Uphill fight for man cited for dunes events
Park Service: Snowshoe races 'detract from wilderness'
By Jason Blevins
Denver Post Staff Writer

Sunday, May 26, 2002 - Andrew Bielecki is learning that, in some cases, it is illegal to run in the sand.
In fact, the organizer of annual snowshoe events at the Great Sand Dunes National Monument, called "Tabasco Extreme Heat" races, is facing jail time for organizing events in 1999 and 2000 without a permit.

The race at the monument in southern Colorado is billed as the world's only desert snowshoe race, and it drew up to 150 competitors to the sinewy sand dunes every October between 1994 and 1998.

Steve Chaney, the park's superintendent, raised the permit fee from $50 to $200 and told Bielecki the October 1998 race would be the last and the Great Sand Dunes would not permit another race.

The next year, Bielecki, a longtime race promoter in Colorado and a competitive athlete, returned with a different event based outside the monument boundaries.

He billed the event as a scramble instead of a race. It wasn't competitive and it wasn't timed. He asked for donations instead of an entry fee for the 5-kilometer trot. He moved the sponsorship banners off park property. Bielecki said most of the participants paid park entrance fees and went to the park to pick up trash and have a picnic.

The trash pick-ups and picnics in October 1999 and 2000 could land Bielecki in jail for two years in addition to costing him a $20,000 fine.

"In this instance, the Park Service feels that this event detracts from the wilderness experience of those visiting the park," said Colorado's U.S. attorney, John Suthers, noting that a wilderness experience should not involve dozens of racers, even if they are picking up trash. "It is the responsibility of the U.S Attorney's Office to ensure that the regulations and policies adopted by the park are adhered to, and this is enforced in federal court."

A reinterpretation of the federal regulations governing activities in designated wilderness areas in 1998 has resulted in four federal charges against Bielecki for twice conducting business at the monument and failing to obtain a permit in October of 1999 and 2000.

The Park Service, through the U.S. Attorney's Office, has also filed a civil suit seeking to stop any future Bielecki event at the sand dunes.

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"They told me in 1998 that they would not be issuing any more permits and then in 1999 they cited me for not getting a permit," said Bielecki, a Crested Butte resident who also hosts the 24-hour Montezuma's Revenge bike race out of Montezuma and the Snowfusion races at Snowmass Village.

During the post-event picnic and trash pick-up at the park in October 1999, park rangers distributed fliers calling the event an illegal activity. Two weeks later, Bielecki received a letter citing him for conducting business in a national monument without a permit.

"I gathered a group of people to go to a place and pick up garbage and leave it a better place than we found it," he says, pointing to the 10-year-old Rim Rock Race in Colorado National Monument whose organizers have not faced any criminal charges. "This has been going on for four years now. It's been in front of five magistrate judges. This is taxpayer money they are spending to prosecute me for running with my friends in the sand. It doesn't make any sense to me."

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Tom Sobal, a Leadville-based race director who has run the sand dunes event for several years, said he wonders why it's OK for hunting guides to operate an elk hunting business in wilderness areas but Bielecki can't snowshoe on wilderness sand.

"It's not like we did any damage," Sobal said. "With the next wind our tracks disappear. This is a sad thing."