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Shauna Severson sets new Juneau Ridge Race female record
- Klas Stolpe
- 1 hour ago
- 12 min read
Benjamin Browning first overall in race’s second-fastest all-time male finish
By Klas Stolpe
Juneau Independent
It was a day for the out-of-towners along the 15-mile Juneau Ridge Race course as Eagle River’s Shauna Severson, 39, shaved seven minutes off the female course record, finishing the fog-enclosed day in 2 hours 32 minutes and 2 seconds. Idaho’s Ben Browning, age 20, crossed the finish line first overall with the second fastest male race time in history at 2:08:02.
“This race is different because I get to travel and the mountain is not one I would be on all the time like I would at home,” Severson said. “The first year I did it I had a goal for myself, so I have come back a couple of times and was able to hit it today.”
Severson ran a 2:54:27 in the 2024 race and 2:40:40 in 2025. Despite the fog she cruised the ridge and down to place ninth overall, and top the 2:39:39 mark set by Juneau’s Abby Jahn (then age 30) in 2023.
“I have a hard time when it is foggy, I get vertigo,” she said. “So once I get in the fog I get dizzy and lightheaded. Otherwise the trail was great, just deal with wet rocks and snow.”
Her race strategy was getting up early to take in enough liquids for the outing. She tried to trot the entire course, keeping the same range of motion in her legs despite the changes from steeper grade to downhill.
She was in a small pack at the start and was passed by a couple runners just before the summit, but ran the ridge and down completely alone.
“I was running solo,” she said. “My advice for anything is just get out and move your body. If you want to do a mountain run or race or a distance run or race you just have to build up to it and get out and get comfortable in your environment.”
Browning was comfortable from the start and nearly hit the course record of 2:07:37 set by Juneau’s Zach Bursell (then 30) in 2023.
“I don’t know, it was just kind of a fun race,” Browning said. “I enjoyed it. I didn’t feel like I was majorly pushing it, but overall it was just fun. I enjoyed going up.”
Browning ran this season as a freshman for the University of Alaska Anchorage. He heard of the race from teammate Edgar Jesus Vera-Alverado, a 2024 Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé graduate.
“He convinced me to come up and try it,” Browning said. “I did a preview of the course on Friday. I just run mountains and bike and run cross-country for UAA and do some summer training. But otherwise, I just love the mountains.”
Browning flew through the woods, across the waterfall and up the switchbacks in the lead and sliced through the fog unchallenged.
“I would just need to find a way to push a little more,” he answered when asked what to do better. “The fog made it a little bit difficult. Coming down I think I took a route less on the snow, I should have gone more on the snow, it would have sped it up a little bit. But otherwise I was pretty happy with it. I’m not sure if I will be back next year, I want to try some other mountain races in Anchorage.”
Kenai’s Achilles Theisen, 29, placed second overall in 2:11:29.
“It was a pretty surreal race,” Theisen said. “Absolutely beautiful. The ridge was a little longer than I thought it would be.”
Theisen had previewed the course prior but only to the summit of Mt. Juneau. It was rainy and cold and had taken longer than he and friend Chase Laker, 18, (sixth overall in 2:29.11) expected.
“But I would say the whole race was all encompassing with what Alaska mountain running has to offer,” Theisen said. “You are going through the dense shrubbery to the peaks that are swathed with exposed rock, into glissading across snow fields. A pretty cool race honestly.”
Theisen started the run to the Mt. Juneau Trailhead in sixth.
“It is a two and a half hour race,” he said. “I am a science major. I know what my heart rate is to last that time and distance. I took it easy on the uphill but still had a high output for at least 90 minutes. I just tried to be in control.”
He was fifth the first quarter of the climb, passed two runners to be behind Ian Curtis, 24, (Curtis finished third in 2:14:09) near the summit and stayed behind him until the ridge glissade. Theisen went into second and held that position on the descent and through Granite Basin.
“I thought I would be making up time on Ben Browning, but Ben just had an absolutely phenomenal race,” Theisen said. “You can see his splits on strava. Not only did he go insanely fast on the up, he went insanely fast on the down. He was almost dropping a sub-five-minute mile for three miles on the down. I was dropping, like five-30s. Once you get into the five-minute range that is a huge discrepancy between 5:30 and five minute. An insane difference in effort. Ben definitely earned the win. But also, it is never fun to get second. (Laughs) I nerd out all the time, ‘I can hold this zone at approximately this heart rate for approximately this amount of time.’ I nerd out all the time. And then you have a guy like Ben who just pushed himself the entire way.”
This was Theisen’s first “ultra.” Races further than a marathon earn that distinction, but some are included if the terrain is unique and challenging.
“My longest trail race,” Theisen said. The former NCAA All-American runner for Division II Black Hill State University in Spearfish, South Dakota, switched sports to Biathlon (xc skiing and shooting) and competes each year for a spot on the U.S. Team.
“I do have trouble combining the two and making it happen,” he said. “But during the summer one of the best things for my training is good hours transitioning to trail. I guess I would say in Alaska I have had my success, usually through Strava workouts and segment records in a lot of places. So I think that looks better than it actually is. I think racing trumps all. You have to win the race
Tucson, Arizona’s Brianna Grigsby, 39, was the second female, and 21st overall, in 3:00:32.
“I would have made it under three if I didn’t make a wrong turn in the Basin,” Grigsby said. “And I cost myself about 60-90 seconds. But that’s okay because I still made a 20-minute PR from my 2021 time which was 3:20 and in 2019 I ran it in 3:29, so I am getting better with age.”
She has run over 70 ultra races and includes the Juneau race as one of her favorites.
“I like that it is steep,” Grigsby said. “Because I love climbing and descending stuff. I love being in the mountains. It is a lot more interesting to me than running a flat race. I think being familiar with the ridge definitely helps. I have run it many times since I started coming up here for work in 2018. I got out there a couple times in advance of the race this year just to scope out what the conditions were like because they change so much from year to year depending on snow levels. So it is a little different each time…This was a little more fog, but they did a really good job of flagging the course...I really enjoy running this. For me it is a short distance race and I really enjoy pushing hard, and I can’t run that hard in a 100-mile race. It is a distance I enjoy because I can push for three hours. The suffering is going to end soon
She will be running an Oregon 50-miler in August and a Colorado 100-miler in September.
“I am sneaking in a little 30K in California in July,” she said. “Just another speed workout.”
Mary Fetter, 24, rounded out the female podium, placing 24th overall in 3:07:45, and Ian Curtis, 24, rounded out the male podium, placing third in 2:14:09. The top three received Rainbow Foods gift cards.
Rounding out the top 10 were 2025 JDHS graduate Ferguson Wheeler, 18, (now a college athlete at Claremont-Mudd-Scripps) in fourth with 2:24:18; John Lackey, 22, fifth in 2:26:16; Chase Laker, 18, sixth in 2:29:11; Oregon’s Brennen McCulloch, 28, seventh in 2:30:52; 2025 Sitka graduate Connor Hitchcock, 19, eighth in 2:31:13; Severson; and William Aylward, 25, 10th in 2:46:17.
“It was so fun,” Hitchcock said. He is now running for Minnesota’s St. Olaf College and majoring in Kinesiology. “My first time doing this race and it was a blast. The course was awesome, great people.”
He noted how important traveling as a high school athlete was, including sleeping in schools, spending a whole weekend with teams at a meet and making friends.
“The camaraderie between athletes in this area is just so great,” he said. “It is huge. I wouldn’t have met half of these guys in the race today if it hadn’t been for Lynn Canal (Running Camp), just traveling to meets and hanging out with all the teams. I love trail running and it is so great to see that community thriving.”
Individual age group winners received $100 gift cards from Foggy Mountain. They were male 60-plus, John Nagel, 65, with a time of 3:34:46; female 50-59, Amber McDonough, 50, with a 3:25:58; male 50-59, Alex Andrews, 57, with 3:10:55; female 40-49, Sarah Matula, 43, with 3:34:39; male 40-49, Kiel Renick, 44, with 2:52:55; female under 40, Shauna Severson, 39, with 2:32:02; and male under 40, Ben Browning, 20, with 2:08:02.
Race directors Bryan Hitchcock and Geoff Rose also added a new honor, dubbed the “49er” in honor of the great state of Alaska and given to the 49th place finisher. Sable Zellhuber, 26, finished 49th in 3:27:33. Racers had to be present for awards, so 50th place finisher Isabel Barnwell, 30, was noted for 3:27:41. She too was not present, so 48th place finisher Jordan Callahan, 38, with a 3:27:03 time received her choice of prizes from the donor table.
Also acknowledged were the youngest and the oldest race finishers. Incoming JDHS senior Angus Andrews, 17, was the former and Dan Rondeau, 72, the latter.
“It is pretty cool,” Andrews said. “I haven’t thought about it much, but it is cool to think about and I am happy to be out here running. That is what it is really about. It is my first time racing the ridge, but I definitely hiked it plenty. But it is a different feeling when you are running up there hard.”
He did beat father Alex Andrews' time, placing 17th overall in 2:56:00.
“We didn’t know how that was going to go,” Angus Andrews said. “And honestly I had no idea, but I ended up beating him. I think the hard part of this race is being mentally ready for the pain. By the time you are at the end everything is going to be hurting and you have to keep going, knowing that you will get to the end eventually. But it feels like it is longer and longer the more you run. But after you finish it feels great. Honestly it is my favorite part, after a big race or a big hike you just feel great because you accomplished that... there are definitely some classmates I want to get into this, but it is hard, it is a commitment. You think about it all summer.”
Rondeau shaved over 30 minutes off his 4:53:29 from last year, hitting a personal best time of 4:21:32.
“Definitely, without a doubt I am the oldest,” Rondeau said. “It feels that way sometimes too. I think what makes this race so special is all the flavors of the race. You are doing one thing, like climbing in the woods, then climbing in the open, then you are on the ridge, and you’re in snow, and then descending in snow… and you’re running in the stream down Granite Creek Basin, actually in the stream. There is always the old avalanche that happened a couple months ago and it is kind of rough. Then the growth over the Granite Trail and then you hit Perseverance and the Flume. I liked this year they had the detour over the beginning of the Flume. Just all the flavors and the people.”
Also acknowledged were racers who have participated in five or more Juneau Ridge Races.
Kiel Renick, 44, Quinn Trący, 46, Brandon Ivanowicz, 44, Rachel Phelps, 41, have run five each; Rondeau, 72, Naomi Staley, 34, Aaron Morrison, 50, Alex Burkhart, 33, and Dave Pusich, 60, six each; and John Nagel, 65, and Alex Andrews, 57, have raced in all seven years of the event.
“The attraction is to get a head start on being in shape for the rest of the summer,” Alex Andrews said. “The weather for this race changes every year. Last year was so hot that I almost melted and I cramped up. It draws a lot of out-of-towners but also a pretty solid group from Juneau just really loving the race. I love challenging myself each year under different conditions and trying to keep in shape to keep it fun.”
Said Nagel, “I am so grateful for the directors and volunteers on the course. It just never gets old. There is always a new challenge and so much more that I can say.”
No matter the number of races under their hydration vests, runners were surprised by the Juneau Ridge Race.
“That downhill and that snow really killed my legs,” Elizabeth Hermanson, 40, said. She finished the course in 3:35:00. The course was flagged for a summer route descent into Granite Basin or the faster winter descent. “The up on this race was amazing, but I missed the route and did the summer route so did a little bit more. That finish here was probably one of the harder finishes I have had. It was a really good race. A really good course. I have done quite a few trail marathons and will be doing my first ultra this July, a 50-miler. Some of the things I did well that helped me today was that I broke it up into chunks in my head because you can pace each part a little differently. The uphill, the ridge in the snow and the finish. I should have broken it into four instead of three because that downhill is something else in your legs at the end of everything.”
Even for locals.
“The hardest part is always the Juneau climb for me, just pacing myself,” Jonas Lamb, 46, said at the finish. “I was starting to flag and then realized I wasn’t fully extending my legs on every step. Once I started doing that I was able to charge that last little climb on Juneau. The worst part is always when I hit Basin Road. I love trail running, but I don’t usually do much more than eight milers. Now it is kind of a Spring routine. It is something to train for, I usually build up to a 10 or 12-miler before the race and run a couple times a week.”
His son, 2025 JDHS graduate Finn Lamb, 19, a Dartmouth College engineering student, hit 3:15:37 for 37th. The younger Lamb was a cross-country runner and skier and track standout for the Crimson Bears.
“I asked him for fueling advice the first time,” Jonas Lamb said. “Because I had never run for more than two hours before and I didn’t realize how important that was. I need to find him now but he is probably at home already taking a shower.”
Juneau’s Claire Ima, 42, finished with an hour to spare from the cutoff time.
“It was great,” Ima, a 2002 JDHS graduate said. “I was born and raised here and moved away about four years ago. My partner (Rob Pudner) and I came back to do the race. He was unfortunately injured. I had never done it before, and it was really great to get to the end. I had hiked it before, but this was the first time doing the race. Rob has to do it now so we will be back next year.”
Rainbow Foods and Foggy Mountain Shop were noted as prize donors since the race's inception, and Forno Rosso pizza was dialed in with providing delicious varieties of pizza for every race finisher and fan attending.
All race results were not available. Photos and race results will follow.
• Contact Klas Stolpe at sports@juneauindependent.com
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