Schwoerer, Robinson capture victory in Alaska Wilderness Classic

The winning play in Alaska's most secret sporting event wasn't so much a masterstroke as it was a mistake.

En route to their victory in last week's Alaska Wilderness Classic, Toby Schwoerer and Harlow Robinson hiked across a huge Brooks Range ice cirque that led to a steep and icy climb up and over the first of four mountain passes on their journey.

They later learned there was a gully to the east offering a safer, less extreme way around the pass. Schwoerer knew about the gully — it appeared on a topographical map he had printed out — but when he put the race route into his GPS, he mistakenly plotted a course that went straight up the glacier.

"On the map I had us going up that gully, but on my GPS I must have put the route right over the glacier, which I know was way more dangerous," Schwoerer said.

"Such a thin margin of error we had there. Turns out we got lucky."

Schwoerer, 42, and Robinson, 50, finished the race —- roughly 105 miles from Galbraith Lake to Wiseman — in less than 37 hours.

They didn't sleep a wink along the way. They started at noon Sunday, along with 12 other racers, and reached their destination at 12:34 a.m. Tuesday, more than eight hours ahead of the second-place team of John Pekar and Matt Kupilik of Anchorage.

It was Schwoerer's first Wilderness Classic victory in four attempts, although he has won the winter version of the race a number of times. Robinson is also a winner of the winter event, but this year marked his debut in the summer event.

The Wilderness Classic is the most extreme of Alaska's many extreme sporting events. It takes participants to remote parts of the state and provides little to no support. There is a start line and a finish line but typically no real trail between the two.

The summer race, which changes locations every three years, dates back to the early 1980s. It doesn't have a website and it doesn't publicize results (although The Classic Report chronicles some of the races).

The under-the-radar aspect "is part of the culture around it," said Robinson, a veteran of most of Alaska's mountain races.

"It's a very unique race," he said. "There's nothing like it. You're out there for a long time, and you're usually not on trails."

Robinson said Schwoerer talked him into doing the race after the cancellation of this year's Crow Pass Crossing, an annual wilderness marathon that each man has won twice.

Schwoerer, who came to Anchorage from Germany to ski for UAA, said Robinson's running and hiking resume made him an ideal partner.

This is the second year the Wilderness Classic has gone from Galbraith Lake to Wiseman, which Schwoerer called "a really great route for running — no brush, perfect tundra."

"That's what I really enjoy," he said, "and I wanted to do it with Harlow because he kind of introduced me to mountain running with my first Crow Pass."

Robinson said he hit the jackpot by doing his first summer Wilderness Classic with Schwoerer.

"I am so in reverence to Toby for his skills and abilities," he said. "A lot of the credit is due to him and his route-finding skills and athletic ability."

The pair covered the first 56 miles on foot in less than 24 hours — a stretch that included a total elevation gain of 11,000 feet.

Once at the Hammond River, they inflated a tandem packraft and rafted the rest of the way to Wiseman.

Before reaching the river, they navigated their way up four mountain passes. While heading up the first one, they found themselves in a bowl of ice, with no apparent easy way to the other side.

"There was ice going all the way up the rim onto the cliff," Schwoerer said. "There was one little section that was a line of weakness … and this tiny little gap went up and over the pass.

"That's what we saw, and then the fog rolled in and basically we had 10 to 30 feet of elevation more to go up."

Once safely over the pass, the two men wondered and worried about competitors behind them.

"We said, 'What are the other guys going to do? If it's socked in like this, there's no way to see this little gap,' " Schwoerer said.

After the race, as they enjoyed the finish-line hospitality provided by Bernie and Uta Hicker of Wiseman, Schwoerer and Robinson quizzed other competitors about the gnarliest part of their trip.

"We asked the other guys, 'How did you guys cross the ice?' '' Schwoerer said, "and they said, 'Oh, we just used the gully on the east side.'

"… They were navigating off the map — the map I didn't use."