A ski-centric weekend—without much skiing: Writing for the Loppet

The last in a three-part series

As late as Wednesday, I was wondering what I was going to do all weekend. It turned out I had way too much on my plate (and never got around to my taxes). I got an email on Friday from John Munger at the City of Lakes suggesting that maybe I wanted to write a City of Lakes Loppet race report, and perhaps focus on some interesting people there. Yeah, that might be fun. Then I got a call from him saying that I had been volunteered to do so.

Okay then.

I got the contact information for all the winners (classic and skate, male and female) as well as some other assorted dignitaries. And to their credit, everyone responded to me. Props to Andy, Audrey, Matt, Kristina and Caitlin for that. I sent out an email asking them to email or call me please on Saturday after I got back from Wirth. By the time I woke up Sunday I got an email from Andy Liebner, the classic winner. Then I got a call from Audrey Weber, who also won the classic race. I had about 500 words—what John wanted at a minimum, and figured that if none of the other skiing superstars called back, well, I'd have something.

I had an email from Caitlin, too. But that one seemed like a long shot. She was in Norway for a World Cup race and would be back later in the afternoon, could we Skype then? We could try. So instead of enjoying the sunshine, I was booting up Skype. It took us a while to get it to run correctly (I had to disable my video from trying to load, it seems) but once it did, she talked to me for more than an hour, which was beyond awesome. We each thought the other had a dog barking because of the feedback, but I got, well, way more than I needed from Caitlin. About the City of Lakes, which she won in 2008 (coming 10th overall—she said she knows she is ready for the World Cup when she is skiing with the top men in the US). About being a poor athlete in the Twin Cities. About the Olympics. Oh, yeah, did I mention that she was in Vancouver? Garrott (Vancouver) on Friday, Carolyn (Torino, biathlon) on Saturday, Caitlin today.

Anyway, Caitlin is awesome—she offered to show me a week of Olympic training this summer. Maybe I'll write that up for a local publication; I think it would be interesting. If not, it will get me in to shape. She offered to do a strength session with the Mac ski team, too. Collin says "very tight."

She finally had to go to bed in Norway, and Matt Liebsch called. He had "five or ten minutes" while he shuttled his kids around. Half an hour later I had pages of notes from talking to him too. Matt won the Birkie last year, the Mora two years running, and the City of Lakes this year. Oh, and he has two young kids. Yeah. Wow.

Finally, I called Kristina Owen, who won the women's skate race. I got some copy from her and set to writing. By the evening, I had condensed it all down to 2100 words—less than three times what John wanted, although I think the word count might be malleable—and some great stories. I'll post them here soon.

So while I had skis on for a total of about an hour, it was a very ski-heavy weekend. It was 64 on Sunday, the snow is gone (but might return later this week) and I'm off to Colorado next weekend. And it's probably the most I've thought about skiing—without actually skiing much—ever.

A ski-centric weekend—without much skiing: Wirth kids race

The second in a three-part series

Last week on Facebook, I saw a video of the ski-ter–totter they'd set up over at Wirth:



I said, in a sense, "I want to go to there." I asked how I could and they said "come volunteer at noon on Saturday." That I can do. I am usually racing in races, so I can't volunteer for them; this is a chance to give back. And little kids skiing around are cute.

On Friday, I got an email. They were starting a bit earlier. Could I be there at 10:15? Sure! It's not like I went to Hayward the night before. So I set my alarm, woke up in the morning, and hopped on my bike for the ride over to Wirth. The ride went well with two glitches. First, when I tried to navigate the ramp from West River Parkway to 1st Street and 5th Avenue S (southeast corner), I found out that my skis were rather wider than the ramp. I got stuck, stopped, backed out, and walked my bike up the stairs.

The ride through Downtown Minneapolis (yes, down Hennepin with my skis) was fine for a while; I was not too wide for the Bassett Creek Trail spiral bridge (although it was close, and I took it very easy) and zoomed off towards the park. The one problem was that someone decided to groom the bike trail for skiing, and where it had been groomed it had not melted (everything else was dry). The Googles bike directions say it was a third of a mile, and I walked/hike-a-biked most of it. (Here's my whole route on Google bike directions; I did not follow what it suggested—hence all the waypoints—and took the Greenway home.)

Once I got to the race site, I was put to work. As the races finished up, John Swain and I set the course for the SkiX-c course. This entailed carrying V-board (well, C-board, well, painted PVC pipes) around, putting in a ton of flags, and making sure the slalom course was not too easy or too hard. Jojo Winters helped out as well. The kids had fun, no one went in to a utility poles, and the biggest mishap of the day was when I lost a ski while carrying the snow auger downhill (to put in the slalom gates). I wound up sitting on the ground with a 18" long drill bit and Ed Swain (John's dad) laughing at me as I chased my ski downhill. One of the bindings on my rock skis had broken; I spent the race trying to figure out how to put it together and finally used one of the tools in my bike bag to do so. The plastic is still cracked, but it works.

I skied the course a couple of times—it was about the right difficulty, and took a few trips over the ski-ter–totter. Then we played ski soccer (like the game, but a bit less tackley, and with the stipulation that you kick the ball through the goal, which I didn't really like) which was fun. It was adults vs. kids and John and I were on the kids team (apparently the age cutoff was about 26, as Carolyn Bramante, an olympic biathlete and former City of Lakes champion, and the one performing the sweet tele landing off the ski-ter–totter, was on the adult team). Everyone won. Everyone was soaked. Okay, especially me; I tackled the adults.

Then it was time to clean up, switch in to the slightly-drier bike shoes, and bike home. Slowly.

But the ski weekend without much skiing (today was the only day I actually donned ski boots) was not over yet!

A ski-centric weekend—without much skiing: Birkie Movie

The first in a three-part series

Conditions have deteriorated dramatically in the last week (Wirth is skiable on the snowmaking but it's wet and slushy; I might go over for one last ski in the sun this afternoon). As I type the mercury is pushing 60 with bright sunshine. However, this does not mean that skiing is not the center of my life right now. Far from it.

Last week, I found out, by email, about a Birkie video which was being put together by Scott Brown called "A Day in February." Scott's a guy I match up against pretty well, it seems, and who skis with a camera on his head. It turns out that in addition to taking video of some races, he's also filmed training, talked to the Birkie Folks, filmed waxing, filmed stonegrinding, filmed his buddies skiing across a plowed Mosquito Brook Road and such. And after a two weeks of editing, he compiled it all in to a feature-length film. It was to be shown for one night only at the theater in Hayward. Friday night. 7:30.

I told him I'd love to come but didn't really want to drive that far and asked if he knew anyone else going up for just the movie. He did. Problem solved. So I skipped out of work, headed up Dale and 35E and met Eric around WBL to carpool up to Hayward. Traffic was free until just after Highway 8, when it ground to a halt. We rolled towards the next exit at about 10 mph, and discussed what to do. I reached back and grabbed the Minnesota DeLorme Atlas and Gazetteer which was rattling around the back seat, and saw that if we got off at the next exit we could cut diagonally across to Highway 8 and get away from the traffic. "If this works," I announced, "we'll be there by 7:20." Always trust a geographer.

And it did. We rolled in to the theater in Hayward and were in the door at 7:26. There was little rush. The lobby was filled with assorted dignitaries, none of whom I recognized in street clothes. I had to ask who Scott Brown, the star of the show, was, as I'm used to seeing him with a camera atop his head. We finally found our seats by around 7:45 and the show was on.

The picture was great. For a guy who just bought a video camera, Scott put on quite a show. It had a feeling of a kind-of hokey documentary, but in a good way. It'd serve as a good introduction for those of us who take skiing a little too seriously to show to our friends and family. "See! This is what stonegrinding is! And this is how you wax." (Because of the music, Scott can't distribute the film. Too bad.)

But the best parts were on snow. Early-season on a barely-snowed-in Birkie. (I've done that.) Training at 5 a.m. at Elm Creek—below 0. (I've done that, well, not at Elm Creek.) The Loppet. The Pre-Birkie. And then the main show. Standing at the line—I felt like I was right back in Cable—was almost eerie; my heart started pounding and my stomach felt just like it did on race day, even though it was 45˚ outside and the snow was all but gone.

And the footage of the race was great. I saw myself several times (my form looks off—I should get the raw footage of the race from Scott to analyze) and confirmed that I only lost to Scott because my skis had slowed down by the end of the race, as he passed me on the last downhill. While I didn't see myself up Main Street, I did see myself go to get my finisher pin at the end.

Then the film shifted to Scott interviewing skiers at Mosquito Brook. Folks who'd finish in five or six hours (the winner was under two). The guy who said if he fell one more time he was sitting down right there. He finished. For anyone who thinks that most people ski like us guys near the front—these folks were the true Birkie skiers. I was done with my lake-on cheering by the time they came through.

After the flick, we went to the Angry Minnow for dinner and a beer. I was driving, so a beer. (Oh, also, you can by beer at the theater. I love Wisconsin.) It was a nice gathering, I got to meet the director of the Birkie, Ned Zuelsdorff, who's a real nice guy. I complimented him for his race, trail and grooming, he seemed to like my numbers. Although he said that my elevation profile had caused some uproar in their office. Well, they should publish better ones if they have 'em. Now I'm tentatively scheduled to bike the course this spring with a GPS.

After an hour or so, and a chat with Olympian Garrott Kuzzy (yup, that's who hangs out in Hayward; he was drinking 7-Up), Eric and I piled in the car for the traffic- (and deer-) free drive back to the Cities. I was in bed by the early hour of 2. Nothing to do tomorrow. Oh, wait …