Provided by Corey Rich, coreyrich.com. Todd Offenbacher looks at a route on a climbing expedition to La Esfinge, Peru, for the North Face.

TV Personality Lives Life on the Edge

Amanda Fehd
December 9, 2005

Amanda Fehd December 9, 2005

When he was a kid, Todd Offenbacher loved exploring the woods near his home in Potomac, Md., wandering for hours and wishing he was born 200 years earlier so he could join an expedition with Lewis and Clark.

Two decades later, he satisfied that thirst for exploration when he discovered mountaineering, rock climbing and skiing.

Most of us know Offenbacher, 43, as the guy on our TV sets, but to him, hosting Resort Sports Network is just a job that fits him well.

In fact, he's dared some of the most remote and challenging terrain in the world, charting new routes with several big names in the climbing world and scaling peaks in Mexico, Peru, Pakistan, Thailand, Vietnam and Europe.

Adventure photographer Corey Rich met Offenbacher five years ago at a climbing area off Highway 88.

"Within the first 10 seconds, I realized his enthusiasm for the adventure world was contagious and you couldn't help but get excited if you are within 50 feet of the guy," Rich said.

In person, he's the same cheery guy he is on TV, but a bit more intense.

"I have an absolute passion to live in, play in, and work in the mountains," Offenbacher said.

	Provided to the Tahoe Daily Tribune by Corey Rich, coreyrich.com. Todd Offenbacher leads a climb on Medicine Man on Calaveras Dome.

Why take the inherent risk of these sports?

"It's a metaphor for life. You have to manage your fear. You have to calculate. You have to push yourself. To me, it's a primal thing that's in people. You either have it or you don't."

The man is bursting at the seams with energy and ideas.

Three years ago, he tore his quadriceps muscle almost completely off his patella during a misadventure in the rocks at Kirkwood and was out for the rest of the ski season.

Laid up in bed, grumpy and bored, and watching ski movie after ski movie, the idea of a film festival entered his head and never left.

Now in its third year and coinciding with Heavenly's 50th anniversary celebrations Dec. 16 and 17, the Lake Tahoe Adventure Film Festival takes up Offenbacher's every spare minute.

What he really wanted was a festival that's exciting on and off screen.

It's really got to be "the next best thing to doing it," he thought as he propped his lame leg on his couch three years ago.

And so a slogan was born.

South Shore is a diamond in the rough, Rich said, that has much more to offer than full-fledged resort towns like Aspen. Offenbacher's enthusiasm makes him a great person to organize a festival that draws attention to that, he said.

"Todd believes in this community and he believes in adventure," Rich said. "Events like the film festival make this place more desirable. It's what will put us on the map and provide a sense of community."

With breathtaking mountains, casino nightlife and three large metropolitan areas within short driving distance, organizers believe the festival has potential to grow to be bigger and better than competing events.

In the last three years, the event has expanded its sponsors, films and audience.

This is the first year Offenbacher's had to turn down film submissions.

Next spring, he hopes to take it on tour to several other cities.

The whole process has taught him a lot about life.

"Rupturing my quadriceps, here was this horrible, excruciatingly painful thing. You have to find something positive in it, because that's how you live life," he said. "Life is shorter than you think. Don't take anything too seriously."

He learned that lesson once already.

In the '90s Offenbacher discovered Yosemite Valley and the monolith of rock climbers' dreams, El Capitan.

He took several long trips from Maryland, but when he would head back to the airport in Reno, he'd always get this sinking feeling driving through the gorgeous expanse of Washoe Valley, like he was heading in the wrong direction.

All his family and friends lived in Maryland, where he owned a successful physical fitness center. Yes, it's true, he was once a body builder, and once a runner up in Mr. USA.

But that's way in the past, Offenbacher says.

When he moved to South Lake Tahoe nine years ago, he never looked back.

"I genuinely love this place," he said. Of all the mountain ranges he's played in - the Alps, Rockies, Appalachians, Himalayas - nothing beats the Sierra Nevada.