RICH BENNETT
Vertfest Race Director

Rich was lucky enough to grow up on Coast Salish Lands and learned to ski at Snoqualmie Pass in the mid ‘80s. Drawn to high alpine places and the outdoors he spent much of the 90’s working for a local mountain shop and enjoyed exploring the Cascade Range climbing, skiing, backpacking, running and fishing. Alpental is his home mountain and has been teaching lessons there for over ten seasons. Rich helped support some of the early uphill races at Alpental in the early 2000’s and raced at Vertfest several times over the years. Rich is excited to continue to be associated with this mountain community celebration and all things backcountry. Rich married a local gal from North Bend, and they have raised two rippers of their own.