Mike and I headed to Murphy today to see if I could help him break some bones.  While slightly faster than yesterday the trails were actually still quite slow, so there were only a couple tricky descents.  I failed to get big air off the ski jump descent, esp the second lap where I picked a bad line.  Mike had to sit down a couple times but otherwise did very well with the trails following the berm around most of the corners.  He lost his gatorade on the first go around, so we went around a second time to retrieve it and by the end of that he was pretty worn out.  Skied about 18k total, in just over 2hr.

3 EMXC skiers took part in Birkie events this year, with Craig Cardinal doing the full 50k and Jim Wellbrock and Mike Kosloski doing their first ever Korteloppets.  I'm going to sleep now, but I'll write up more about it in the near future.  For now check out skinny ski or the Birkie website for details.

Mike and I headed for snowy Wisconsin Thursday night for a layover at my folks before heading to Cable and the Birkie trails, the Mecca of skiing in the midwest.  Jim's replacement came down with a bug, so he was at home with the kids and fixie Paul had undisclosed "stuff" to do.  So the intrepid duo loaded up on tater tot hotdish and made it an early night to prepare for the day ahead.  Saturday morning started with sub-zero temps and the crew decided to check out the Cardinal family sledding hill before getting back on the road.  The snow started kind of slow, but was fast enough that Mike managed to make it "over the top" of the opposing slope, the goal of all sliders at this hill when conditions allow.  The pair then set off for the Birkie trails and started skiing about noon.  Temps were now about 5 above and still rising, so no Vasaline or balaclava were necessary.  We started out on the Tony Wise trail, a short run on the Birkebeiner trail, then on to the Birkie classic trail to bring us to powerline.  We backtracked enough so we could see a majority of the powerline section and Mike got his photo of the day before his batteries gave out.  We took the Birkie trail through powelines, past the first food stop, and into the woods.  There was about 3/4" of new snow on top of perfect grooming, so while it looked like we were breaking trail, there was very little extra work because of it.  Mike got his first big surprise at about 7k, the first real hill of the day.  It is steep, but not long compared to a couple of the climbs that were yet to come.  I got a bit ahead so I made the climb a couple times, just for the speed rush of going back down the hill.  The top of this climb is the high point of the Kortelopet course, so the Korte course is downhill from there.  On this day however, we decided to keep climbing.  There is about 1 decent climb per km until the Korte turnoff, but from there the Birkie trail starts to rise again, and we decided to go up with it.  We made the climb to the high point and took in the views from it's 1730 foot elevation.  We then coasted down to the firetower water stop and cut back onto the new Birkie classic trail.  We joined that trail in the middle of the climb to it's high point, and were then rewarded with a nice downhill about 3/4 of a km long, and a trail going down a majoritiy of the way back to where we rejoined the Korte trail.  We hopped around a bit after that, trying to see as much of the Korte course as we could with limited energy and daylight, and avoid the collegiate races going on in the area.  Temps were beginning to cool from their 15 degree high, and the sunlight had lost much of it's radiant warming strength, so we decided it must be time to find some food.  We stopped at Coops in Hayward for taco pizza and breadsticks and Mike had a couple beers, one for him and one for Jim who couldn't make it.  Then it was back to my folks for me, and back to the cities for Mike so he could get ready for the winter carnival the next day. 

Instead of going with the U of M club up to the Noqi this weekend I decided to stick around and cherry pick some smaller races.  I did the Balsam Vinterfest on Saturday.  The temp at race start was -5, but with plenty of sunshine and no wind it wasn't cold at all.  I started at the back of a group of five and slowly picked them off over the first 3k or so.  I took the lead probably right around 4k, and had opened up a good gap before making a wrong turn and losing some ground.  I held the lead, but now there was one guy from Riverbrook ski shop right on my tail.  I tried to ditch him for a couple km, but when that wasn't happening I let him take over the lead for a while.   The 20k race was 2 laps, and I took the lead back about 3k into the second lap.  I held pace for a couple km, then hammered a flat after the longest climb on the course and opened up a gap.  I was skiing scared after that and kept the tempo high to make sure he couldn't regain contact.  I pushed it all the way to the line and ended up about 25 sec ahead.  It was the first ski race I have ever won, and I was the first Amery alum ever to win the event too, so the crowd (the 5 guys putting on the race and a couple boyscouts handing out water) was pretty excited.

Sunday was another cold morning and I was out on the classic skis.  On the advice of a Finn Sisu worker I tried Rex powergrip as a binder, and my aprehension about doing so turned out to be well founded.  The stuff went on way too thick, so my skis dragged a fair amount on the leafy course and double pole was a struggle.  I skied almost the whole race with Devon from Finn Sisu (the same guy who gave me the advice about the powergrip) and near the end there were 4 of us going down the last hill towards the line.  It was an icy S-curve hill and I took a digger on one of the curves.  I was already out of contact of the other 3, so I didn't feel too bad about it, especially since there was nobody behind me for a ways.  So I finish and am later checking results... it turns out those 3 ahead of me were the lead pack, and I ended up 4th.  Far better than I thought I was, and I probably would have pushed harded had I realized it.  Oh well, teaches me not to just settle in I guess.  I did win several things in the raffle however, including a rollerski vest, waterbottle cage for the Fisher, and a new wax scraper. 

All in all a good weekend, and motivation to train that much harder for city next weekend, when the competition will be far more fierce.

CC

The whole EMXC met at Battle Creek for some fun on the hills.  Mike arrive first and made a recon of the trail system, with only a couple of "face plants".  John arrived with Hot Chocolate for the post ski, and Jim, Craig and Paul rounded out the team.  After some attention-grabbing downhills, the team tried out the 3K "easier" loop west of Battle Creek Road, which provided lots of opportunity to work on turns.  Back to the main section which provided plenty of climbing to tire out the legs.  Paul had a particularly nasty spill on the hard left turn, perhaps tweaking his knee and decided to head home.  Hope he's OK.  Mike left at 3:00 for "other opportunities", while Jim and Craig did another loop or two around lighted section.  Balsam Vinter Fest for Craig awaits tomorrow, others are off to their weekend.  Have a good one!

Mike and Jim tried to meet for skiing today, but the timing was off.  Mike did 20+ km at Carver under much better conditions than the last time and had a super time, tainted only by the discovery of some potential mechanical issues with one of the Atomic Teams, requiring more investigation in the AM tomorrow.  Jim was able to sneak in 3 Ironwood loops at Cleary from 3:40 to 5:10.  There were lots of people, at least 75 cars in the parking lot, and many on the trails.  He met up with a couple wearing Olaf hats and found out that one of them used to coach swimming and Northfield High and knew Keith Casson, a former VP at Sheldahl "back in the day", and apparently his son was one of the outstanding swimmers of his day.  Conditions were super as usual at Cleary, with light snow falling on the trail.  Another great day, and the excitement builds as the E.M.X.C. has a decision tomorrow, to go Arb or go Olaf....what will it be???

I got up to the Birkie trails Friday night and put in about 20k to get a preview of the course and make sure my classic technique didn't get rusty.  The trails were in great shape and the Start grip tape was giving bomber kick.  I was striding hills I would have trouble walking up they were so steep.  Friday night dropped about 3.5 inches on the trails, so Saturday morning was slower for the race.  Since I didn't start in front the trails were reasonably fast for me.  I waxed the world cup's thin to win, so I was slipping a bit on a couple of the climbs, but overall still had very good kick.  Turns out 42k is a long way to classic ski, but that is why I do those early season races, so the ones in the later season go easier.  Conditions in Seeley were great, should be quite good for our upcoming Korte trail preview as long as next week doesn't do too much damage.  The rising temps made for pleasant racing conditions, and I felt great starting.  I ran out of energy before the race end though, and lost a lot of ground on the leaders in the second half.  Ended up 19th overall, about 17 min back from the winning pack, half of which was made up of my friends Dave and Bjorn.

Several members of the E.M.X.C. met at Lebanon Hills to see a new trail system.  Temps were a bit warmer (around 3 Deg F) so the snow felt a bit faster than Cleary on Wednesday.  Brand new cordouroy awaited the team, and no one else showed up while we skied except a guy on a Surly Pugsley who was riding the singletrack on the 4" tires and a mailman who spent a while in the parking lot.  Everyone spent some time on their backside getting used to the switchback turns and more technical course at Lebanon compared to some of the other trail systems.  Paul, Mike and Jim made three big loops and two smaller ones, while John covered the shorter, more technical loop several times.  Light snow began to float down on the team as they left.  A great time!  Jim had confirmed rumours of grooming in Northfield earlier in the day with a quick stop up at the Arb.  So on the way back to get the kids, he stopped in at the water tower for a couple quick loops.  The trail was very wide and mostly in pretty good shape, with some areas of debris and soft snow needing more skiers to firm up.  After one outer loop and some misc. back and forth, and not wanting to beat up the classic tracks for tomorrow's CCCR, Jim decided to head home.  A super day of skiing!

Amidst a whitewashing of new falling snow the EMXC slid up to the arb to check out the conditions.  The new snow provided a sking surface that, while cumbersome, was much preferable to the sheets of ice that were in evidence for the last couple weeks.  Craig and John started going over the basics, while Mike, Paul, and Jim explored the trails testing out the new conditions.  Everyone had some good safe fun and most made plans to get out of town early to get kids or prepare for the messy trip up into the metro.