Ross wins again as Alaska's gnarliest triathlon gets injection of new blood

Even though a seven-time champion set the pace, the 16th annual Hammerman Triathlon was a showcase for new blood Saturday at Kincaid Park.

Megan Chelf, a two-time runner-up, grabbed her first triathlon title with a gigantic margin of victory in the women's competition.

Middle-schooler Konrad Renner, 13 going on 30, shaved several minutes off his time from a year ago to land a spot in the top half of the men's field — not bad, given the race has an alleged age requirement of 15.

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And grade-schooler Murphy Kimball celebrated his 10th birthday by providing a strong final leg for his relay teammates, also known as mom and dad.

Even perennial champion Will Ross did something, well, if not new, then at least unconventional. Until Saturday, Alaska's top off-road triathlete hadn't gone swimming since the beginning of November.

"It felt good the first couple minutes," he said, "and then I remembered I hadn't swum in awhile."

Not that it mattered much. Ross, 27, collected his third straight victory and his seventh overall by holding off Jason Lamoreaux by 66 seconds.

Ross recorded a time of 1 hour, 33 minutes, 4 seconds on a gnarly 18.5-mile course. Part of the world-wide Xterra off-road triathlon series, the Hammerman meets the definition of extreme — a half-mile swim in Little Campbell Lake, a 14-mile mountain bike on root-filled and often single-track trails and a 4-mile run on technical terrain.

A field of 148 competed, including some who weren't even born when the first Hammerman happened 15 years ago.

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Renner made his debut as a solo Hammerman racer last year at age 12, the youngest solo racer in race history.

"He said, 'I want to do this race. Whadda I gotta do?' " said Rebecca McKee, one of the race organizers.

A competitive swimmer with the Northern Lights Swim Club, Renner had solid swimming credentials. Race officials decided if he could prove that he could handle the bike course, and enjoy it, he could enter the race — the same criteria followed three years ago when Renner's older brother, Torsten, did his first Hammerman at age 12.

Renner passed his test, completing the ride with race director Andy Duenow to get the OK to enter last year's race.

This year he performed like a seasoned veteran — one as adept in a post-race interview as he was on the race course.

"You just get more comfortable with not being nervous before the race," Renner said. "When they blow the air horn at the start — the one-minute warning — you get relaxed. There's not the angst of the year before."

He provided a colorful and concise breakdown of his race.

"The hardest part for me is the run," Renner said. "The swim is very refreshing for me, and I love the bike. … It's a pretty technical ride, lots of tricky turns that make it a really enjoyable ride.

"The transitions usually go OK, and then I head out on the run — the 4-mile slog."

Because of the Renner brothers, race officials created a new age group for racers ages 10-14. So far Torsten and Konrad are the only ones who have competed in it, but Konrad is confident more kids will take up triathlon, a sport he plans to pursue for years to come.

"I want this to be a lifetime thing," he said. "I want others to make it a lifetime thing. Triathlon for kids (is) becoming a new thing in the 21st century."

Kimball, the day's youngest racer, is becoming a triathlete one discipline at a time. The Hammerman marked the second time he's competed in a triathlon relay this summer, and both times he did the run.

He flew across the finish line Saturday and ran straight to a table of refreshments, where he grabbed a cookie and some red Twizzlers. A birthday cake, presumably, would come later.

Murphy is the son of a pair of elite athletes — Will and Jenny Kimball, West High schoolteachers who once were both Olympic contenders — Will in the marathon, Jenny in biathlon. (When they married in 2001, they started their wedding day by running the Bear Paw Classic 5K.)

"Welcome to the family," Jenny said as she and Murphy waited for Will to finish the bike.

Held on a bone-jarring course with lots of twists and some screaming downhills, the 14-mile bike is perhaps the most challenging aspect of the Hammerman. More than half of it is on Kincaid's narrow, harrowing single tracks, where Ross and Chelf pulled away for their victories.

"It's brutal. That bike course is tough," Chelf said. "The run is also beastly."

As is Chelf. Since moving from Wisconsin to Alaska seven years ago with husband Josh, she has established herself as a top mountain biker and a promising triathlete.

Chelf used her technical riding skills to open a huge gap over her nearest competitor. She finished in 1:47:35 to place sixth overall, about 20 minutes ahead of women's runner-up Corrie Smith.

Chelf said she got serious about mountain biking after the birth of her second son Jory, now 3.

At age 29, she thinks she has yet to hit her potential — especially given that in cycling, some of her top competition comes from women in their 30s, 40s and 50s.

"It seems like in Alaska, the older you get (the better you get)," she said. "I'm not even in my prime yet. I've got years to go. I'm surrounded by a lot of older mentors who push me all the time."

Ross said he didn't take the lead until about a third of the way through the bike.

"It's nice to be chasing and not being chased," he said.

"When you're leading, you never know where you are — you don't know the time gap, so you just have to be mentally strong."

Ross held off Lamoreaux, who in turn finished in 1:34:10 for an eight-second edge over the winning relay team of swimmer Wyatt Adams, biker Peter Brewer and runner Cody Priest.

Adams, a former Division I swimmer for UNLV, was the first person to complete the mass-start swim, finishing in about 10 minutes.

Brewer survived the bike to keep the team in contention. "That was rough," he said as he tagged off to Priest, who crushed it in the run.

Not everyone made it through the bike. Paramedics were called after a woman crashed on a downhill, and she was transported out of the woods on a 4-wheeler, her face bloody, scraped and a little swollen.

"Now I do the walk of shame," she said as the 4-wheeler passed a cluster of spectators on its way to the parking lot.

"If you were a football player," Duenow said as he carried her bike, "people would be applauding right now."