25th Annual Numb Bum 24hr Ice Race - Pembina Offroad Association - Sandy Beach, AB, Canada

February 15th - 16th

I had the opportunity to stay up for 39 hours and shoot the Numb Bum 24hr Ice Race in Sandy Beach, AB this past weekend. This was nothing in comparison to the Quad and Bike teams that pushed hard for 24 hours of racing. The competition for first place was very close with only a 6 minute difference at the end of the race with both teams completing 108 laps of the 15km course.

By far the most fun I had was at night since you can't default to the standard head on corner shot and need to be more creative. With the ring road that we plowed around the course it was easy to drive the perimeter and set up to shoot right next to the car, sometimes even using the headlights to help with lighting.

Near the end I had the opportunity to go up in a helicopter above the course to get some aerial shots. The images I took with the Canon 300mm 2.8 IS II all came out very blurry, and I don't mean just not sharp. It was like there was something wrong with IS on the lens since I was shooting w/ shutter speeds approaching 1/8000th. I tried Mode 1 and 3 but didn't think to turn it off while I was in the air. I did however get some wide shots with the 16-35mm 2.8 but should have run back and grabbed the 70-200 before heading up.

Already thinking of new shots and things to include during the 24hrs for the event's social media feed for 2015

-Jeremy