Ensenada to San Felipe 250

Just got back from a crazy trip to Baja on Sunday night. I travelled with Roger Norman and some members of his race team documenting their adventures during the Ensenada to San Felipe 250. We left Thursday morning, did some prerunning Friday, followed the race Saturday and left Sunday, it was wild. I was hanging out the window of the chase truck on poorly maintained Mexican highways going 80mph chasing the prerunner with my HVX mounted to the side of the car on a panhead; also riding in the prerunner with my tripod strapped literally on top of me operating through 100mph off road intensity. It was all in good fun though, and we gathered some really great footage. Check out the piece I cut together for Norman Motorsports.

Noman Motorsports - RECORD Ensenada to San Felipe 250 from Seth Naugle on Vimeo.

Back Country Telemark Skiing in Tahoe

Photo: Kenny and I trek up the the last steep section of a mountain overlooking beautiful Lake Tahoe.

Skiing is way harder than I had anticipated. I tried it once when I was 6 and remember it being not too difficult. I'm a southern California kid, so the snow is a whole new environment for me. I had heard that telemark skiing is super hard from many people around here in Tahoe, but I was willing to give it a try.

I met Kenny while climbing at the gym, he is a strong climber and also happens to be a skillful telemark skier. We got to talking about skiing and I asked him if he could teach me some backcountry stuff and he agreed. Here is a link to his website:

www.TahoeWakesports.com

Backcountry Tahoe is absolutely gorgeous. I was amazed that we were able to hike around out there. Even more impressive was the fact that we could walk up hills with skins attached to our skis. The whole time while we were going up I couldn't help the thought that we were going to have to ski all the way back down. Going down was way hard for me, my legs kept wanting to go in different directions and I got to practice my crashing in depth. The good thing is I made it down the mountain in one piece. Super thanks to Kenny for taking me out and being patient with me.

Check out the rest of the photos here:

Baja1000 2009 Ensenada

    

Photo: Norman Racing Trophy truck launches off the first jump of the 2009 Baja 1000.

The Baja 1000 is quite a spectacle,  attracting people young and old, rich and poor, from all over to witness one of motor sports's gnarliest races across the desert. My brother Seth and I were lucky enough to get to tag along with RPM Photographer Howard Tande  (check out his site) who shoots for Norman Motorsports.

Unfortunately the vehicle we had planned on traveling around Mexico in was having some mechanical issues so we were only able to capture the start and finish line area of the race. We did our best and were happy with the few shots we were able to get.

Check out this link for More Pics!

Here is a short video piece Seth put together for Norman Motorsports.
*If the video skips, click on "HD is ON" on the right side of the video player, and that will switch playback to standard definition for lower bandwidth systems.*

2009 Baja 1000 - Norman Motorsports from Seth Naugle on Vimeo.

Nature Reel

Best of my nature footage I've shot.

Nature Reel from Seth Naugle on Vimeo.

DP Reel

My Director of Photography Reel. Basically the best of all the footage I've shot in my career so far cut together as a promo piece.

DP Reel Vimeo from Seth Naugle on Vimeo.

"To Purgatory and Back," Bouldering in the Middle of Nowhere Desert of Nevada

                                      

Photo: Trekking through the desert in search of good climbs. "Purgatory," Nevada.

Most people I've met in the Tahoe area have heard of Purgatory, but have never climbed there because you might as well drive the extra hour and a half to go to Bishop. Jason Burd invited my girl friend Sasha and I to go along with him for a day trip. We drove a solid 3 hours into the middle of nowhere to get there. It was definitely worth the trip, we just wished we could have stayed a few extra days, there were boulders everywhere.

For more information about Purgatory, check out this website:

Purgatory guide

 

 Photo: Jason Burd on a really cool V3 cave problem we found.

Photo: Rafael Valdes clings to an awesome arete problem we found.

Photo: Rafael Valdes on V3 arete.          

This place has some really nice routes. We barely touched the surface of what was around.                                         

Thanks to Sasha for helping me out with the pole flash. To light these shots I used a Canon 580ex II attached to a extentable monopod held by Sasha. The flash was powered by a Quantom Turbo 2x2 battery. The flash was triggered by a pocket wizard. Images were produced on a Canon 5D Mark II with 16-25mm L lens.

Photo: Sasha Coben working on a V2 crack problem.

 

We will definitely need to come back to Purgatory later this winter. Being so remote, it was one of the quietest places I have ever been.  Check out this link to see the rest of the photos from the day.

Purgatory Photos

Thanks again to everyone that was there for the trip.

Action Sports Reel

I've shot quite a few random sports events or spots in the last few months, these are some of my favorite shots from my vault of footage. Hope you enjoy it!

Action Sports Reel from Seth Naugle on Vimeo.

Classic V4 Arete at the "Incline Bouders," North Lake Tahoe, CA

Photo: Paul Otis at the crux of the Arete with wife Julie spotting from below.

This classic line was first introduced to us by Jason Burd, owner of High Altitude Fitness climbing gym in North Lake Tahoe. Check out his Gym

He called it V4, and we all agreed it was one of the best V4 problems in the area. The weather has been beautiful here in Tahoe lately, the climbing could not get any better.

Photo: Jason Burd

Photos: Julie Otis working the arete while Sasha Coben keeps a safe spot below.

Click here to see all of the photos from the day! 

Another day living life to its fullest! Thanks to everyone who was there and helped out.

Climbing at the "Smilee Boulders" in Lake Tahoe

Photo: Julie Otis climbs V4-V5ish unnamed problem at the Smilee Boulders in Lake Tahoe.

I met Julie about a month ago while climbing in Lake Tahoe. Julie and her husband Paul are local Tahoe climbers who crush it. In addition to being strong climbers, they both work as school teachers. Paul puts a lot of time into finding and developing new climbing areas. I've never met someone so stoked on google earth, he uses it to seek out virgin rock.

 

 

Photo: Paul on a V9ish project at Donner Lake

They are super cool folks and I look foreword to climbing with them more in the future. Thanks Julie and Paul!

Click here to see all the photos from the day

Tahoe climbing at Spooner

Photo: Juan Rodriguez free solos a 5:10a at Spooner, Lake Tahoe, California.

A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to meet Mad Rock sponsored climber Juan Rodriguez. Apparently he was on a cross country road trip on a 600cc Kawasaki motorcycle from Oregon to Cedar Point, an amusement park in Ohio, to ride an epic roller coaster. A good story for sure, but I'm sure it was just a good excuse to go on an epic road trip. We only got to climb one day together but he was a super chill and inspiring guy.

Here are a few more pics from the day. Thank you Juan.

 

Sunset by the Lake

Here are a few shots I took on my way back from climbing last week.









Sasha and I were wandering around the beach and she happened to by standing in a small patch of golden light. I quickly grabbed the camera and fired a few frames off. This one was my favorite.

Moved to Tahoe, First Post

Just finally got this blog thing going, its been awhile in the making. Sasha and I just moved to Lake Tahoe recently. After the white white rafting season ended on the Kern river I needed a place to go and Tahoe sounded like the most promising place to live for two photographers. We moved here with high hopes. So far the place is epic! This has to be the most beautiful places I have been. We had our first snow last week, here are a few pics, check them out:

Here is a picture of the front of my place

Here are a few pics from the backyard





The first snow of the season but short lived. A day later all the snow was gone and the temps have been warming up. Great weather for climbing though!