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 3rd 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.