris guard of a trail runner with the low lugs, thick…

BEACH LOUNGER 1. OAKLEY OFFSHOOT, $140 With their full-lens wraps and optics as good as high-end poly gets, the Offshoots look stylish whether you’re sailing, skating, or sipping cocktails. They’ll work for road biking but lack rubber on the earpieces, so put them away for trail rides. oakley.com STREET SMART 2. VONZIPPER LOMAX, $150 The Blues Brothers’ black-box styling is back, and the optics are better than ever. VonZipper uses a polarized gray lens to cut through glare on the water. But be warned: gaps in peripheral coverage rule out the Lomax for days of savage sun and wind. vonzipper.com SPEED RACER 3. SMITH PIVLOCK V2 MAX, $240 Switching among the three sets of lenses that come with the ultra-technical PivLock V2 Max is as simple as it gets: flip…