Hi Everyone. Important note as of March 24. Because I'll be traveling, I won't be able to complete uploading to the galleries for each race until about April 8. In addition, I won't be able to process any orders until after April 8. Please be patient.
Here are the first 41 women, including extras of some racers. Just added Bibs 21-41 on 3/24.
More eventually.
Hi Everyone. Important note as of March 24. Because I'll be traveling, I won't be able to complete uploading to the galleries for each race until about April 8. In addition, I won't be able to process any orders until after April 8. Please be patient.
Here are the initial uploads from SG2, through Bib 11.
Eventually everyone will be uploaded, but it will be several weeks following an unavoidable delay. Please be patient.
Hi Everyone. Important note as of March 24. Because I'll be traveling, I won't be able to complete uploading to the galleries for each race until about April 8. In addition, I won't be able to process any orders until after April 8. Please be patient.
Here are the first SG2 photos through Bib 20.
More to come, but it may take several weeks. Please be patient.
Hi Everyone. Important note as of March 24. Because I'll be traveling, I won't be able to complete uploading to the galleries for each race until about April 8. In addition, I won't be able to process any orders until after April 8. Please be patient.
Uploading of the first run slalom photos is now complete.
I also photographed the second run, and will eventually upload some photos from that run. It might be a few weeks. Please be patient.
Hi Everyone. Important note as of March 24. Because I'll be traveling, I won't be able to complete uploading to the galleries for each race until about April 8. In addition, I won't be able to process any orders until after April 8. Please be patient.
Here are the first few, through Bib 4, from the first Super-G.
More to come in coming weeks. Please be patient.
Hi Everyone. Important note as of March 24. Because I'll be traveling, I won't be able to complete uploading to the galleries for each race until about April 8. In addition, I won't be able to process any orders until after April 8. Please be patient.
Here are the photos through Bib 21. More to come in coming weeks.
Hi Everyone. Important note as of March 24. Because I'll be traveling, I won't be able to complete uploading to the galleries for each race until about April 8. In addition, I won't be able to process any orders until after April 8. Please be patient.
These are the run 1 uploads for the first 40 racers. More to come.
Note that these are not fully edited. Some are darker and some are lighter than ideal, but time pressure prevents full editing for display purposes.
Hi Everyone. Important note as of March 24. Because I'll be traveling, I won't be able to complete uploading to the galleries for each race until about April 8. In addition, I won't be able to process any orders until after April 8. Please be patient.
Here are the uploads of images from run 1. Run 1 uploading is complete.
Maybe run 2, eventually.
Racer photos are in run order.
Okay. Both runs of Race 1 are now uploaded. This means, among other things, that all uploading of all the 2024 Alyeska Cup images for all age groups and all events is complete.
It also means uploading for my very last galleries for ASC junior races is complete. The only remaining races I'll be photographing (and eventually uploading) will be the Western Region U16s.
I could not photograph Race 2.
Uploading is now complete for both runs.
I couldn't photograph Race 2.
Not a great day weatherwise for racing or photography. Camera shutter closed down, missing Miriam Satre's entire first run (#100 is one of the non-images of her first run). I loaded more from her second run.
People sometimes order prints or digital files. These were tough conditions for clean images. Before ordering, you might let me know which files you might want before placing an order. I can tell you whether not to order or whether a smaller size would be better.
One of the main reasons I take race photos is to get media coverage for racers, the sport of alpine racing, and the ski club. So the first priority after a race is to submit, within the applicable deadline, photos and captions to the Anchorage Daily News, primarily, and sometimes to the Juneau Empire and to Ski Racing.
Here are the nine images submitted today for the U12/U14 tech races. There were several images of some racers, to give the ADN compositional choices. And by now, most non-racers don't want to see the usual "gate-crush" shots. So one goal is to give the Sports staff a variety of choices. Thus, I gave the ADN three different shots of Reilly Cooper and three different shots of Mia Huey.
Why are some racers depicted? Deadlines prevent leisurely review of thousands of images. (17,000 Friday; 12,000 Saturday.)
I work with the results, usually USSS Dashboard until official results are available, and try to quickly find the best shots of the top three racers in class. (Such as Cooper and Huey in this series.) "Best" means different things to different people. I strive for high quality images technically, and also images that make racing interesting for even casual readers. To some extent, choices have to be made that are difficult. Here are examples: a heroic run that ends in a DQ or DNF is Impossible to explain in a short caption); a great single run that is paired with an incomplete or even just a slower run; a DQ on the first run and a "winning" (top time) second run for a qualifier (impossible to explain to Outsiders).
And sometimes a racer who normally finishes off the podium breaks through with a great race. Hard, but not always impossible, to explain. (Hint for everyone not always finishing on the podium: keep striving.) The sport is cruel. A very strong racer may simply have a bad race, or a bad series, and so on. You have our sympathy. But explaining it to the larger audience is too challenging. The news cycle is even crueler than ski racing.
The pressure to get images to the ADN delays and distracts from getting the race galleries uploaded. And just in case anyone gets impatient for the race galleries, it takes hours of selecting and processing to select, edit, and upload suitable gallery photos.
So, for the time being enjoy these nine images. The race galleries will eventually be uploaded.
And keep in mind the club needs to review its general publicity and media functions, starting with finding a race photographer for next season. Know any good photographers willing to step up?
Since posting the first nine images, I added four more, from the U16+ races. These are the four I sent the ADN on Monday, 2/19, with captions and a plea for more coverage online.
The last four show Avery Reger, Corbin Wilson, Ava Huey, and Henry Nordstrom
These are some test shots taken during GS training on February 15, using a lens I probably won't use for any of the Alyeska Cup races. It is long and allowed some fun face shots, but it isn't fast enough (f/11) to be consistently good for racing, at least not in shade in February.
Very hit or miss who was photographed, and it was a short photo session.
Uploading of men's Race 2 is now complete.
The cold interfered with photography. The camera focus sometimes misbehaved and the shutter sometimes refused to fire. It didn't help that my fingers were getting frostbitten, despite four handwarmers per glove.
As a result, it was impossible to photograph everyone in the best (closest) gates, so the gallery includes a lot off less-ideal images from more distant gates. These will not make first -quality images. I've included them partly to prevent people from feeling left out and partly to show (despite poor image quality) some first-rate skiing in gates higher on the Cabbage Patch.
Another result was that there are more images of some and fewer of others.
Enjoy viewing. I suggest contacting me before ordering anything. Racers: please be sure to copy an adult parent or guardian with any email, to comply with club protocols.
Uploading of women's Race 2 is now complete.
As before, very cold weather made it hard to get optimal images. It made optimal racing, hard, too. At least one racer (Cameron Taylor) was missed completely: the camera wouldn't focus and fire. It didn't help that I couldn't feel the shutter button. Four hand warmers in each glove didn't solve the problems.
The "jump" pictures are, in general, not high quality. I would prefer no one order them. They might make small prints or low-res images, at best.
Uploading for men's Race 1 is now complete. Race 2 may take another day or two.
It was - no surprise - very cold, and the camera declined to focus consistently for every racer. So some people may be missing, and many ideal shots were unsuccessful.
As always, these fast uploads are not perfectly processed. But for viewing, they are adequate.