PROFILE ALEX INTERMILL: Life is an ongoing adventure for local attorney

PROFILE

ALEX INTERMILL

Life is an ongoing adventure for local attorney

As an attorney, Alex Intermill is used to the hectic pace of corporate law. So you’d think that in his spare time, he’d just want to kick back and relax.
You’d be wrong.

The 33-year-old is an environmental and real estate attorney with Indianapolis-based Bose McKinney & Evans as well as the town attorney
for Pendleton, in Madison County. He gets his adrenalin pumping by competing in mountain bike endurance races, paddling down rapids in a whitewater raft, and climbing mountain peaks.

Adventure sports, he says, keep him focused on the task at hand and provide an escape from everyday worries.

“You had better be focused on what you’re doing when you’re flying down a mountain-bike trail or you’ll find trees right in front of you,” he said.

Intermill recently completed a six-hour mountain bike race in Fort Yargo State Park, about 30 miles northeast of Atlanta-similar terrain to the Hoosier National Forest, where he trains, he said. He finished eighth out of 17 competitors, completing four, 11.3-mile laps in just under 6 hours.

During the week of June 5 Intermill plans to climb Mount Rainier-elevation 14,410 feet-as part of a training seminar to prepare him for his biggest goal: climbing Alaska’s Denali range, which includes North America’s highest mountain, 20,320-foot Mount McKinley.

He and his friend Joe Bridwell planned to have a third member in their climbing party. Intermill’s wife, Caitlin, was going to join them, but she recently found out she’s pregnant with their first child.

The couple met in 1998 when Intermill returned to Indianapolis after serving two years in the Peace Corps in Manduara, Paraguay, working as a beekeeping extension agent.

“I wasn’t ready to commit to law school yet, so I
entered the Peace Corps,” Intermill said. “I learned Spanish, and when I returned I got my teaching degree from IUPUI and taught high school Spanish in Westfield while
attending the IU School of Law here at night.” He’s had his share of good-natured jabs from colleagues about his training regiment for the mountain trek-climbing the stairs of the First Indiana building wearing a backpack. With the impending birth of his child in October, Intermill admits that being a new father will be his “greatest adventure and greatest test of endurance.” [Raising a child for] “18 years and beyond makes a sixhour race pale in comparison,” he said. Will being a father make him less of a risk-taker? “I think I do a pretty good job of watching the limits and monitoring my recklessness,” Intermill said. “It will be a concern, but I want my child to know me for exactly who I am.” Intermill admires other adventure sports enthusiasts, such as mountain climber Ed Vestures, surfer Laird Hamilton and David “Tinker” Juarez, an endurance mountain bike racer who competed in the Georgia race. “He passed me on my third lap and again on my fourth lap,” Intermill said. “He ended up beating the entire field by two laps-at the age of 45.” “All of these guys are older than me and have been competing for years. That’s my hope-that I’ll be able to challenge and push myself for as long as I can.”