Every morning, our writers wake up to the breakfast of champions; a glass of fine cognac and numerous cigars. No rocks in the yak for our writers, for they will spend the rest of their day writing about real rocks (boulders, cliffs, mountains) Puny ice cubes don’t deserve to be graced with their attention. The cigars are for building lung endurance.
Our writers have dominated many rocks in their lifetimes. They continue to do so, but now, they write about them. Meet the team.
Managing Editors
Yoon Kim – Editor-in-Chief
Yoon has been a member of the North American Snow Journalists Association (NASJA) as well as American Society of Journalists and Authors (ASJA) since 2008. His writing has won him many awards, most notably to him, $130,000 in college scholarships. He’s interviewed Shaun White, Torstein Horgmo, Hannah Teter, and Gretchen Bleiler. He’s also interviewed people with real jobs including Tim Westergren (founder of Pandora.com), Kevin Smith, and OK Go. One day, he hopes to join the ranks of the former, and be interviewed for excelling in a non-job activity.
Adam Vanderbush – Marketing Director
Adam is a compassionate dude. Unless it comes to winning, in which case, he is heartless. Ask the deer in the picture. He is one of the most creative guys that Yoon has ever met and was scouted hard from the day Yoon stepped into TrailsEdge. Adam loves the internet as much as he loves his mother, which is a lot.
Rick Olson – Managing Editor
Rick excels in every single outdoor activity known to man. He’s also your quality go-to guy when someone conjures up a dubious trip idea. He’ll throw caution to the wind and use his chalk bag as a beer holster in exchange for a good story to tell from a barstool. Cleaned up versions of his tavern jargon can be read on Wend, where he is an Editor-at-Large, or you can see how he traveled all summer at www.playgroundtour.com.
Patrick Hutchison – Managing Editor
Patrick is originally from Seattle but you’ll find him traveling, hiking, writing and eating in Patagonia. As a youngster, Patrick fell in love with the wooded outdoors, where he would intentionally get himself lost. Now, he tries not to get lost, but investigates gear that would save him just in case he did. You can follow his adventures in Patagonia at www.chasingthecloudwall.wordpress.com.
Vito Valentinetti - Editor at Large
Vito has spent his life rambling the backways and byways of the world searching for inspiration, stories, and the perfect pint. This native Vermonter claims that that he can drink an entire bottle of maple syrup and Mad River Glen is the best ski area on the planet. He was last seen somewhere between Big Sky, Montana and Tucson, Arizona.
Bryan Schatz – Editor at Large
Bryan doesn’t fool around, got it? And most wouldn’t characterize him as a ‘joyous fellow,’ though he does find joy in a few things; namely mud, lunacy, and eating terror for breakfast. He also delights in the outdoors, has an unfortunately destitute lifestyle and is intrigued by fringe societies. Bryan hopes to one day become a crime journalist of tremendous stature. You can get in touch with him here.
Melina Coogan – Editor at Large
Melina Coogan is a champion storyteller. For the last thirteen years she has been traveling the globe, climbing and whitewater kayaking in over a dozen countries, purely for the sake of having things to talk about. She excels at puns, vocabulary, and campfire story domination. She studied writing at the University of Washington with scholarships for both fiction and poetry. Currently a Seattle resident, she writes for magazines and her blog, The Wilder Coast .
Nikki Hodgson – Editor at Large
Nikki is a freelance writer with a talent for creating spectacles and getting into ridiculous situations. When not writing, she enjoys falling down mountain slopes, kayaking rivers upside down, and repairing things with duct tape. Dividing her time between Europe and the Middle East she despises temperatures above 100 F, and has mastered the following French phrases: Can you call mountain rescue? I don’t think it’s broken. And I would love another bottle of wine, thanks. Follow her (mis)adventures Nikki Travels.
Chris Pence – Editor at Large
Chris is a freelancer by trade who braves the wicked outdoors any time he retrieves the mail and lives to tell about it. Based out of Chicago, Chris enjoyed growing up in and exploring the Pennsylvania countryside before hacking his way through the urban jungle of the Windy City. He takes an inordinate amount of pleasure in hiking, camping, swimming, running dunes until his legs seize up, and looking down steep cliffs through pay binoculars (seriously, he has some height issues).
Columnists
Jake Mohrmann – “GearHead”
Jake is an adventurer and has done just about every outdoor pursuit from mountain biking to vertical cave spelunking. He’s led trips up Mt. Rainier and the Grand Tetons and has done trail work on several of Colorado’s 14ers. Whether it be elk hunting in the Rockies or sharing a cervesa with his wife on a beach in Mexico, his passion is for the adventure. When he’s not outside, Jake writes a blog with his wife at OurEverydayAdventures.com and he also is a moderator for the Gore-Tex online community.
Tracey McCormick – Cycling/Mountain Biking Editor
For Tracey, playing outdoors as a child meant frolicking among the 40 trees that surrounded the polluted pond in her small suburban city in Rhode Island. At 18 she graduated to hiking, nordic skiing and the occasional snowshoe, then snowboarding and sprint triathloning. With her mid-20s move to Colorado she discovered her one true love: mountain biking. She and her love have traveled all over the Southwest, searching for pristine singletrack, Wylie Coyote landscapes, and much-needed solitude. Tracey’s idea of a really good day entails her car, bike, and body all in good working order.
Nate Alder - Biz/Tech Editor
Nate has been featured in Inc.com, Fortune Small Business, SGB, and other business publications for his inventions ranging from cell phone technologies, to innovations in apparel technologies. He has taken companies from the startup stage to profitability and is currently hunting for his next entrepreneurial venture in aerodynamic design. When not devising a new way to crack into tech, you can find him in front of his computer covering new technologies in the outdoor industry. Read more about him in Inc Magazine.
