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The Race To Alaska

@racetoalaska

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No motors. No support. All the way to Alaska.
A project of @nw_maritime

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There is a particular kind of beauty that only shows up in the margins, and Race to Alaska has always lived out there, past the point where sensible people turn back toward the marina and put the kettle on.

It was every crew watching multiple things break and deciding stubbornly to fix them with whatever was left on board. It was every paddler and rower who chose to move themselves the entire distance under nothing but their own arms and legs, because somewhere along the way human powered stopped being the hard way to do it and started being the reason to do it.

Nobody signs up for seven hundred miles of headwinds and jury rigged rudders because it’s efficient. They do it because the margins are where the good stuff lives, and because scared and brave have never canceled each other out, they’ve been in the same boat the whole time.

None of this would happen without our wonderfully stubborn racers who “do it because they must”, who do it year after year to finally finish, our racers who start, who DNF, who try again, who break their rudders, who help each other out, who lose their masts, who have an insatiable drive to needlessly inconvenience themselves for the sake of building character.

Race to Alaska lasts only a month, but Northwest Maritime, the nonprofit that creates R2AK, works year round to get people onto the water, facing challenges, and doing something interesting with them. That takes many forms: youth programs, maritime skills, boatbuilding, the @woodenboatfestival. R2AK is just its least housebroken version of all of this.

None of it happens without the sponsors who’ve housed us, fueled us, given their time, believed in something this absurd, and welcomed this unruly fleet into Victoria and Ketchikan like we belong there: Fisheries Supply our Official Supplier of R2AK, @ourfirstfed, @mithun_design, The Landing Hotel, @baranoffishing, @mytimezero, @visitketchikan, @chateauvictoria, @socialfabricbrewing, @denalibrewing, @maritimemusbc, @nw_maritime and Marine Exchange of Puget Sound.
See you all in 2028.

🎥: @garretweintrob taken in Ketchikan, Alaska by @racetoalaska

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3 months ago

Northbound Nutters are leading the fleet and they have the footage to prove it. They sliced through Seymour Narrows at slack tide in a way that can only be described as cinematic, which is either a testament to their seamanship or their instinct for content farming.

🎥: @taylor.shoots @heytaybayphoto

#r2ak #racetoalaska #sailingrace #sailing #britishcolumbiacanada by @racetoalaska

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4 months ago

2028 R2AK is for the love of the game

🎥: @andrewtomayko by @racetoalaska

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a month ago

Northbound Nutters are first to finish R2AK 2026.

Colloquially, the yellow boat. A 32-foot trimaran that went Victoria to Ketchikan in 5 days, 8 hours, and 4 minutes with a simple strategy: go fast, stop when useful, then go faster.

Two stops (Campbell River and Port McNeill), a mid-race offshore repair pause, and then the rest of the race done like a cheetah launched from a t-shirt cannon.

Northbound Nutters: first in, still yellow, and officially done with northbound.

🎥: @ryderb_photography

#r2ak #adventurerace #racetoalaska #northboundnutters #trimaran by @racetoalaska

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4 months ago

Here’s a step-by-step of ‘How To Cross the Finish Line’ demonstrated by Team Norn To Be Wild

Step 1: Sail 750 miles
Step 2: Arrive in Ketchikan wearing matching knit sweaters
Step 3: High five Race Boss
Step 4: Ring bell
Step 5: Pop champagne
Step 6: Pour into boots
Step 7: Drink out of boots
Step 8: Hug your crew

Special shoutout to Rachel, who quit her job as the R2AK social media manager to go do the exact thing she used to post about. Terrible career move. Excellent life choice. Congrats @sailnorn

📸: @yurodivys

#norntobewild #racetoalaska #womensailors #norn #r2ak taken in Ketchikan, Alaska by @racetoalaska

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4 months ago

Barge

🎥: @yurodivys

#r2ak #racetoalaska #kayak #barge #boogiebarge by @racetoalaska

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4 months ago

Team Slowpoke opened up Grey Dawn for the full cribs tour: Kayla, Sam, Tara, Fish, and Eric all present and accounted for, more than enough PFDs (shout out Coast Guard), and somewhere out there is an Andy who the crew has never met, who once attempted this race and ended up in the San Juans instead, and who was not at this interview, all of which may or may not be related

🎥: @garretweintrob

#r2ak #racetoalaska #cribs #teamslowpoke #alaska by @racetoalaska

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4 months ago

At 4:21 p.m. AKDT Martin Rother of Team Let’s Wing It and Yota Kano of Team Rainy finished the Race to Alaska.

They registered as separate teams but for nearly 750 miles north, they traveled as one. Sharing the same pace, the same camps, and the same weather and tide windows to move or wait. When one team stopped, both teams stopped. Their final day was their biggest yet: 60 miles into Ketchikan, still side by side.

Once the bell was rung, the paddles went down and the celebratory beers came out. Thanks to our friends at @denalibrewing for making the finish line taste a little better after 18 days, 5 hours, and 21 minutes on the water. Congrats Martin and Yota for completing the Race to Alaska.

🎥: @garretweintrob

#racetoalaska #r2ak #humanpowered #teamrainy #teamletswingit taken in Ketchikan, Alaska by @racetoalaska

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3 months ago

Today’s daily video features Team Wet Leg, who were making one hell of a run, sitting comfortably in second place until the Hecate Strait decided to ask some questions about the structural integrity of their mast.

And honestly? Respect. This is the same boat that had been sitting on Facebook Marketplace for about five years, and somehow they took that marketplace boat into open waters and had it ripping along in second place. They made it a long way before the mast decided it had participated enough. No calling for help, no injuries, and somehow they even managed to rig their own sail and keep moving. More footage of that whole saga coming soon.

But before all of that, here’s a peaceful little interview with Team Wet Leg back when the mast was still doing its job.

🎥: @taylor.shoots @heytaybayphoto

#r2ak #racetoalaska #sailingrace #teamwetleg #adventurerace by @racetoalaska

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4 months ago

Mark, Ari, Luis, Jodi, Anne, and Julia are SEVENTY48 and WA360 veterans. Now they’re taking a stab at R2AK, which they described as tantalizing, terrifying, and the ultimate challenge. Proving it by bouncing through the Georgia Strait toward Seymour Narrows on a 1978 Santa Cruz 33, with a wine bag somewhere in the mix.

Catch their full story on Episode 6 of the R2AK Podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube.

🎥: @taylor.shoots

#racetoalaska #r2ak #raceon #ketchikan #adventurerace by @racetoalaska

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4 months ago

People seem to think there’s a highly coordinated media operation following the race. That’s flattering.
What you’re actually looking at is Jesse, the race boss, leading us on a rolling scavenger hunt up the Inside Passage in Disco (thank you Fisheries Supply Official Supplier of R2AK)

We spend a lot of time tracking down racers, hearing increasingly creative descriptions of the conditions, and documenting the sort of decisions that seem perfectly reasonable after a few days without sleep.

One minute we’re watching teams get bounced around the Strait of Georgia. The next we’re getting spun around in Seymour Narrows to ask teams how they’re doing and getting a front-row seat to the consequences of their answer.

Meanwhile, Jesse continues his campaign to move north with the race while the rest of us continue our campaign to remind him about the fenders.

🎥: @garretweintrob

#racetoalaska #r2ak #fisheriessupply #humanpowered #alaska by @racetoalaska

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4 months ago

Team O Race is out and Randy’s selling. Bye for now.

🎥: @garretweintrob

#r2ak #racetoalaska #sailingrace #DNF #adventurerace by @racetoalaska

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4 months ago