It’s been a busy time around these parts, and while you all have been getting out and getting after it, so too have a number of members of Team CLIF Bar‘s Free Sports roster.   In this post you’ll find some of the latest happenings across all four of our Free Sports from a handful of our fine athlete ambassadors in the field.

Get stoked and then get back out there!

Han’s “No Way” Rey Rides India - VIDEO

Hans Rey (Team CLIF Bar), Richie Schley, and Joscha Forstreuter travelled to the Indian Himalayas. Their goal: to reach the mysterious Roopkund Lake, a glacial lake in the Uttarakhand region, famous for hundreds of ancient human skeletons at its bottom, and to ride down a sheer endless technical downhill over 3,500m/ 11'000ft on trails that had previously never been ridden.

*for another great Hans Rey adventure check out this article on Hansy from a trip to the Czech singletrack paradise Pod Smerkm

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One of the main reasons we run and stay active is to be healthy. While organic food and drink may not have an immediate effect on your performance as a runner, the long term effects of organic food on your overall health, as well as that of our planet, are important. After all, you are what you eat.

Listen in on the latest latest episode of the CLIFCast podcast: Organic Food and Drink.

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If you’re running the Honda LA Marathon this coming weekend, you’re in for an amazing tour of this city. However, a race of this magnitude – 20,000 people – requires that you be prepared for the challenges of a large, marquee event. Read on to learn about what you’ll see and how to handle this beautiful course.

The new “Stadium to the Sea” course does a lot of things right including placing the majority of its hills during the first six miles. However, don’t be deceived; this is not a flat course. You’ll encounter rolling hills and “undulations” throughout the course, but the trickiest and nastiest of your hills will be served up while you’re still fresh.

THE START
On race morning the energy will be electric at Dodger Stadium – and you want to be able to enjoy it. As with any race, allow ample time to arrive, drop your bag at gear check, use the porta-potties and make your way to the actual starting line. Once you’ve calculated how much time you’ll need, add another half hour to it. The last thing you want on race morning is added stress.

You MUST be at the start, in place and ready to go at the scheduled 7:24am time – but don’t be thrown off your game if it takes a few extra minutes to get moving!  Cool your heels, sit down on the pavement to rest your legs, and make some conversation with the runners around you.  Stay calm and save your energy for the race.

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The Clif Bar Field Marketing team has a reputation for containing some pretty enthusiastic folks, like Erik Winkler for example. Not one to shy away from a challenge, he donned a giant foam CLIF BAR costume and went backcountry skiing, UPHILL, no joke! Read on and watch to download the full adventure.

I’m Erik Winkler, the sign-up-for-anything man. A friend asks, “Hey, want to ride from Seattle to Portland this weekend?” “Yep, I respond”. “Hey, want to be in a 7 person multiport relay” “Yep”. I’m up for anything and usually happy to be so.

Well, this weekend was no exception. As a proud and loyal member of the NW Clif Bar Crew, when my boss asked me if I’d be willing to participate in a backcountry ski race wearing a giant foam Clif Bar, I naturally agreed without hesitation.

Welcome to Vertfest ’12 at Alpental, a backcountry ski race that starts at the base of the hill and ascends 2400 feet to the top and back down. However, this is just the recreational division…for the crazies out there, you could do a second lap, break out the Lycra!

Being that I am a mere mortal and covered in a giant foam CLIF BAR, I chose to go Rec. From the get go, my super-sized CLIF BAR brought smiles to my fellow racers and chairlift onlookers.

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It’s not every day that the phone rings and we are given the chance to support a cadre of hard charging skiers and boarders in a totally fresh fashion. Well, maybe not entirely fresh, but certainly a way of embracing the winter that has all but died on the vine of how we look to get it done when the goods fall on the mountain towns that winter blesses with each changing season.

Armed with one rattletrap truck, a handcrafted tiny house on the trailer behind it, and who knows how many CLIF BARs, changes of gear, and pairs of gloves and goggles to get the job done, these professional ski bums spent the past two months chasing storms, making the most of some of America’s most iconic mountain towns, and mixed and mingled amongst the locals all along the way.

Brought to us by our friends at Outdoor Research, the Sidecountry Sessions inspires a new way of seeing and being in the mountain towns that so many of us call home while honoring the heroes that make each of these places so uniquely their own.

*You might have seen these along the journey on our Facebook page, but we thought it would be fun to put it all together in one big (reads like a ski bum’s diary) blog post. Check out the goods below and don’t hesitate to hop on over to the Sidecountry Sessions site at Outdoor Research to see it there as well. Read up, get inspired, and go make some greatness of your own!

TEASER

Session: noun \sesh-uh’n\ Any period of time devoted to a specific activity, such as slaying pow

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