Sports - Ski to Sea - Ski to Sea trainer

POSTED: Friday, May. 22, 2009

Kayak: Team Kulshan Cycles captain is a reigning Top Gun

Kayaker Heather Nelson is the woman to beat.

The accomplished paddler is a repeating Top Gun, making her the fastest woman on the water the last couple years. Last year alone she finished 7 minutes ahead of the next person in the Whatcom County Female division. According to the Bellingham/Whatcom Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Nelson is the only male or female competitor to turn in the fastest time in her leg of the race in the first two years that the Top Gun awards have been presented.

"You do have a little target on your back when you're Top Gun," she said with a grin.

But that doesn't seem to faze the 37-year-old Sudden Valley resident. She does Ski to Sea for the fun of it, not to win.

Nelson is the captain of Team Kulshan Cycles, a team she started a couple years ago with teammate and co-owner of Kulshan Cycles, Kae Moe. The pair wanted to create a team to showcase local women - no out of town ringers are allowed.

"Part of the reason I started captaining a Whatcom County women's team is because there are so many amazing women athletes here," the five-time Ski to Sea competitor said.

Nelson is a well-respected athlete, having competed in numerous long-distance paddling races. At the 2006 Yukon River Quest in Canada, Nelson even set the solo women's record for the 460-mile course.

So Ski to Sea should be a cake-walk, right? Not quite, Nelson said. This year she's is training as the mother of a toddler.

"Racing and being a new mom is harder, both physically and emotionally than I ever expected," Nelson wrote in an e-mail. "Yet, there are so many women in Whatcom County that do it with such grace."

Nelson's nearly 15-month-old son, Hayden, takes almost all of her free time nowadays. That means she has to ignore the desire to sit in silence and solitude when she does get a chance to get on the water.

"My training is really focused," she said. "Each time I'm on the water I have to make it really count."

This will be Nelson's sixth Ski to Sea and fifth time doing the kayak leg. She and her husband, fellow kayaker and Team RE/MAX captain Brandon Nelson, were drafted onto teams essentially as soon as the couple moved to Bellingham.

And Nelson loves it.

"It's part of the community and culture to do Ski to Sea," she said. "We start planning as soon as the race is over."

But don't expect the kayaking duo to compete together any time soon.

"I'm pretty attached to my women's team," Nelson said. "Plus one of us would have to give up the kayaking leg."

TEAM KULSHAN CYCLES

Division: Whatcom County Women

Cross-country ski: Kae Moe

Downhill: Cara Carbone

Run: Christy Fazio

Road bike: Marti Riemer-Reiss

Canoe: Veronica Wisniewski and Char Waller

Mountain bike: Nicola Mann

Kayak: Heather Nelson