Sports

Peter Nestler has unofficially broken the Guinness World Record for most bum skips in 30 seconds.

After reviewing the video of his third attempt on Friday in slow motion, Nestler thinks he completed 93 bum skips in the allotted time. The current official record is 82.

A bum skip is a way of jumping rope while seated. The rope is doubled over and spun in one hand beneath the jumper.

The Ketchikan-born, Juneau-raised professional rope jumper completed the feat during an assembly at Glacier Valley Elementary School.

That’s his second rope jumping world record this year. Nestler wants to break a total of 11 by 2014. He wants to check off two more in Juneau next week for fastest mile while hopping on one foot and jumping rope, and for the most rope skips while juggling a soccer ball in one minute.

A video and paperwork that includes signed witness statements must be vetted by the Guinness officials to become official.

Nestler lives in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Peter Nestler has been hooked on jumping rope since second grade, when he saw an exhibition at Glacier Valley Elementary School.

In third grade, he joined the Juneau Jumpers. By the time he finished high school, he had helped his team win seven world championships.

Now 33 and living in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Nestler has come full circle. He’ll perform his world class rope and unicycle skills for a new generation at Glacier Valley on Friday.

“It’s where I learned to jump rope,” he said. “I was on the team there, pretty much my entire learning curve was at Glacier Valley. So it’s kind of neat, and I was thinking about where to do these records. And I was like, you know, it would be kind of cool to have one where I actually started.”

During the show, the Ketchikan native hopes to set a new world record for most bum skips in 30 seconds.

That’s right, bum skips. Nestler explains:

“Basically, you’re seated with your feet out in front of you, and you’re jumping while you’re sitting down,” he said. “For this particular record … you hold both handles in one hand, so the rope’s basically cut in half. And then you spin the rope so it’s making kind of like a helicopter motion, but it’s going, it’s staying on the ground and you’re jumping over that with every jump.”

The current record is 82, according to the Guinness World Records press office.

He already holds the record for most rope skips on a unicycle in one minute: 237. Nestler hopes to set a total of 11 new world records this year, three of them in Juneau in the next six days.

Unicycle Skipping World Record from Peter Nestler on Vimeo.

And yes, this is his day job. He’s been professionally unicycling, jumping rope, and spreading a kid friendly motivational message around the world since 2002.

“A lot of people look at people like me that are professional or really good at something and they just think, ‘Oh, you know, he’s just born that way,'” Nestler said. “And I’m like, ‘Well, no.’ I’m definitely one of the people, I don’t pick stuff up quickly, but I work very, very hard, and the reason I’m good at stuff is I practice more than anybody else at something.”

Separately, he performs for churches and youth ministries with a faith-based message. He said his faith and relationship with God has helped him get where he is today.

He’ll perform next Wednesday at the Hub, an after school program at the Juneau Christian Center. There, he hopes to beat the record for the most rope skips while juggling a soccer ball in one minute. That’s 31.

He’ll also try to for the speed record for running a mile on one foot while jumping rope. The time to beat is 34 minutes, 1 second.

Constant conditioning and performing hundreds of shows a year inevitably leads to aches and pains. Add the grueling travel schedule, and he’s questioned his career.

“You definitely have those moments where you’re thinking, ‘Well, is this really the kind of job you want?'”

So far, the answer has been yes.

“But at the end, when you get out and you’re performing, you just kind of see the look on these kids’ faces,” he said. “They see me out there jumpin’, and you kind of see sometimes, those light bulbs kick off behind their heads. It’s like, you know, this really is what I like to do and I love the opportunity to do it,” he said.

Check back Friday for the latest on Peter Nestler’s world record attempt.

School begins Tuesday in Juneau, so watch out for kids on bicycles — and Juneau’s police chief.

He’ll be riding his bicycle this week throughout Juneau to raise awareness of bicyclists.

Since June 1st, the Juneau Police Department has had five reports of vehicle and bike collisions. The problem seems to be drivers who fail to give bicycle riders the right of way.

Chief Bryce Johnson wants to encourage drivers to watch out for bicyclists on the road. He’s participating in a contest called “Spot the Chief for a Ten Spot.”

He may be easy to see in a spotted shirt and helmet.  The first ten callers to JPD will get a 10-dollar bill, but you need to call within two hours of seeing him on his bicycle and also when you’re not driving!

The Capital City Chapter of the Alaska Peace Officers Association is putting up the cash for the prizes.  All the ten dollar winners will be entered into a drawing for a bike tune up from Cycle Alaska.

Click here “Spot the Chief for a Ten Spot.”

This week Bryan Smith and his Rocky Mountain Hockey School coaching staff have been working with more than 50 Juneau hockey players at the Treadwell Ice Arena. It’s the arena’s 11^th season with players from 5 to 17 getting coaching daily on the ice. All photos by Steve Quinn.

Three days of derby fishing amounts to almost $44,000-dollars toward the Territorial Sportsmen Scholarship Fund.

Participants of the Golden North Salmon Derby caught more than 30,000 pounds of salmon. Almost 28,000 of that was coho, which reflects a drop in the number of kings caught.

Derby chair Mike Satre says all the fish were sold to Alaska Glacier Seafoods.

“We were seeing just about a $1.25 per pound on the cohos and it’s $4 per pound for a good bright, bright king salmon. All the fish turned in for the derby, it averaged about $1.41 a pound when you look at everything all together.”

Satre says the total weight of salmon sold was a fifty percent increase from last year’s amount.

The Territorial Sportsmen gives out scholarships to several graduates of Juneau’s school district for college and vocational school.

Derby awards will be given tomorrow night at Centennial Hall.

On top of getting $10,000 in cash, first place winner Jody Hass and her family get to ride to the event in a limo.

After more than two days of trolling for salmon during the Golden North Salmon Derby, Jody Hass and her family were wrapping it up when one decided to bite.

Jody Hass describes the majority of derby weekend as pretty dull.

Hass and husband Jason, 6-year-old son Carvin, and 4-year-old daughter Landia launched their 22-foot Olympic from Douglas Friday night to spend the whole weekend fishing.

By about noon on Sunday, they decided to call it quits after lunch. Hass retreated into the boat to make hot turkey sandwiches.

“I heard the initial zing of line being taken so I ran out onto the deck,” she says.

It took Hass about 15 minutes to reel in the 29.2-pound winning king salmon.

“It was fighting with all its might, swimming all around the boat prop, and underneath the boat, and a couple times we thought we were going to lose it and it was going to get tangled up in something.”

Once it got close to the boat, Jason Hass netted the king.

” My husband said, ‘Okay, when it gets up to the boat, don’t freak out.’ And I said, ‘Why? How big is it?’ He goes, ‘Just don’t freak out.’ I didn’t actually see it until it got in the boat, and then, yeah, I was freaking out,” Hass describes.

Meanwhile, as Hass was catching a big fish, no one was checking on lunch. “The meat ended up being burnt to a crisp,” she laughs.

Using a boat scale, the fish weighed in at 28 pounds.

“We decided we better get into town fast, so he got the gear into the boat and I went inside and threw the lunch out the windows and started motoring into town.”

At the official derby weigh-in station at Douglas Harbor, her fish actually weighed 29.2 pounds, which put her in first place. Hass was shocked.

“We went home and we were sitting around biting our nails until 6 o’ clock just worrying if anybody was going to pass it or not,” she says.

Hass’s first place prize includes 10,000-dollars in cash. Her plan is to use it as down payment for property in Gustavus where a cabin will one day be built.

Unofficial derby results:

A 29.2-pound king salmon is the unofficial winner of this year’s Golden North Salmon Derby. That was caught by Jody Hass on Sunday at 12:50 pm and brought to the Douglas weigh station.

In other unofficial results, Al Risley came in second with a 28.8-pound king caught Sunday at 8:45 am and turned in at the Amalga harbor. And in third place is a 26-pound chinook caught by Amy Fosket just after 4 pm Saturday and weighed in at Auke Bay.

The 67th annual event was a success with over 1200 participants. The derby started Friday morning and ended yesterday evening.

The 67th biggest fish weighed in at 15.5 pounds caught by Chip Verrelli Sunday just after 5:30.

283 fish were weighed in and many more entered as scholarship fish. All salmon turned in will be sold to Glacier Seafood and proceeds go towards the Territorial Sportsmen Scholarship Foundation. Scholarships are given to students and adults to pursue further education.

Results will be confirmed Tuesday. The top fish are posted on the Golden North Salmon Derby website. Prizes will be given out Thursday at 7 pm in Centennial Hall. First place takes home 10,000 in cash. Prizes are given to the 67 biggest fish and there will also be drawings for those who turned in scholarship fish.