Who doesn't love the Olympics and the Olympic fans?  In case you couldn't make it out to Vancouver for the 2010 festivities, here's a photo recap:

First off, Canada takes the Men's Hockey gold in an epic ice battle against the USA team:

Flip out about the Men's Freestyle Aerial Finals:

See China's Shen Xue and Zhao Hongbo make a comeback with a Figure Skating Pairs gold medal performance:

Another beautiful performance by the first black pair, Vanessa James and Yannick Bonheur of France:

Here's American Short Track Speed Skater Apolo Ohno looking extremely excited to hold the most individual medals in history (who wouldn't be!?):

Go the Bobsleigh way with the Women's Finals:

Take a moment and enjoy the Norway Curling team with their argyle pants taking center stage:

A mozaic of Sweden's Charlotte Kalla and Anna Haag celebrating after their medal winning Team Sprint Free:

What does an Olympic Gold Medal look like?  Here's a close up:

If you can't get one of the medals, bask in the glow of the Olympic Rings:

Enjoy Ilanaaq, the inukshuk:

And remember to give the Vancouver Olympic Mascots a hug:

Way cute, eh? Meomi is the talented creator of those adorable mascots.  She also designed the iGoogle theme, Tea House.

The 2010 Olympic show is now over but we hope you're inspired to acheive your personal bests this month and next with Skimble!

Many San Franciscans made it out to The North Face after hours last night.  Upstairs we all gathered around to meet Daniel Mazur, an incredible mountaineer and guide!  Dan's best known for leading Greg Mortenson's K2 expedition in the novel, Three Cups of Tea, as well as rescuing Australian climber Lincoln Hall during a summit attempt up Mt. Everest.  When you meet him in person, you'll soon realize he's a humble yet lively man who simply explains that you may have to make hard (life & death) decisions up at 20,000+ ft elevation.  He's fortunate enough to have survived countless summits while enjoying nature and trying to leave no trace.

Dan shared many fun, funny and enlightening stories about his first and impromptu rescue expedition up Mt. Everest.  I won't spoil them here!  You'll just have to meet him at another talk.

Before the night ended, we all got to play with some mountaineering tools that have been to Everest and back!  Here's a fun pic of Dan, myself and the ice axe:

And at 29029 ft in elevation, you may just need some air:

No time to get lightheaded though.  The interactive talk supported the low-income mountain families of Nepal.  The Mountain Fund is currently building a 300-person school in the Nepalese mountain range where there is no government support.  They are also working to provide basic health care for the area.  Realizing that basic needs are not met in these remote areas, Dan and SummitClimb guides are helping to raise awareness and collect funds for the cause.

With that in mind, the SF people opened up their checkbooks and some even did a little swiping.

Randy Reddig from Square was on site to swipe credit cards through their new payment device to instantly donate to The Mountain Fund.  Here are a few pics of some successful transactions:

Last weekend, Skimble attended Macworld Expo 2010 in San Francisco.  Sophia Brueckner and Maria Ly of Skimble (and ex-Google girls) are Apple junkies.  They certainly felt at home exploring the expo.  Here's a little recap:

Complimentary Macworld Portraits!  Here are some Skimble action shots taken by the amazing photographer, Asa Mathat:

Back to the expo floor, these were the action-oriented tools & gadgets that we love:

Dots: The iPhone Glove that feels Gloveless

credit: JD Lasica's telefingers

These gloves keep your hands warm while enabling you to tap and touch away.  They are so awesome that most of their gloves are currently sold out.  Who wouldn't be thrilled to sport stylish DOTSgloves while skimbling on cold days?!

Joby: Flexible tripods and mobile device holders

These guys were a lot of fun at the expo, providing us with free pics using their new Gorilla Camera App for the iPhone!  The picture above hits home - their tripods are ideal for impromptu action shots when you're, you know, just hanging out of a limb.  They're really rugged and definitely capable of keeping up with you!

URBAN TOOL: Fashionable & functional tech carrying solutions

It was fun discovering this female-led company located in Austria.  Finally, a company that offers innovative and stylish carrying solutions that fit your iPhone, iPod, digital camera, wallet, keys, and water bottle.  What's more is that they've kindly supplied us with several awesome pieces for our Skimble Contests, including the crossHOLSTER and hipHOLSTER!  More details about next month's prizes coming soon.

Today MSN Canada features Skimble in their latest Tech & Gadgets roundup,

The Best Sites to Better Yourself:

1. The Happiness Project - the book & tools to help construct your "happiness project"
2. Skimble - that's us!
3. The Extraordinaries - do or create missions, help others from the comfort of your home
4. iTunes U & other open courseware sites - education adventures and video lectures
5. Livestrong - for health, fitness and lifestyle goal-seekers, a Lance Armstrong brainchild!
6. London Word Festival - Once a day for 31 days I will: ______________

MSN Canada: thanks for the northern discovery!  Tell your friends down south and come visit us in SF sometime, eh?

Women 2.0 and VidSF recently caught up with Team Skimble at the gym - watch as Maria Ly Makes the Climb:

Gabe and Maria would like to give a special thanks to Women2.0's Emily Goligoski, VidSF and Mission Cliffs for kicking tail and their continued support!

Be active to win big (in more ways than one)!  This month, Skimble will be giving away Skimble Action Packs including your choice of Skimble t-shirt and a $50 Gift Card from REI or MEC:

What do you have to do to get the goods?  Just be active with Skimble.  Each day in February that you track at least one activity on Skimble, you earn one contest entry.  At the end of the month, winners are randomly chosen from these entries.  That's pretty much it so get on it and be active!

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Need some motivation?  Invite your friends and follow some people who got their 'action' on last month!  Congrats to the Skimble Leaders of January 2010:

• Sebastien V is an advanced ashtanga yoga instructor with a pretty impressive video on his profile...just saying.
• Matt Y is an all arounder who likes running, biking, rock climbing, yoga, and gym fitness.
• Tony M swims like a dolphin but prefers ninja-fighting pandas (refer to profile pic)!
• Inuk S - In oder Aus in Switzerland: pilates & aerobics indoors, biking & hockey outdoors.
• Sean N is enjoying his personal-best triathlon w/ his favorite activities: hiking, cardio and yoga.
• Cedric M keeps fit in the city by playing basketball and lifting weights.
• Dan C tracks his urban and adventure hikes all around Taipei, Taiwan.
• Katie J spends her time learning yoga and hiking around New Mexico.
• Gian F is a trooper road bike riding long distances on cold mornings in Florida.
• Chris B achieved his personal best while mountain biking pretty damn hard.

ChicMeetsGeek™ is an event designed to bridge the social gap between the cultural chic and intellectual geeks.  Curious?  They've officially launched their webiste and here's their promotional video for the upcoming event:

Their next event is scheduled at the ultra-chic Automattic Lounge at Pier 38 in San Francisco on Thursday, February 4, 2010, to recognize BUILD.org, a nonprofit social venture that empowers underprivileged and under-resourced high school students with an education in entrepreneurship.

Maria invites you to climb rocks with her in support of ChicMeetsGeek™ and the BUILD charity during the upcoming event's Silent Auction.

‘Rock On’ prize package for you and a friend:

• learn to climb or improve your climbing skills with Maria Ly of Skimble
• choose from a local climbing gym or nearby, outdoor crag
• climb in style with a Skimble schwag pack including T-shirts
• full climbing gear and nutritional snacks provided for the day

See you there!

When you're not sharing 'action shots' in foreign lands, you're probably getting and staying fit at a local gym.  Throughout the years, Gabe and Maria have been frequent gym rats at many of the Touchstone Climbing gyms across northern California.

The commuity is fantastic and we've built many friendships while wrestling with the plastic holds.  Today, you will find us at the first installment of the TRS4 competition series at Great Western Power, Co. in Oakland CA.

The nice folks at Touchstone Climb have given the community the heads up that Skimble will be there in action and giving away some Skimble schwag including muscle and racerback tank tops - how sweet is that?

If you just want to come out and support your climbing friends, it'll be a fun time with free food and beer (when you're done climbing!).  At the end of the night, they usually come up with a few 'creative' contests and give away prizes.  During Maria's first ever TBS(3) competition, she bouldered a chair and won a free chalk bag!

Good luck to all and, remember, it's all about having fun and achieving your personal bests!  Follow Touchstone Climb for the latest updates about new routes at all of their gyms.

The Outdoor Retailer Winter Market conference has kicked off this year in Salt Lake City from Jan 20-24, 2010.  We're experiencing all the fun through the many @ORWinter tweets, facebook updates, and blog posts.  Here are some ways you can get fun and 'thought provoking' updates:

#ORWinter Tweets and Hashtags

To start you off, get the latest Twitter tweets about ORWinter by searching the #orwinter hashtag via Twitter Search, a TweetDeck hashtag search or Twitterfall.  Here are some things that may or may not be happening at #ORWinter:

@outsidehilary: Callista from Fox 13 shooting the @salomonsports Quest boot at #ORWinter all mtn demo.

Meanwhile, Ambler Apparel issues a press release in ALL CAPS to try and let Callista know she'd be warmer and even more stylin' with one of their hats on ;)

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@theclimbergirl: My 100% unbiased opinion is that the @keen_shoes booth has the most rockin music right now. #dancepartyKEEN

@keen_shoes responds: KEEN kids sneak peek #ORWinter

= kiddy dance sequence begins... < insert awesome video, anyone? >

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@outsidemagazine: Test gear for Outside. Sign up for the Outside Gear Army @outsidemagazine. #OR #Gear http://bit.ly/nbFzf

@skimble responds in rhyme: let us test out gear, wherever far and near. we'll do it in style, across the miles. srsly, we're engineers! #OR #ORWinter

Outdoor Retailer Blog Posts

PembaServes, the outdoor brand evangelists, are often found tweeting and blogging about the outdoor industry. 

They'll be covering OR Winter Panel: “Boots on the Ground: Real People Getting Things Done with Social Media”.  “Boots on the Ground” is the first of a series of “unofficial” social media panels created by key influencers of the outdoor industry.  It would be great if this was streamed live because we'd be watching :)

Trailspace, the gear site, regularly attends the OR markets and have already provided some great blog and photo coverage of this year's conference:

For more photos and videos, check out Mike Lewis' visual ORWinter gallery on TransworldBusiness.

Got your attention?  Great.  The InsideOutdoorRetailer, an OR blog, brings us industry updates and a special request we can all get involved with:

Haiti needs our help.  OIA is recommending working through http://www.americares.org to funnel contributions, especially of gear that will be necessary in urban rescue and portable living arrangements.  This is the time to shine as an industry for outdoor recreation.   Other groups with people and programs on the ground or very soon will... http://www.medicinesglobal.org, or super easy text the word 'Haiti' to 90999 to put $10 to the American Red Cross. 

Please do it now and help the Haiti earthquake victims in need.  Hope everyone has a great time at Outdoor Retailer Winter 2010 and also remembers to show a little (or a lot) of support for current issues from around the world!

A nice follow-up from the publicity Skimble got from a TV segment in France!  Many people have downloaded the Skimble iPhone app and we're now featured as one of the top 'New' applications in the iTunes App Store:

Thanks for all the support and encouragement.  In case you're wondering, we're currently translating the app into French, thanks to a few amazing volunteers, and hope to release that soon :)

If you haven't already checked out the Skimble iPhone App, please download it now and remember to show us some love and rate our application.

Merci beaucoup.  Skimble: surveillez vos performances sportives!  Oui oui.