Cross Country Skiing

[Skierchickie]

Yaaayyyyyyy!!!!!

Okay, so my skis aren't waxed yet, the trails are soft and slow, but I've been out the last 2 days. In a couple of days we should have enough snow for the real grooming to begin, and I plan to wax up the ol' rock skis tomorrow (should make it possible to move them ). Should be great this weekend. It's been snowing HARD this week!

Anybody else?

[surgtech1956]

Where do you have snow? I am in Bay City, Michigan and its just freaking windy here. Can't wait for the snow - I have to bring our skis out of the shed and get the snowshoes ready.

[Skierchickie]

I'm in Calumet, in the UP. I do believe winter is here, at last. My house is about 2 miles from Lake Superior, so we get tons of lake effect snow (well, except for last year). We're in the middle of a storm right now - this morning as I was leaving for work I mentally ran through my winter stuff, and had to go back to the garage and grab my snowshoes (I got caught without them a couple of years ago in a big storm, and vowed never to do that again, after we had to abandon both vehicles 1/4 mile from home).

It's freaking windy here, too, if that helps at all. Tuesday morning our snow was coming down with 60-65mph gusts (okay, not so much "coming down" as "blowing past").

Good luck on your snow - didn't the LP get a bunch over Thanksgiving? I know Gaylord got several inches, and I thought a storm passed to the south?

[surgtech1956]

Here in Bay City we didn't get anything on Thanksgiving. Heard they had snow farther north. This week we were suppose to have snow showers all week long, just got a few flurries. Enjoy the snow. Never been any farther north than the bridge, I know you get alot more snow than we do in the LP.

[Bron]

Our trails were groomed last week, so we did some training after work, then the föhn came from Italy and melted everything
My skis are waxed and ready.
Anyone doing any races this season?

[yellow]

Well, I haven't even taken my waxing bench out of storage. Maybe I should send my skis to one of you ladies to wax for me!! I think I waxed them at the end of the season, though, so they are probably ready to go. Winter's taking its sweet time getting here, so in order to avoid getting too amped about skiing, I'm leaving it all in the basement until we get enough snow to maybe ski on. That could be this weekend, though I'll be out of town.

No races for me...I'm far too pathethic. I enjoy going out and skating just for the heck of it.

[Bron]

Shhh. Don't tell anyone, but we didn't actually put the wax bench away at the end of last season. In fact it took DH several months to get round to removing the klister/pine needle mixture that was sticking to his classic skis.

Citizens' races are quite popular here and there are short ones too (wouldn't like anyone to get the idea that I am a hard-core racer). I'm trying to pick one big one though as our challenge for the winter, maybe the Engadine ski marathon as we did mainly classic last year, so this year skating would be good.

Do any of you train at night? I love skiing through the Bavarian countryside in the evenings - it's always so quiet.

[teawoman]

I did some xc skiing when I was a teenager, and my bike club does it in the winter, so I got myself some skis this week and am ready to go.

Unfortunately, all the advisories on our xc places recommend rock skis.

I guess my new skis will be rock skis in a coupla years

[Skierchickie]

I guess my new skis will be rock skis in a coupla years

Or sooner, if you play your cards right! It's so hard to see that first gouge. I got a nice one in my "not quite rock skis, but not my good skis" my first day on them this year. Oh well, those were never going to be fast anyway. I'm totally sick of my actual rock skis, so these will probably take their place anyway.

We now have about 1-1/2 feet of snow on the ground, and all of our xc areas are open. And using the big groomers! I need to get out tomorrow morning, before we leave town for several days (boo hoo!). Won't be doing any skiing downstate. We're supposed to get another 8 inches or so here tomorrow & tomorrow night. It has slowed down quite a bit now, from what it was doing for a couple of weeks.

May you all get a good dumping on soon!

[roadie gal]

I've been out skating twice. The first month is always humbling... no matter how much I've swam/biked/run it never carries over to ski skating. *sigh*

I'm a lazy waxer. I like the stuff I can just roll on and go. No irons and benches for me.

[bmccasland]

I missssss snow. I wanna go cross country skiing. WHINE, whimper, whimper

[roadie gal]

I just got back from going out with the 3 dogs for a semi-backcountry ski. I say "semi" because the snowmobiles had gotten there first and the trail was packed down.

The dogs loved it! They've been wading through chest deep snow for a week, so this hard packed stuff was a blast. Even my big lazy guy... um, I mean my energy conservationist ... was running and playing.

We were out for an hour. Now the dogs are lying around exhausted.

But the best part is that it didn't bother my plantar fasciitis! Yay, yay, yay!

[bambu101]

In the last few days we have gotten about 20 inches of snow- beautiful fluffly powder, and then a little granular snow/sleet on top. I went out Friday and Saturday and got to use the new skis. It was great, and I worked my butt off breaking a trail through all that snow.

For the first time in years, it looks like we will have lots of snow over the Christmas to New Year's week, which I have off. Yippee!!!!!

[Skierchickie]

The trails are still going strong! Of course, now it's too warm after work, so I can only get out on the weekends. It's been 50-ish the past 3 days, but our last significant snow was Monday night (8 inches of wet, heavy stuff). The banks have shrunk quite a bit, but no bare patches yet except right next to the house and anyplace that has been plowed. The trails are well-covered! The crust skiing isn't quite ready yet - I was breaking through a little this morning.

It was fun and fast this morning - I took a spectacular crash - stepping around a sharp curve, I thought I was doing great (too sure of myself = hitting a tree once, etc), then caught an edge. My right ski spun around, with the rest of me following, skidding several feet spread-eagled. Swollen, sore area just below my knee (where it hit the ski edge), sore shoulder, sore meaty part of one palm, sore legs in general. Achy neck, either from the crash or from the disease that is running rampant at work, starting with that and cruising on into a high fever. I'm still hoping not to get it.

Gotta get one really painful crash in every season. I'm just glad I didn't break a pole! I suppose some day it could be a bone, but we won't worry about that!

[Crankin]

Bump!
I went for my third ski of the season, but my first real ski... at Windblown in NH. It's at 1800 feet and was originally built to be a small downhill area. I am exhausted. Lots of climbing and downhill on the blue trails. I won't even go on a black trail here.
I went with a group and I was fine. Only fell (well knee touches, not total falls) on the ups.