Overlander Loppet

Saturday was the Overlander Loppet at Stake Lake trails near Kamloops, a 30 km free technique event…which means most skiers were skating. I wasn’t worried about the race distance having completed the 50 km Payak Loppet the week prior, but I was wondering how much I’d recovered from the extreme effort of last weekend’s long race. During the week I skied 3 times, making sure to take it easy. Monday I skied with Dion, while Katja tried out her newly acquired skate skis. On the first climb up Hollyburn I found that my skis had no glide, seems CH10 wax was too warm for the cold -3 deg C conditions…and Dion was flying up the hill ahead of me…I was quickly thinking this was going to be a difficult session. Well it turned out that first climb was about all Dion had for speed, I made him suffer the rest of the session while he complained about the 65 lb weight difference between us holding him back. I pointed out that he needed to learn to use that extra 65 lbs of muscle to power his poles…yes, as a former national team sprint kayaker, Dion is one muscle bound dude. Wednesday Katja and I skated again and I noticed my legs tired quickly on the climbs which I took as a sign of not yet having fully recovered from the Payak. I backed off to ski with Katja, trying to pass along some skating tips that I’ve found helpful while I’ve been learning to skate. She is doing really well, managing to grunt her way up the many hilly trails at Cypress. She’ll make a huge advancement once she gets comfortable keeping her feet under her center of gravity so she can ski on flatter skis, that will come with time on her skis as it is mostly a balance thing. On Thursday I skied classic and it was so nice. Classic skiing can be so relaxing, even when skiing hard I find it to be so rhythmic that it seems less arduous than a similar effort on skates. I had a really good ski and was easily stomping up the climbs so things seemed on track for the weekend.

We stayed in Merritt Friday night, preferring not to do the long drive Saturday morning despite the hospitable 11 am race start time. In the days leading up to race day the weather had been quite cold at Stake Lake, -12 deg C in the mornings then warming to -5 deg C by midday. Unfortunately the weather forecast for Saturday was to be significantly warmer…this was making wax choice challenging. I ended up erring on the side of wax for cold so used LF7. I used our newly acquired Finite tool (thanks to Bob at Deep Cove Outdoors) to imprint structure to our skis. I first applied linear structure to the entire ski, then applied broken V structure from the binding to the tail. Well, when I started the race I had FAST skis…I’d never felt skis that were working so well with the snow. At one point on the first lap I was skiing at the back of group of about 7 skiers…as we pushed into a headwind, this is why I was at the back, I actually ran into the back of another skier, couldn’t slow down my fast skis…after finally pushing him forward both my skis were pointing outward…uh oh, SPLAT…face-plant! I quickly got up, caught the group and 2-skated right through them leaving them in my wake. Unfortunately, as the sun warmed the snow my skis became very sluggish, especially the tip section…seems the linear structure was particularly ineffective on the wetter snow. That may have contributed to Katja’s miserable race…see her blog for the gory details. By the start of the 3^rd lap I was beginning to tire, was definitely feeling the effects of last weekend’s effort. I ended up being passed by 1 skier, I didn’t bother trying to stay with him since I could feel my tank running close to empty. Soon I noticed a group of 3 skiers trailing not far behind…yikes, this was going to be a painful finish. I used my remaining energy to power over the last few short steep climbs and breathed a huge sigh of relief as I crested the last climb to see the stadium, crossing the line 10 seconds clear of the chasers. I am fairly proud of my result, having finished well ahead of a couple skiers who beat me in last weekend’s race. My finishing time was 1:44:30…I’m curious to know just how much quicker I could have gone if the snow had stayed cold for my skis…oh well, next time! Full race result can be found here.

Overall this is a pretty cool loppet…the course is quite challenging, has some fast sweeping corners and a combination of long climbs, short steep climbs as well as some false flats that can be skied quickly with 1- or 2-skate techniques. And the volunteers were excellent, especially the great words of encouragement by the vollies at the aid stations…thanks guys! At the post race festivities we were treated to a great lunch, I had corn chowder with bun, cookies and hot apple cider. The draw prizes were a ski bag, a really fancy raincoat from the 2010 Olympics, a pair of really sweet powder downhill skis and a pair of Salomon Nordic skis…none of which we won.

Our final ski race is scheduled for next weekend at Vernon’s Sovereign Lake Nordic Center…another 30 km skate race.

Payak Loppet

Saturday was the Payak loppet at Callaghan…and it is best summarized as having been a very, very hard race. Quite a bit of snow fell Friday, but fortunately it only snowed lightly at times during the race. But the upper trails were quite soft and bumpy, with built up snow that made the corners extra challenging. Overall I am satisfied with my race, as expected my biggest weakness was not having the stamina to skate strongly for the full 50 km distance. I ran out of gas the second time through Porter’s Glide after which I lost touch with the group I’d been skiing with most of the race. I’ve done enough long distance races over the years in a variety of sports to know that when my body gets to this point all I can do is go into survival mode and just try to be as efficient as possible while expending minimal energy. In this case that included counting down the last few climbs on Mountain View before the final stretch into the stadium. Although I was completely wiped from the effort, I was well satisfied for having completed the loppet. I’m particularly happy with my 2-skating during the loppet as I was able to use it on the flat sections to catch and pass quite a few skiers without working too hard. My time was 3:28, which is about the time I’d hoped to achieve. I’m already looking forward to next year’s Payak having identified things to work on that will allow me to better my loppet time: 1) improve my offset technique, particularly on steeper climbs, 2) improve my step turning for winding descents, and 3) prepare better for the 50 km race distance.

Unfortunately for JG, he broke a pole on the first climb 1 minute into the race. On returning to the start area he was loaned a pair of poles by the Salomon rep. With the loaner poles JG was able to restart with the 15 km group and although he skied mostly on his own, was able to finish the 50 km distance. Katja had a good race and you can read about it on her blog, along with some photos. Now it is time to recover before next weekends 30 km Overlander Loppet near Kamloops.

Payak preparations

For the past 2 weeks skate skiing has been the focus to prepare for the Sigge’s Payak loppet this Saturday at Callaghan. Last week I managed to ski 3 nights at Cypress with the main focus to practise offset climbing knowing this will be critical due to the very hilly nature of the Payak course. On two of the nights I climbed Lower Powerline 8 times, rather than trying to go fast, I focussed on a steady rhythm that I could maintain semi-comfortably. Seemed to work out ok…although the steepest part of the hill still bogs me down more than I’d like. Last Saturday we skied Callaghan with the objectives of 1) checking out the new loppet course and 2) getting a final long distance ski on my skates. Early in the session our first objective was met with resistance as the Olympic and biathlon trails were not groomed. The 3-4 inches of fresh powder made for slow skating and was tiring since it required really exaggerated picking up the skis. The skiing improved once we made our way onto Norwegian Woods and the rest of the trails familiar to us. Skiing the new course, which is basically reverse to the direction we did last year, worked out pretty well. Although while skiing up the Lunch Lake trails JG commented about how much more enjoyable the trail was when coming down the twisting turns…it brought a smile to our faces as we rounded another corner and trudged up the next hill. As the ski progressed it seemed JG was having to wait for me more and more at the top of the hills. I think I was feeling the fact that my longest skating session had been about 2 hours. On top of that I’d lost confidence in the glide of my skis…really felt like I was having to work harder than I should have to keep up with JG…maybe he was feeling particularly strong. So on the climbs I went at my own pace, not wanting to go too deep so soon before the loppet. We ended up skiing for a little over 3.5 hours, only covering 44 km. Oh, and the trails were for the most part in uncharacteristically poor condition…there was a groove down the middle of most of the trails so one ski was always fighting a hole in the snow. According to the groomers, when they groom freshly snowed upon trails at around 0 deg C the snow tends to build up on a spot between the 2 blades resulting in the groove. Fortunately we don’t encounter this often and hopefully not again this Saturday!

Sunday Katja and I paddle Burnaby Lake…I paddled my Neloski. The lake was flat calm and I was feeling surprisingly good in the boat for having not paddled for quite some time. I remember feeling that the paddling motion was really working my lats and triceps, the same muscles used for poling. In fact, I skipped my planned Monday night ski since my lats and triceps were sore. Tuesday night I skied in the rain, but my raincoat did its job and the snow was really nice…except for the really soft parts where the pole would sink deep. Did an easy steady paced session on the upper trails, working on long relaxed 2-skate strides and efficient offset on the short climbs. I really like the feel of soft wet snow…too bad I have to get wet to enjoy it! Wednesday night Katja joined me on the trails…very hard packed lightning quick trails. The trails were not icy but the snow was compressed quite hard. I like these conditions since it is so easy to go fast, but it make me uneasy, thinking that at any time I might catch an edge and loose the little control I have of my skis. But I made it unscathed and even climbed Lower Powerline a couple times, taking advantage of the strong tail wind pushing me up the hill…yessss! All that’s left to be done now is rest, eat properly and prepare the skis…then enjoy the loppet!

 

Nickel Plate Loppet

Katja, John and I travelled to the South Okanagan for the Nickel Plate Loppet, a 30 km classic ski race on Apex Mountain. To get straight to the point…this event was excellent! The course was a good mix of flat and rolling terrain with some moderate hills and a couple short steeper hills, of which we completed 2 laps. The venue has a nice lodge complete with a wood stove and the après race consisted of chilli and a seemingly endless selection of baked goods supplied by the Nickel Plate Nordic Center members. As for the race, well all 3 of us had performances we were very happy with. The flat and rolling terrain provided ample opportunity for double poling…which I took full advantage of. All the practice I’d done really paid off as my double poling allowed me to finish ahead of many skiers with much better diagonal striding technique than mine. On pretty much all the climbs I herringboned outside the tracks…didn’t seem to have much grip and my technique was pretty weak. But any time I lost on the climbs and technical descents I was able to more than make up for on the flats…was so cool to be able to double pole to catch and ski away from other racers. On the 2^nd lap I had caught a few skiers during the 15-20 km portion of the course, despite crashing on the flattest section of the course…(is important to plant the pole outside the ski, not inside)…with 1 of the guys passing me again on the switchback descent down Cannonball. He stretched his lead up Eagles Nest but I kept him within sight. Then as the trail levelled out I caught him as we rounded the meadow at the 25 km mark and just kept on going, really pouring on some powerful double poling before the trail tilted down. Turned out I managed to stay ahead of him through the last 5 km, a fact that I’m sure contributed to my satisfied grin at the finish line. That and seeing JG at the finish line having finished 45 seconds ahead of me with both of us finishing in under 2 hours (1:57:08 and 1:57:53), the magic time that as we chatted earlier at the starting line seemed out of our reach but something we’d be stoked to achieve. Katja finished in 2:40, well under the 3 hours she thought it would take her and she had some good racing with other skiers, managing to finish just ahead of the gal she’d been swapping places with throughout much of the race.

We visited our buddy Keith in Peachland Saturday evening, catching up over beers and enjoying a fine meal at a great local restaurant called Gasthaus on the Lake. The place was packed but they managed to find us a table despite not having a reservation…great food, highly recommend it. I never get tired of the view from Keith’s place…the lake and the snow covered hills…and the family of quail darting around the bushes. Thanks again for putting us up for the night Keith…keep paddling, we’ll be back in the summer!

Sunday JG and I skied again while Katja had a snooze and took a walk. We skated this time as we now are turning our attention to final preparation for the upcoming P’ayak Loppet at Callaghan. And we found the hills…they are on the trail called Panorama Ridge…and they have some serious hills! After a long winding descent we must’ve spent the next 30-40 minutes climbing, taking many breaks along the way to catch our breath. All I could think after finally making it to the top was how thankful this trail was NOT part of the loppet course!

The drive home went smoothly…arrived at the curling rink 25 minutes before our match. Once again we were tied going into the last end and Dad again made his last shot to give us a 7-6 win…doesn’t matter that we were leading 6-2 at one point! J

Early Feb. skiing

Skied Callaghan yesterday under beautiful sunny skies. Started off skating with JG, we ventured up onto “How it goes” the very hilly trails that are part of the P’ayak loppet course. Fortunately the snow was excellent on these upper trails, packed soft snow that was very nice for skating, most of the lower trails were a bit on the crunchy side. The views from these upper trails are majestic, check out Katja’s blog for some of her photos of the day. My offset technique is coming along, I felt much better this day at Callaghan, last Saturday I could not keep up with JG on the long climbs, in fact I found myself wanting to stop to rest often last weekend…these moments were far less frequent this weekend. After 2 hours skating I switched to classic skis. With the bright sun and about 5 deg C temps the tracks were softening in the non-shady areas, perfect for my crowns. JG didn’t want to apply klister to his skis so stayed on skates. I did some nice double poling practice on Porters Glide then skied Mountain View. JG and I skied this last weekend on skates on Katja’s recommendation, she said it was nice to ski it coming back toward the lodge. We didn’t share Katja’s pleasure with the trails, finding the hills more than we needed late in our day. Well, this time it was a very nice ski, especially since most of it was open to the sun giving snow my skis thrived on. And as a major bonus, the steep downhills coming off “Around the World” trail had excellent tracks and allowed me to pick up huge speed, so much so that I glided about the ¾ the way up the steep hill at the end of Mountain View. This route was so much fun that I did it twice, hitting a top speed of 45 km/h on the descent…very cool! My totals for the day were 3:20 and 46 km.

Earlier in the week Katja and I skied Cypress Monday and Wednesday, I skated both times. Monday was quite snowy, a wet heavy snow that seemed to slow my skis. Wednesday I did lots of offset practice, and was finally able to climb “Powerline” without having to stop for a rest. Although near the end of the ski my left calf started cramping likely due to having run to/from work earlier in the day. Leading with my right leg fixed the problem, but showed that I need to improve leading with my right leg while offset climbing. Thursday I skied classic at Cypress despite feeling quite tired, was feeling short on sleep. So I did my five intervals up Hollyburn and Lower Telemark, mostly to practice my double poling for the upcoming Nickel Plate Loppet.

Last Sunday evening we won our curling match when my Dad threw a perfect last shot of the game to grab just enough of the button to give us a 5-4 win.

In racing news, Canada’s Devon Kershaw continues to show fine form, grabbing a second consecutive 3^rd place at a skate sprint World Cup race at Moscow. Then he followed that up with 1^st place in a 15 km mass start skate World Cup race at Rybinsk, located about 300 km north of Moscow. There are some cool videos of the races on the FIS cross country website, check out the link to the right under Skiing Organizations.

Cariboo race cancelled

Bit of a bummer with the news that the Cariboo Marathon has been cancelled due to lack of enough snow to safely hold the race. This was the highlight loppet of my season, and I was feeling quite ready for the 50 km classic race. Oh well, time to switch to skate mode to prepare for the Sigge’s P’ayak, a 50 km skate event at Callaghan where they have lots of snow. So did my first skate ski session last night after a couple weeks focusing on classic…and my legs really felt it. The techniques are so different and I quickly lost the strength in my skating muscles. I think the slow snow conditions didn’t help but I’m quite certain it wasn’t the only reason for my tiredness.

Wednesday was an interesting ski at Cypress, it was snowing buckets on the mountain making for very soft tracks with lots of loose snow on the trails…it felt more like back-country skiing. Was fun to be out there in such snowy conditions, especially once I gave up on trying to go fast.

Excellent classic skiing

Cypress’ trails were in excellent form for classic skiing tonight…I had plenty of grip even when diagonal striding up Lower Powerline…so of course I had to climb it 3 times. And as a bonus the groomers did a great job setting the tracks, nice and smooth with nearly continuous tracks to ski without the gaps and bumps that had plagued the trails lately. The skiing was so nice I considered to skip my interval workout to just enjoy some steady paced cruising to take advantage of the sweet snow/trail conditions…but stayed the course and did the workout.

Darn icy roads!

Failed in our attempt to ski Callaghan Saturday. As the road narrowed in the canyon north of Squamish the highway became a parking lot. The compacted snow that fell Friday had turned to ice with the heavy rain…not even snow tires would help if a tire couldn’t contact the pavement. We even passed a snow plow/de-icer that was stuck on one of the hills. So after 20 min. not moving on the highway we turned around with many others. Bit of a puzzlement how the highways folks didn’t have the roads open…the weather forecast was bang on so this wasn’t a surprise. Whistler businesses should be pissed with the city folks, this is their peak season and they had many potential customers not able to reach them due to the roads not being cleared. So after 3.5 hours of driving all I got was a sore back. Had planned to try going back to Callaghan Sunday but after recovering on the couch for a few hours I decided my back shouldn’t sit in the car for that long again so soon. Late afternoon I decided something needed done to salvage something from the day, was feeling like I’d accomplished nothing and the forecast for Sunday was looking like crap, rain and strong winds. Hmmm, so I decided to go skiing Saturday evening, figuring the trails would have quieted down since most would have skied during daylight hours. Katja got home from here paddle  at the Cove just before 5, so I jumped in the car and headed to the hill. I knocked off 3.5 hours of classic skiing, covering 47.9 km at an average of 13.4 km/h. I felt much better about my day and about being back on track in my preparations for the Cariboo Marathon in 2 weeks time.

In racing news, Canada’s Devon Kershaw finished 3rd in Sunday’s World Cup event in Estonia, a 15 km individual start classic ski race on an apparently grueling hilly course.

Good skiing but no race

Had a great skating session Monday evening…the trails were in excellent condition, soft packed is the best description I can think of. I ticked off 30 km in 2 hours and found that I could hold my speed through all the corners and downhills thanks to the cooperative snow…no ice and no build up of soft snow. Only bummer was my eyes after skiing, once at the car my eyes became very irritated, like they had been scratched, was difficult to keep them open and they were watering non-stop. Made for a tricky drive home, fortunately I could follow the flashing lights of a snow plow to get down the mountain.

Tuesday I picked up a pair of ski glasses from Deep Cove Outdoors on my way to the mountain. Bob recommended the CASCO Nordic Spirit Vautron, it has both a photochromatic lens for daytime use and a clear lens that worked well while skiing at night. Fortunately my eyes seemed to like the new glasses, had no vision issues post last night’s ski. On the down side John and I had planned to team up for the TNR which the website indicated would be a team pursuit race where teams of 2 ski classic and skate, 2 laps each, alternating. At registration we found out the race had been changed to an individual pursuit where each skier does 1 lap skate and 1 lap classic…great. I don’t own, and don’t plan on owning combi-boots, those designed for both skate and classic skiing, and from what I’ve been told do neither overly well. Anyways, I am not impressed with the poor communication so I’ll be taking a break from the TNRs for a while…will focus my skiing on improving for upcoming loppets. I ended up skating for an hour Tuesday evening, left earlier than I might have since my face and ears were getting cold…was -10 deg C when I left the mountain. Not too cold to ski but need to dress a bit warmer for those colder conditions.

Ran to/from work today on snow covered roadways and trails. Traffic on Knight St. bridge was slow but people seemed to be using more than their usual caution on the treacherous roads. But I got to run past some of the slow moving traffic this morning on the bridge…I really enjoy that!

Loppet racing at Salmon Arm

Did our fist loppet of the season Saturday at Salmon Arm’s Larch Hills Nordics. Both Katja and I did the 36  km Reino Keski-Salmi loppet which was 2 laps of an 18 km course. The trails were in excellent condition thanks to the recent snowfall…and by recent I mean the snow that fell Friday night…while we were driving to Salmon Arm. We left home around 5:45 and arrived in Salmon Arm at 11:45, with an about 45 min. stop in Hope for dinner. The snow started to fall shortly after we hit the Coquihalla Hwy, it took a break as we passed through Kamloops then started again for the final leg of the drive. The Golf handled the snowy roads very well making the drive a bit less stressful than it could have been. The hardest part was getting past slow moving vehicles without  being able to see the lanes. The bumpy strips of pavement at the edges of the road were useful for helping guide our course. After a short night’s sleep we were back on the road by 7:15 heading to the ski area, a 15km drive. The race started at 9am…and it started right on time…so much so that we were almost caught off guard. Everyone was standing in the starting area chatting waiting for the start then BANG, a gun went off and we all realized the race had just started…time to ski!

Starting at the back I had time to find my groove while working my way past some of the skiers. My skis only had so-so grip climbing the hills, but they were short enough that I could grunt up them with crappy technique. After about 7 km there was an aid station and while most in my group slowed to grab a drink I kept going and ended up not seeing any of those skiers for the rest of the race. Shortly after the aid station was a fairly long but not steep hill and I was slowly gaining on another skier, Tracy from 100 Mile House after meeting her post-race. I didn’t quite catch her by the top of the climb and there followed a long winding descent where she sped away out of sight. I eventually caught her on a long slightly inclined section and at the same time I was passed by a late-60′s aged skier who I later learned was a former Olympian. He had a unique technique, he leaned way forward the whole time he skied, his upper body was nearly horizontal, almost as though he was riding a racing bicycle. Anyways, soon there was another descent on windy trails and both them took off on me. Shortly after the start/finish area I managed to once again catch up. As the trails flattened out I was able to double pole away from my companions…didn’t really do this on purpose, just noticed that after 1 of the double poling sections I found myself all alone. I ended up maintaining my lead until after the big climb…it wasn’t until after the long downhill section that Tracy caught me, commenting about my double poling as she easily diagonal strided past me up the hill. I stayed with her until once again the trails sloped downward shortly before the finish where she once again took off. I finished about 25 seconds behind her in 2:36:04. Overall I was happy with my race considering that my lower back was sore most of the race, had been sore during drive the night before. And I really felt flat the entire race, had no snap in my legs  so could not do any bursts to quickly power over the shorter steeper hills.  But I was really happy with my double poling which I felt I could do as much as I wanted without tiring, this should come in quite handy at the Cariboo Marathon in February.

On the drive home there was lots of snow on the Coquihalla from Merritt to Hope but again we had no issues other than getting past slower vehicles. We hit snow and hail again at Langley but we fortunately didn’t hit any traffic snarls. After a long 10 hour sleep we did a long walk along the river today, followed by a snoozed on the couch while watching football. Time for a quick dinner now then its off to our Sunday evening curling match.