Well, I got my wish

SNNNOOOW! Gobs of it. Late winter snow finally arrived in Minnesota and xc skiing should be good...now. Last weekend's snow storm was 24 hours too late for a full 50K Birkebeiner. Oh well, fickle weather is the order of the day (this is the view from the company office window right now). The Birke trail was very severe. The first 3-5K was "truck load snow" brought in from whoknowswhere and it was very dirty so most of my wax was left there. Once the trail narrowed in the woods, it was very hard packed and icy with many bare spots of grass, dirt, leaves, twigs and human carnage. Most of the downhill sections had safety patrol warning skiers to slow down and space out. I managed to stay upright through all the descents (thanks to my teenage years of alpine skiing) and finished the 25K unscathed. The bottoms of my skis? What bottoms? I left most of the cintered base material ($$ the most expensive part of the ski $$) out on the course as ground cover for the rest of the skiers. Good thing I used my B skis but still made me cringe when I took a close look at the bases after the race. Thick and thin will race again...next year.

Happy March first. Daylight savings begins in 11 days and the Spring Equinox is in 21 days. There are snowflakes the size of paper plates falling right now and my coach has a 2 hour aerobic ski slated for me this Sunday. Yeah! I just love it when coach lets me cross train. It really breaks up the monotony of my past 3 months of indoor ironman training. Hey! I'd better go home and wax. Later skaters.