SEVENTY48: People power takes on the Puget Sound

PORT TOWNSEND — The 2025 edition of SEVENTY48 is in the books, and this year’s finishers brought the fire in near record-setting time.

From elite speedsters to tenacious first-timers, racers launched from Tacoma’s Foss Waterway at 7 p.m. Friday and paddled, rowed or pedaled their way to Port Townsend in a feat of grit, planning and sheer endurance.

Team Tritons took first place overall in spectacular fashion, unseating two-time champs Beasts from the East with a time of 10 hours, 9 minutes, tying the inaugural race record and coming within 34 minutes of the all-time fastest finish.

0 seconds of 0 secondsVolume 0%

00:00

“SEVENTY48 racers don’t just chase a finish line, they chase their limits,” said Jesse Wiegel, Race Boss at Northwest Maritime. “It’s a race that proves how far the human body (and spirit) can go when it’s just muscle, water and willpower.”

This year’s SEVENTY48 brought its usual mix of ingenuity, tenacity and weather-induced grit. The breezes blew in from the northwest this year: persistent, unhelpful, and gusting up to 16 to 18 knots on Saturday afternoon. More than 40 teams made the smart call to pull up on beaches and wait it out rather than burn out before the final push. Out of 120 registered teams, 104 launched from Tacoma and 77 powered all the way to Port Townsend within the 48-hour window.

Currents added their own personality, clashing with the wind at unpredictable intervals and turning stretches of Puget Sound into a frothy blender of whitecaps and low morale.

While SEVENTY48 kicked off the season, WA360, a 360-mile human- and wind-powered race around Puget Sound, returns for its second run June 28, starting and ending in Port Townsend. With no Race to Alaska this year, WA360 takes center stage in the region’s celebration of pure, non-motorized maritime adventure.

The race is organized by Northwest Maritime, a nonprofit based in Port Townsend. The mission of Northwest Maritime is to engage and educate people of all generations in traditional and contemporary maritime life, in a spirit of adventure and discovery.

Northwest Maritime also organizes the Port Townsend Wooden Boat Festival, Salish100 and 48° North Magazine. NWM is home to the Port Townsend Maritime Academy, Port Townsend High School Sailing Team and countless school, youth and adult maritime programs in partnership with the Maritime High School in Des Moines.

Category winners

First Place Overall: Team Tritons

Time: 10 hours, 9 minutes

Crew: Rich Long, Rob Pelkey, Dave Jensen

Vessel: Carbonology Triple Surfski

Winner – By Yourself Class: Team Wave Forager

Time: 11:12.

Crew: Ken Deem

Vessel: Maas 24 Rowboat

Winner – Facing Backwards: Team We Are a Laughing Roomba

Time: 14:41.

Crew: Rod Sternagel and Haleigh Werner