All for 5 dollars

In case you haven’t heard yet, Rumford does not have good skiing right now and interestingly, seems to be one of the few places that doesn’t have good skiing. I drove over there the other day to find the snow wind blown and very dirty apart from a few sheltered spots in the woods. On the other hand, despite some misfortune on the mountain that happened to make headlines http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-12087306 (which I fortunately avoided despite being on the mountain for some tele skiing), sugarloaf has incredible skiing right now. I’ve gone just about every other day and the trails have only gotten better over the last week. On top of that, a half day there only cost me 5 bucks. That’s a small price for great skiing and spectacular scenery (the sugarloaf outdoor center is more or less surrounded by mountains). Of course, the low price might explain why their groomers have all broken down this week. On my last trip there on Thursday, one of the loops I skied absolutely reeked of diesel oil after the piston bully sprang a leak somewhere. With their snowmobiles broken too, who knows what things will be like after the warm up forecast for the weekend.
Enough bad news, the skiing really has been great, even at my old high school where I skied with some UNH kids today and in Augusta on the new race trails there.

For good measure, here are some pictures

Snow place like home

One of the benefits of being an English major at SLU is that you often have lots of essays to write in lieu of finals. For the first semester ever I got away with that this fall, and packed up my stuff yesterday morning (Monday) and headed back to Burlington. In reality I could've left Thursday afternoon, but I'm never THAT on top of my assignments. Still, by leaving yesterday I guaranteed myself an extra week of break and access to really solid skiing. I thanked my car Big Red for the Christmas miracle of not breaking down this trip, carried my skis inside and found a giant platter of York peppermint patties which I proceeded to immediately do work on. This morning I woke up to my dog barking at the snowplow, which is always a good sign. Sure enough there's a few fresh inches out there and a good forecast. Eric will be home later today, and we have a good crew to train with up at Trapps and Sleepy Hollow so the start of break is looking good. See you all at those Eastern Cups!

Steve's way of saying goodbye

Oh, here are the pictures from Higley a few weeks ago per Ethan's request. As you can see, the first snow dump in Colton was a big one, chest high in some spots. We even ventured out onto the new trail we cut this year for Higley Trail Day. We did train that day, but couldn't help throwing tele turns down all the hills.

NYSEF Opener

Well we tried to get to the NYSEF opener on sunday but nearly slid off the road in Potsdam and had to turn back. Would have been great to get in a race prior to the Eastern Cup openers and World Famous Osceola race, we will have team members racing in both of these events. Skiing the past three weeks has been great at both Star Lake right after returning from break and then we were able to ski at Higley all last week, even classic and in the woods. The current warm up certainly is not great but we should have something to at least skate ski on at Higley when it freezes up again. Maybe Adam will post some photos he took earlier in the week making turns in the powder on one of the woods trails.

Race Photos

Some photos from the classic sprint in Canada, sorry some are a little blurry, focus wasn't working right for a bit.

http://picasaweb.google.com/skibum540/CanadaRaceDay#

Star Lake comes through

We went from rollerskiing in a blinding snowstorm on Wednesday...

...to skating on excellent conditions, complete with grooming, at our mountain-plateau secret training facility in Star Lake. Two days of skating, then intervals this morning. OD ski on tap tomorrow.

PICTURES

Here are some pictures from the trip. Photos from the race coming soon...

http://picasaweb.google.com/skibum540/Canada#

Quebec Camp 2011

Here are some photos from the sprint race on Saturday at Foret Montmorency in Quebec. The camp went really well with most getting in around 16-18hrs on the week, nearly all of it on snow. The grooming could have been better earlier in the week but we were able to finish the week with a long ski on Sunday at Mt. Saint Anne which opened over the weekend. We decided to stick with this plan rather than racing again on Sunday which I feel was better from a training perspective. The drive back was fairly uneventful although we are now back to dryland training or perhaps wetland training given the amount of rainfall predicted for the next couple of days. Maybe we can get on snow again this weekend. Nearly a foot of snow fell just 30minutes to our south while we were in Quebec but unfortunately the rain over today and tomorrow will pretty much wash that away. Results from the sprint can be found here http://www.zone4.ca/results.asp?id=3186.

Our top finishers were Leah Hart '12 and Eric Lustgarten '14. I think we did well given the amount of training we did during the week.

Something Like a Religious Pilgrimage

Like all true Nordic skiers should, I completed my pilgrimage to Norway this past weekend. The cheap plane tickets brought us to a small airport just south of Oslo, so after a short 45 minute bus ride, we arrived in the city just as the sun was setting, despite it being only 4 o’clock. After a 650 Kroner (over $100 american--food is really expensive there to say the least!) meal of reindeer and fjord-fresh shrimp, we toured around the city for the rest of Friday night. On Saturday again we did more exploring, only taking breaks when we needed to relieve ourselves from the frigid –15˚ C temperatures. After a few mishaps with public transportation, we made it up the hill to Holmenkollen, where we saw the ski jump and part of the world cup course from last year. Surprisingly, the ski jump didn’t appear to be all that big, however, the stadium seating surrounding the landing was rather impressive. Following the long, cold day of walking around the city, we treated ourselves to a home cooked dinner of spaghetti and shrimp, which we cooked in the hostel’s communal kitchen. Sitting in the lounge, with a big plate of shrimp and pasta, watching the men’s classic Kuusamo 10km while in Norway, I could not have been much happier.

On Sunday, we met up with SLU’s favorite Norwegian, Knut, for a walk in the city’s surrounding wood. With the few centimeters of fresh snow that had fallen the night before, and it still coming down, the woods and city were blanketed with the best type of that fresh Norwegian white stuff. We walked through the trails a bit, eventually onto part of the FIS course and ended up on the top of a small ridge, over looking the city. We ended the hike in a rustic lodge, where we were treated to Norwegian pastries and brown cheese. After a small tour guided by Knut, we left later that night for a small fishing village near the airport where we stayed the night.

In the morning, as we boarded the plane, I realized that despite not actually having done any skiing, the trip was well worth it and would definitely get me through the tough week of essays and presentations that was to come. Between naps on the plane, I thought about how beautiful and wonderful the country was, trying to figure out when I would next be able to return.

More photos from camp

Some skate intervals yesterday in the pouring rain, which led to glare ice on the trail today. But with some fresh snow coming down all day things were better by the afternoon. Everyone seems to be here now; SLU, UVM, Colby, Bowdoin, Bates, Burke, some Middkids, Biathletes and Canadian teams. There's a lot more terrain open and something resembling grooming happened today. Here's some more pictures. Connor has been taking a bunch so hopefully he'll post those too.


Cameraman Carlos and Kyle


Waxing up


Icy trails today, but falling snow made it much better a few hours later


Wet boots suck at training camp. Here's the boot dryer I made. My first one blew the circuits in the house but this one is alright so far.


Kyle strides in the falling snow Tuesday morning

For those who were wondering...

There is snow in Canada. Buckets of it. We skied for 3 hours today, saw a moose, and never took the same trail twice. Internet is shaky, but we'll keep trying to post stuff and updates.

Skiing Celebrities; on snow in October

I was going to put up some nice fall foliage photos, but this is much more important. It's been a goal for me since my Junior year in High School to try and ski on my birthday. This year October 13th rolled around and, even though I was home in the mountains for Mid-semester break, things were just cold and rainy. Until the last few nights, that is, when a nasty Nor'easter blew in a dumped a foot of snow on top of Mt. Mansfield. Every fall I watch the webcams anxiously, and for the last 5 years I've dragged a crew of skiers up various mountains in search of October skiing. This morning Eric, Hollis, my friend Danika and I strapped the skinny skis on our backs and high-tailed it up Stowe's Toll Road to the white summit. This promised to be one of the best early snow trips ever.


The hike up was dry for the first part, but as the snow grew deeper we turned the corner and ran into a van from The Weather Channel. Not your local newscast team, the actual legit Weather Channel. We were called over by a guy named Jim Cantore, who Danika excitedly informed us was some type of TV celebrity in the weather world. News to me. He introduced himself and asked us to ski back a forth a little bit between two lift towers as the were "Desperate for some B-roll footage".


Needless to say it was incredibly nerve-wracking to be putting on real skis and taking our very first strides of the season on national television, but we figured the general public wouldn't have much idea what we were doing anyway. Jim thanked us afterward, and immediately we tried to get in touch with anyone who was near a TV, as we were told we would be on TV within the hour. My roommate Ryan was watching and confirmed that he did see us. After the excitement of our 4 seconds of fame, we were even more pumped to ski. We reached a nice flat spot and packed out a 200 meter loop that included some turns, a small climb and descent.

It was about as perfect as you could ask for in October; the snow packed into a solid track for skating, and we made a set of separate classic tracks to switch on and off.


We were far from the only people up there, but we were the only Nordic skiers we saw; the first skating and classic strides in the East? Maybe. Definitely the only ones on television in October. Apparently our skiing wasn't scenic enough to make it onto the re-released web-version of the clip, where they used some 'piner bro instead. Still, you can watch Jim's segment on Stowe HERE, the front-page story on weather.com

Testing week, complete

We finished up our dryland testing week on Sunday with an excellent classic roll through the North Country. While overall our team averages appear to have declined some there were several notable records broken, mostly by Leah Hart who looks exceptionally strong right now. Leah broke every record we have except the St. Regis time trial which she ran in 37:52 (record is held by Kalie Dunn'08 37:07) still an excellent time given the very wet muddy condition of the trail. Leah broke her own Double Pole record by nearly a minute at 9:30, the only woman on the team to ever go under 10 minutes and shaved 5 seconds off the no pole skate record now at 9:13. In the 3000meter on the track she is the first woman on the team who is not on the XC running team to go under 11minutes posting a time of 10:53. Other notable results were Kelsey with a time of 38:50 up St. Regis and a 3K of 11:55 both solid improvements over last year.

For the men Adam broke the double pole record by 5 sec, now at 7:42 and also took the win in the no pole skate test. Kyle won the 3K in 9:56 which is his first sub 10min result on this test and only 13 sec off the record held by Angus McCusker'01. Steve took the win up St. Regis in a very respectable time of 31:03, less than 2min off the record of 29:21 held by Tom Lepesquer'07.

Europe is fun

SLU-SKI greetings from Spain...

I just thought that everyone should know that I just bought a plane ticket to the land of fjords, Petter Northug, woolen sweaters, and the birthplace of nordic skiing. That's right, if you haven't yet figured it out, I am going to NORWAY! Tickets were unbelievably cheap--something roughly equivalent to $40 american--so we jumped on the opportunity. Though there probably won't be much snow, if any, as we're going in November, the trip will be a once in a lifetime opportunity. And hey, maybe I'll even pass by Northug, or Bjørgen, or the Sausage somewhere in the streets Oslo.

Hopefully training and fall is treating everyone well. Ski fast.

The 2010 Presidential Traverse

For last years Traverse info, click HERE And for more info on what exactly the traverse is, click HERE.

In the spirit of ultra-endurance events undertaken by the guys team lately, I guess there needs to be an update on the 2010 edition of the SLUSKI Presidential Traverse. While it seems like the Williams ski team guys have been doing some presidential exploring of their own, I'd like to think we started the recent trend of ski-team assaults on the White Mountains. This year the crew for the 23-mile journey was small; Kyle, Zach and myself. After parking the end-car and returning in a small thunderstorm to soggy gear and tents, we checked all our stuff over. Following former SLUSKIer Jake Birchard's method last year I had decided to bring a big fannypack instead of a backpack this time. While stuffing it with Snickers bars I remarked on a famous old saying passed down about fannypacks. "Sometimes useful, always stupid-looking" or something like that. But Zach actually remarked "I've used them a lot hunting, I've even killed a deer with one before". It came out weird. After suiting up the next morning in damp clothes and soggy trail running shoes, we set off. It was cold and windy (32 on top of Washington with the wind chill) but soon the clouds broke and the views were great. We even jogged some flattish parts, which we would soon regret on the steep downhill portion. We made it safe and sound, 9 and a half hours of hiking later. I even picked up my first hitchhiker at the bottom of the notch. Just when we were complaining about how tired we were from our long day hike, we pick up a dude who was hiking the entire AT from Maine to his home in Tennessee. Normally it's not my thing to pick up strangers, but this guy was clearly tired and hungry and I was confident that Zach could easily take him on if it came down to fists. We spent the night in more wet clothes, and woke up early enough to cheer on Teo and local pro biker/pro skier/pro Skirack man Jake Hollenbach in the Mt. Washington hill climb bike race (Jake took a great 4th place). As a bonus attraction, as we were driving back Kyle and I ran into a bear on the side of the road next to the campground. When the bear tried to attack an old lady taking pictures I ran out of my car, grabbed my fannypack and beat the crap out of it. All said and done it was just another epic SLUSKI adventure, with plenty more to come this fall I'm sure. Can't wait to get back to school tomorrow to see how much Ctown has grown, if the sauna is still kickin' and if the new Price Chopper still has bottle-and-can-returning machines. If anyone wants to come say hi I'm in Sykes this year. 2nd floor, look for the room with the brand new bearskin rug.


Kyle on the trail


I found a flag in a free pile (of course) on the side of the road. Decided to give it new life. Apparently an older couple had enjoyed watching me run around like an idiot from the next peak over while they ate their lunch.


The camera missed him going by, but Teo is on the far left in blue.


At the start of the men's pro race. Jake is in 3rd position here.


Bro's, anyone care to lax??

24 hours of Adrenaline

When the cannon shot rang out at 12 o’clock noon, I hadn’t yet realized what the ensuing 24 hours had in store. I knew that there would be a lot of pain, a good deal of exhaustion, some saddle soreness, and hopefully some excitement, however, what I didn’t know was how eventful the race would be.

Delayed for various hours by an exploded RV motor and the resulting consequence of having to be towed off the Mass TurnPike, my friend Matt and I once again began our trip north to Great Glen in NH. Here, on that the following day, we would begin a 24 hours mountain bike race.

The format was simple—a team, comprised of either 2, 4, or 5, raced an 8 mile loop over a span of 24 hours in hopes of completing more laps than their competitors. Though the rules were pretty straight forward, a good deal of strategy was needed as teams didn’t have to maintain a regimented race order and live timing was available to track everyone’s progress.

The race began at noon on Saturday, however my first lap, being that I was third in our rotation, didn’t come until about 2:30 PM. When the time came, I was pretty nervous as I hadn’t previewed the course and hadn’t really trained for the event. Despite my worries, I was on course before I knew it. Though much of the course was on hard-packed double track, the sections of technical single-track broke up the rests and proved to be quite tiring.

After the first lap I said “oh, [expletive], what’ve I gotten myself into” at the thought of having to do 7 more laps at what seemed to be full speed. Nonetheless, with ample rest between laps (roughly 2 1/4 hrs) and lots of carbs, I managed to maintain relative strength and speed through the afternoon and into the night. More importantly, my team, with the help of some consistency from my roommate and his brother, pulled into the lead (of our respective category) after just a few laps. With the live timing, we were able to track the other teams progress to ensure that we were doing everything in our power to maintain the lead. Through the night, even when sleep was sparse and temperatures were cold, we continued to attack and push onward. When dawn broke, we were all happy to put away our lights and continue riding by daylight. As the second day continued, it looked promising for us as we had gained a surprisingly large 35 minute lead over the second place team.

At 11:20 A.M I began my last, and the team’s last lap. Exhausted and with the win essentially secured, I took the final lap slow and eventually coasted into the arena with delight. And with cliché on my mind, I gave a strong fist pump to cross the finish and end our race.

Following the race—and perhaps the most deserved shower of my life—we packed up camp and prepared for the long ride home. Though I wasn’t able to stay for awards, my teammates stood atop the podium and celebrated the win. However, the weekend did end as all such events should—with a free tee-shirt and a whole lot of pictures.

Finishing the first lap (still fresh legs)

Hydration is key-George Flynn (My roomate)

Bart Flynn-My roommates twin brother

Descending the stairs at the end of the course

Bart Flynn

Patrick Barter-Teammate #4

Atop the Podium!

The Cowboys of Rock and Roll

Oops, editing problems, my bad. I actually wrote this near the beginning of the summer, but I recently made a another trip up the real "Freeman Test Route" of Sunapee after a visit to Maine with Steve and Bogden, which inspired me to go back and find and post this. Also nobody seems to have much to say about their summer, so here's at least something to read.

These days dangerous journeys, split-second decisions and the spirit of adventure seem to have gone the way of gunfights and swinging saloon doors. Maybe I can't recreate real wild west action out here in the East, but the least I can do is try to bring some of the spirit back. The problem is that people have forgotten what real cowboys are. “Back in the day in this town, things were different...” started my boss, John. It was already 87 degrees out at 7 in the morning and John, a 50-something tobacco-spittin', stone hauling machine who can shovel dirt like a human dumptruck and wield a backhoe like a 5th appendage, was telling another of his tales of how Shelburne used to be. Listening to his stories doesn't get old though, because each one isn't just a tale of how cheap gas was or how different music sounded. Every story is about people and places from a time when life was raw and unpredictable. “Now you're all set, Mick”, John assured me, spitting a wad out the window as we cruised down the road in our '88 Chevy Cheyenne pickup. I've just finished double knotting a bandanna with a Bald Eagle and the phrase This Bud's For You onto my forehead. Ever since I cut my hair I've taken to wearing a headband to work. They drain away the 5 gallons of sweat I produce daily I from rock hauling and brush cutting, and when I tie them around my forehead John is convinced that I'm a modern-day reincarnation of a young Mick Jagger. In the spirit of Mick, Hendrix, Moon, Bonham and all the other cowboy's of rock n' roll I decided on a whim Friday afternoon that it was about time for an adventure. At high noon I found out that Steve was racing in a triathlon in New Hampshire Saturday morning. I asked Steve if I could crash on his hotel floor that night and be a pseudo-coach for the event. Thinking I was joking, Steve replied “sure, we've even got an extra bed”. Within an hour of getting home from work I had packed my steed Big Red, found the town to get to, and pulled out of the driveway. “New Hampshire furdamshur!” I yelled, pounding the dashboard and gunning the busted muffler a couple decibels below rock-concert. Three hours later I was chowing down on a burger with Steve and discussing race plans. Despite some rain and a canceled swim leg, the Triathlon (now just a Biathlon?) went off with Steve having a great race.



The sun was shining by the time I left, but my adventure wasn't over. Driving down to the race the day before, I'd gone by signs for Mt. Sunapee. This ski mountain is where Kris Freeman, along with his brother Justin among others, have frequent hillclimb testing runs similar to our own trips up St. Regis. It was on. After taking a different route out of the tri course and ending up lost for about an hour, I pointed the wheels in the general direction of Andover and set off. Like writing cursive or doing math by hand, reading a real paper atlas or roadmap is a skill that seems to have gone to the wayside in today's world. I'm bringing it back. My plotted route took me right to the base lodge, empty and silent. I waited expectantly for a tumbleweed to gently bounce across the bunny slope. After running around looking for a trail I took my ten paces back, hit the watch timer and took off. I ended up running on a Kearsarge-Sunapee connector trail to the summit instead of the correct access road I discovered Freeman uses afterward (my sense of direction apparently doesn't work as well for vertical travel). Not much difference, it was gonna hurt either way. I hammered it out to the top of that hill like I was trying to break the course record. At the top I keeled over to puke, sat down on the lift chair and looked out across the valley and lake below. It seemed like my adventure was almost over. Putting a body through that type of pain and suffering just to be faster is another one of those experiences that seems to have gone to the wayside. But I'm bringing it back.