Merry Go Round

The winter of abbreviated races continues. The Mora Vasaloppet did not have enough snow to run on it's normal course last weekend. Actually there was really no snow at all, the Vasaloppet has an ice grinder they ran around Mora lake to chew up the ice into a snow like consistency. The ice grinder has saved their race a few times, and this year it allowed them to build a pretty fun course. Having the race right in town on Mora lake instead of on the much larger Knife lake meant more loops and shorter races, but it made everything super convenient. Instead of busing out to a lake in the middle of nowhere we could park right in town, walk to bib pickup, to the race start, and to the party tent afterwards. I think this was a great move by the organizers, and I would be fully in favor of a race that started and finished in Mora in the future. Point to point races are exciting, but it is hard to beat the convenience of having all your warmups and everything waiting right where you left them and not needing to deal with the hassle of bag drop.

The race itself went by very quickly. The 58k was shortened to 17k, 5 laps around the lake. Matt took the race out hard and things strung out very quickly. I was not able to hold on after we turned the corner out of the wind and settled into 7th place. There was a group of 2 skiers a bit ahead of me, but every time I would get close they would put in a surge to keep me from catching on, so I skied almost the entire race alone. I was able to mentally keep up a good pace by keeping the two guys ahead in sight, and held on to 7th place.

Focused on Racing - Photo: Bruce Adelsman Skinnyski.com

Since the race location and distances were changed Erik and Elspeth came up with the idea of doing multiple races to get a longer day of skiing in. They pitched this idea to one of the race organizers, and the Vasaloppet board actually took them up on it and added an extra race category recognizing people who did 2 or 3 races. I was hoping to place well in the 17k, so I did not do the classic race before it, but I did enter the 10k race after. So I had a quick 15 minute turnaround from finishing one race to starting the next. I got some blueberry soup and a couple cookies for quick energy and kept moving around so my muscles didn't get too cooled off.

Gliding it out - Photo: Bruce Adelsman Skinnyski.com

The 35k race went out at a more sane pace, but I didn't quite have the punch to go with the lead group when they split off. It would have been fun to ski with the leaders because Vakava was well represented, with Nate and Paul being 2 of the 4 skiers. Hans and I were in the second group though, so Vakava had the front of the race well stacked. I was the strongest skier in my group, so I tried to make others do the work into the wind and took most of my pulls on the tail wind sections. On the final lap I put in a hard surge around a corner with about 3/4 of a km to go and just kept it floored all the way in. I wasn't able to get much of a gap, but it was enough to keep anyone from getting right in my draft, so I held on for 5th place.

Leading the Chase Pack - Photo: Bruce Adelsman Skinnyski.com

The age group prizes at Mora are cool looking dala horses hand made in Sweden. I have many friends with a large collection of horses, but I just won my first one last year. I was third in my age group this year, so thought I would be getting a horse, but they changed from 5 year to 10 year age groups, and to make it more cruel the age group I was in was 25-34, so I would have needed to place 4th in the 17k to get a horse. Oh well, that is good motivation to train and race hard for another year to hopefully add to my stable.

Sprint Finish - Photo: Bruce Adelsman Skinnyski.com

The Minnesota Finlandia was supposed to be this weekend, but Bemidji is short on snow, so it sounds like that event is not going to happen. A group of people might be headed over to Wisconsin for the Hinder Binder instead, so I could get to try out another new race this year. I might also take a weekend off of racing to rest up for the Birkie, which is only a week and a half away.

A dizzying array of races

This last week really flew by, I feel like I barely saw my house. I was home Monday night, then Tuesday I went up to the cities to go running and check out the Dayblock taproom. Wednesday was ski practice, and Thursday I was home but spent most of the evening waxing skis. Then Friday it was back to the cities for the first of three days of racing for the City of Lakes Loppet Ski Festival.

Last year the Loppet introduced a new race called the Minne-Tour, which includes sprints on Friday night, a classic ski marathon on Saturday, and a skate ski marathon on Sunday. Last year I really struggled at these races. This year the lack of snow shortened the two marathons to 15k and 12k, making for a less exhausting weekend.

The weather Friday was great for being outside, upper 20's and light wind. Sprinting is not my forte, but I went out hard and settled in to the middle of the pack. It was good practice skiing fast and cornering in close proximity to other skiers, skills that would come in handy later in the weekend. I did not advance out of my quarter final, but they added a consolation round this year, so I got to race twice, which was fun. Vakava was well represented at the sprints, but none of us made it to the semi finals. Sprints are not really the type of events Vakava is geared towards.

Saturday was the Hoigaard's Classic. The race format was 5 laps of a 3k loop. The temperature was right around freezing, and the snow was icy transformed corn snow, not very good conditions for getting kick. Nate and I opted for purple klister. For those who don't know klister has a similar consistency and stickyness to superglue, but it doesn't dry. It is a painful mess to work with because the way to apply it is to put dabs of it on your kick zone, soften it up to a liquid using a heat gun, then use your thumb to spread this hot, sticky mess into a hopefully thin and uniform layer on your ski base. It also can be tricky to make fast skis in klister conditions because if you choose too cold of a wax it doesn't grip the snow at all, and if you choose too warm of a wax it doesn't release the snow and ice chunks build up on the bottom of your ski. I had only skied on klister once before and had never used it in a race, so I was a bit apprehensive. I was also racing on my new Madshus classic skis for the first time, so a lot of unknowns. During warmups everything seemed fantastic though, and my skis were awesome the whole race.

I got off to a decent start and got in a track right behind Nate heading up the first hill. I was content to relax there for a bit, there was not much room to move around anyway, and I didn't want to go out too hard, because the course is very hilly with very little rest. When we got to the long climb on the course however there was a lane open so I moved over and had open snow to stride my way up into about 5th place. When I reached the top of the hill I could tell this may have been a bit too ambitious of a move and I settled in a bit. The leaders absolutely exploded when we hit the timed "enduro" section of the course and the race blew apart pretty quickly. I found myself skiing with Chris Harvey, and the two of us worked off each other the rest of the race. The pace slowed a bit each lap as the tracks were broken down, the snow on the downhills became deeper, and we started having to weave through skiers we were lapping. I wasn't able to hold on to Chris the last lap and ended up in 13th place. This is my best ever loppet finish, so I was pretty pleased.

Nate and I stopped at Hyland on the way home Saturday to loosen up the legs and get used to skating a bit, since we wouldn't have a chance to warm up on the course the next morning because of other races going on. The snow was ankle deep mashed potatoes, really slow and hard to ski through. If this was what was in store the next day it would be a tough race.

The next day it was back to the same 3k loop, this time only 4 laps and skate skiing, so I expected it to be very fast. In addition there were a few speedy skiers who had not raced the day before, so they would be coming in to the race fresh. I was expecting the course to be in bad shape from all the skiers ahead of me (the elite wave was the last to start) and I expected a lot of traffic and fighting for position, and I was excited to find that neither was the case. The course was in decent shape, the snow actually set up well, and the elite wave spread out quickly so I could move pretty freely on the course.

I started a bit further back and slowly moved my way up through the pack for the first lap. I had Nate and Bjorn in sight in front of me, but just couldn't muster the effort to pull them in, so I chased them for the next couple laps. By the time we got out on the second lap and had a feeling for what the course held in store things settled down just a bit.

I managed to catch Nate and Bjorn on the sledding hill climb on the 3rd lap, and got pulled across the windy stadium. I couldn't quite hold on to them over the next couple short, steep climbs however and the gap opened back up. Every lap on the first climb Ahvo was there yelling at me to catch up to Nate, and every lap I worked to close the gap going uphill, but on the last lap I was just running out of steam. Nate and Bjorn were only a few seconds ahead, but I didn't have the energy to close the gap back down. Then up one of the steep hills right before the finish I made a bad lane selection and got stuck behind some skiers I was lapping. It slowed me only a few seconds, but made catching the group in front of me too large of a task. I ended up in 15th for the day, my best Loppet skate finish ever. It is strange to think that in a way, because I felt like I could have skied better and placed higher, but it is a good sign when a mediocre race is still my best ever finish.

I did end up beating Nate in the overall series by about 45 seconds, but lost to Bjorn by 1 second. Any number of decisions over the two races could have made that second of difference, but it was fun to finish so close. As a fun added bonus I got to ski with a celebrity! The other guy in the picture with Nate and I is Henry Reich who is the creator of awesome Youtube channels MinutePhyics and MinuteEarth. I wish I had realized this at the time, instead of after the race while I was looking at race pictures and watching a Youtube video he was on. It did make for a great double take moment though.

Despite the races being short I was plenty tired by the end of the weekend, short races just mean the pressure is on to go that much harder. Now I'm looking forward to another double race weekend of going around in circle at the Mora Vasaloppet.

A weekend "off"

No racing this weekend, but still plenty of goings on. I had been planning to head up to my Parent's this weekend for the Balsam Vinterfest and to meet up with my friends Garrison and Kristen who were out visiting from Ohio. The warm weather and marginal snow conditions led to the race getting cancelled, but getting to see friends and family still made it worth while to make the trip home.

My parents have a wonderful supportive community around them, so there wasn't a lot they needed, even with my dad having pretty strict lifting and movement restrictions. I took a stab at fixing their internet/routing problems and did some baking with my mom before heading back to Northfield.

Sunday was an exciting day, Gretchen Margret Porath was baptized, and I got to become a Godparent! It was an extra fun service since we also installed a new pastor at church, so lots of new people were welcomed in to our community of faith.

Greta's Baptism

I don't usually expose others to my more creative culinary excursions, but this one has a bit of a story behind it. When we were headed up to the Seeley Hills Classic last weekend Nate, Nichole, and I stopped at my parents for supper. My mom said there was some Carrot Cake soup that we should eat, and the whole trip out there Nichole was trying to figure out what carrot cake soup was. She even did some google research and the results were not promising. When we got to my parents we found out we would actually be eating carrot LEEK soup, and it was very tasty. When I got assigned to bring a dessert for the baptism party I figured carrot cake soup sounded dessert-like.

I looked around for soups that would go good with carrot cake (the recipes Nichole found on the car ride used milk broth and didn't sound appealing) and settled on a creamy carrot and sweet potato bisque with cinnamon and nutmeg as seasoning, very similar taste profile to the cake. My mom and I baked the carrot cake while I was home. I brought both components separately, but combined mine to test how the carrot cake soup would work out.

Carrot Cake Soup!

It was actually rather tasty, although I prefer both components more individually, so I wouldn't go as far at to call it a win.

This weekend brings an abbreviated but still busy weekend of racing. The City of Lakes Loppet is suffering from a lack of snow, so the races have been cut down from 42k each day to about 15k each day. A much more manageable weekend, but the loop the races will be held on is quite hilly, so there will be plenty of pain to be found.