I'm proud to announce the Western Washington Fall Winter Whitewater Race Series!

For fun and for training, this winter we are going to hold an informal series of races on the rivers surrounding the Seattle Area. The Series will showcase some of the most popular class III-IV rivers as well as a couple harder ones. We hope to get people excited about racing and out taking advantage of our local whitewater. This is not about competition as much as pushing ourselves to have fun on rivers we might not normally paddle.
We prefer the mass start format because we feel that it is the safest format for friendly, informal races. There is almost always someone close behind you that can provide help (especially if we get safety volunteers to paddle behind the racers). Furthermore, it's more fun to have people chasing you! Of course this requires paddlers to be courteous and careful at all times and especially when overtaking others. There is no need for aggressiveness or any other forms of unsafe paddling.

-Events will be held on the 3rd Saturday of every month from October 2012 to March 2013, for a total of 6 races. The dates of the races are Oct 20th, Nov 17, Dec 15th, Jan 19th, Feb 16th and Mar 16th.

-There are no entry fees and no prizes for racers. Hopefully we can find some prizes for the safety volunteers.

-Each racer is personally responsible for their decision to participate. Whenever possible we will solicit safety boaters but their presence is not guaranteed. If the course is above your ability to race safely and competently please do not participate.

-It is the goal of the Series to choose race sites that are safe enough to encourage wide participation from the community. We will attempt to choose the location of each race with participant safety as the most foremost consideration. The location of each race will be determined by the racers in the week prior to the race. Although the goal will be to decide on location with as much notice as possible, the deadline for the final decision on location is 8pm of the day prior to the race. Factors influencing this decision include:
-Water levels
-Weather conditions
-Hazards of potential race sites
-Racer preferences and availability

Whenever and wherever appropriate the format will be as follows:
-Mass start race with 2+ safety boaters (when available) to follow up behind racers.
-Short boat (9 foot max) race first followed by a long boat (or open class) race. If people want to paddle other boat types that is fine.

Race Sites:

-Skykomish River
-Green River - Gorge
-MF Snoqualmie - Middle Middle
-Middle Section, SF Stillaguamish
-Canyon Creek, SF Stillaguamish
-*Robe Canyon, SF Stillaguamish - Above 1st class IV to below Mrs. Robinson's. Might not include Landslide portage
*Note: It is the opinion of the Organizers that the Series would not be complete without an event on Robe Canyon, despite the fact that there is already a race on this section. We will attempt to schedule our event in December or January and it is not intended to replace, detract or associate in any way with the "The Robe Race" which is held in April using a partner format.

The goal of the series is to choose the most popular, high quality rivers that are close to Seattle. However, there are a variety of alternate race sites that can replace any of the above (with the exception of Robe) if racers want to make the change.

Alternate Race Sites:

-Lower Tilton River
-Upper Pilchuck River
-Pilchuck Creek
-Sauk (Whitechuck R to Clear Creek)
-Sultan River - Lower

Are there any race categories?
or all long boat?

sweet! this looks like a blast!

Darren was telling me about this last weekend it sounds super cool, I had never raced before the icicle race around PP this year and I developed a new respect for that aspect of WW, I hadn't felt that tired and winded in a loooong time.

Anyway this sounds fun I'm in.