October 23, 2005

2005 Oak Ridge Steeplechase

Last year I photographed the 2004 Oak Ridge Steeplechase for fun. A number of my photos got used in various places ranging from a Nelson County tourism magazine to serving as the model for a painting that was auctioned at this year's steeplechase fundraising gala.

This year I was asked to be the official photographer for the event and, frankly, it was even more fun than last year. :) With a nifty all-access pass and the ability to get on the track, I was able to take photos much closer to the action with shorter, sharper lenses.

Mild sunburn aside, the event was a real treat and I'm already looking forward to next year. Last year's weather was a bit cold and drizzly. By contrast, this year's weather was blue skies, sun and 65 degrees. To top it all off, I got to hang out with my friends at Trax Tech Services who were official sponsors this year and I made good use of their catered meals, drinks and a spiffy tent to hang out in between races.

I've just posted an initial selection of 160 photos from the 700+ that I took today. I haven't done any captioning yet and I need to take a second pass through the raw images, tighten up the editing and do a bit more color correction. I'll get to that in the coming days. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy what I've already placed online.

• HTML gallery
  
• Interactive slideshow (flash)