By Jesse Wiegel, Race Boss
Northwest Maritime exists for one reason: to get you on the water and mildly obsessed. Whether you’re here to learn, mess around, build a career, or just see what it feels like to eat instant oatmeal in a gale, we’ve got you covered. If what we did existed as a menu, it wouldn’t be some curated prix fixe affair—it’s more like the offerings in a high-end shopping mall food court. Maybe you’re not feeling bánh mì today. Fine. Hit Tokyo Express, extra soy sauce, please. Either way, you’re leaving with something tasty.
Enter SEVENTY48: the sweatiest, chafe-iest, and most ruthless route from Tacoma to Port Townsend. It’s our annual love letter to human-powered absurdity—no motors, no support. Since its inception in 2018, over 600 paddlers, rowers, and pedalers have sprinted and hallucinated their way across the finish line. Which, by our (bad) math, means at least a thousand have tried, and about half of them keep coming back for more.
And for what? The front-runners are already home, drying their neoprene and finishing a pizza by the time most folks hit the halfway mark. But the rest keep paddling. For a cause. To honor someone. To mark a change. To see who they are when the wheels come off.
This year, with the reincarnation of WA360 following close on its heels, the frame of SEVENTY48 widens. What was once a pair of beloved, masochistic standalones —SEVENTY48 and Race to Alaska—is now a trilogy. Each event is distinct, but shares essential DNA. SEVENTY48 is the mad dash. WA360 kicks it into a low gear feat of endurance. Race to Alaska is the gauntlet.
Whether or not you see it as part of something bigger, SEVENTY48 can stand alone as a challenge to be proud of—something to tell grandkids about, or recall to mind when one’s tenacity is in doubt.
Just under two weeks remain until the sixth SEVENTY48 gets underway. If you’re on a boat: good luck. If not, be a part of the thing by showing up to the race start or finish to celebrate not just the teams, but the spirit of all those on the water who conquer.
RACE START:
Foss Waterway Seaport, Tacoma.
June 6.
7 PM.