PS: more on weekend trail conditions...

I really should add that if you go up to ski this Saturday or Sunday, use more sense than we did and start skiing around 1-2:00 when the snow is warmed up and it should be good skating!

Weekend Trail Update

Well it's beginning to look a lot like bike season!  

The guys worked hard last night with what ice cutting equipment we have and managed to grind it down to where they reported that skating was good this morning.    

By late afternoon when Donna and I were skating the sun had cooked the South facing slopes and it was getting rather icy in the woods.   Front hill was bad.   Upper meadow near the Baca is still good.   We avoided the road so don't know what it's like there but I'll bet it was icy.

So my weekend report has to remain that conditions are challenging.  So be careful.  There are no classic tracks set....  it's really not possible to try to cut a good deep set of tracks into a base that hard.

However I should add, it is better than roller skiing!!

The New Mexico Cup Nordic Ski Races 2009 Race Report

It has been a while since the New Mexico Cup XC ski race has been held. It used to be held pretty much annually back when there was a lot more New Mexico interest in xc skiing in the 1980's and through about the mid 1990's. It was revived for a couple of years in the early 2000's but it was obvious that a lot of the people who were regulars on the NM xc ski scene had literally up-and-moved on. Those turnouts were pretty slim, so it just didn't seem worth putting on anymore. Other races have variably come and gone with only one old event holding on by a thread – the Chama Chile Classic, which seemed to have breathed a renewed breath just a week earlier this year.

Well, there's no reason that New Mexico doesn't have its own title race. Testing out the old adage, "if you build it, they will come," it was planned and executed, despite the expectation of a low turnout. It's not that New Mexico doesn't have enough xc skiers to field an event, it's just that it hasn't been established and many of the people who do xc ski might not really believe it would be worth giving a go for, and just didn't show up.

It turns out that despite some dry and somewhat warm January weather, the courses at Enchanted Forest were exceptional and it was a great weekend for xc ski racing in the brilliant New Mexico sun. All that can be said is that it was worth it and it is hoped that in time, those that do xc ski in New Mexico will help to make it something permanently established and something special – only time will tell.

With that said, here's how the Revival of the New Mexico Cup 2009 went:

Saturday, January 24
The night before was a little weird with a quick-hitting wet and warm weather system producing drizzle at all but the highest elevations. It was nary below freezing at about 7PM at Enchanted Forest, with a sloppy parking lot and what looked like a soft track.

Sometime during the night, a front passed through with some wind and the temperature dropped to a low of 21-degrees F by about 6AM. With the seriously old and transformed snow, that meant definite klister conditions. But, how much would it warm up? Not too much by the 8:30AM start.

It turns out that not very many people were committed to this 10km classical event. By 8AM, hardly a soul had appeared, but the UNM ski team did arrive and it was announced that a grand total of one of them was going to race. That made registration easy.

All told, only 6 people raced, with about 6 more kids showing up for the kids event. Dirk Grimm, the talented German who now coaches (and was formerly a 4-time NCAA All-American performer in his undergrad years) the UNM Nordic team was an easy winner over Clay Moseley. The icy track left everyone slipping around and looking for some purchase on the ground up snow out of the track. With a soft sugary base lying only about 3 inches beneath, it made double poling just as difficult. Not the best day for a "fun" classical race, but one that taught those 6 competitors a lot more about the need for carefully heating in several layers of klister if it's that icy.

Linda Mieras ("Linda Miller," the youngest daughter of the Millers) won the women's 5km event over Dina Pesenson, who was seen changing a diaper and handing her baby off to Linda's sister Ellen exactly 20 seconds before she took off on her race…way to go, Dina!

Sunday, January 25
Warmish weather had prevailed the previous day, with off-and-on warm snow showers and intermittent sunshine. The tracks softened up, but by nightfall, the temperature again took a plunge and several windy snow squalls amounted to about a half-an inch of new snow by morning. Again, the temperature in the morning was right at 20-degrees F, but it seemed cooler with higher humidity.

The crew at Enchanted Forest got out very early and groomed the course out nicely, breaking up the frozen crust and mixing in the new grappular snow, and generally making for a great day of racing. It would have been a little bit on the sketchy side if they had not gotten out there like that.

As opposed to the previous day, people began showing up early. Registration was a little busier and several more folks poured in. It looked like this would be a decent turnout.

After everyone was pretty much registered, it was warm-up time. Racers were buzzing around getting ready while the EF crew made a few last-minute changes to accommodate the start and finish situation for a mass start race (the first ever at Enchanted Forest).

Finally, it was time to race. Everyone lined up and was quickly off at the start of the clock, manned by Geoff Goins.

Almost instantly, the group sorted itself. The 5 members of the UNM men's team were off like rockets and a couple of the UNM women got up there early as well. Los Alamos skiers, Clay Moseley and John Bernardin fought to follow them. Polina Ermoshina, the star of the UNM women's team set a fast, smooth early pace. She skied steady on the early steep hills, but not too hard. Her technique did most of the work for her and soon she was finding herself pulling away on the long fast Sherwood Forest decent, with Clay in tow. Melanie Zemp, a Swiss skier for the UNM women's team pulled ahead slightly in front of John Bernardin.

Somewhere out there in the aerobic monster zone, UNM Norwegian skier Martin Waaler-Kaas got away from his teammates and skied to an absolutely sick time of 27:48. He was the only one to break 28 minutes. Behind him, UNM's Canadian skier, Casey Dyck outskied the crazy German, Simon Reissman, for second.

In the battle of altitude adaptation vs. smooth skiing, it was probably the altitude that was the deciding factor in favor of Clay, as he was able to get a gap on Polina on the steepest hills, but she held steady during the rest of the course and stayed quite close all the way to the finish. Smooth technique also helped Melanie Zemp keep her advantage over John Bernardin, who skied an excellent race overall as well.

A little further back, another group was duking it out behind the third UNM lady, Sienja Neimeier, who was formerly a junior biathlete from Germany – still only 19 yrs old, she pretty much had to ski the entire event alone. Hans Noordik (what a great name for a xc skier!) was working at the front of a group that contained another LA skier, Tarik Saleh, and former Anchorage high school skier and now Sandia Laboratory mathematician, Shawn Martin. Those three battled it out over the entire course, with Hans' smooth skiing helping him to pull away from Shawn and Tarik. Eventually, the dual was paired down to just Shawn and Tarik. In the end, Shawn got the best of Tarik and claimed it was the descents that gave him the advantage, but it wasn't much, as they finished very close together and looked like they had the most fun. Shawn wins the "racer on rental skis" category, by the way.

Other groups formed too. Dina says that she tried to lead a group for a while, but got ahead of herself and had to pull over and let the 'guys' go through. One of those guys was Chuck Calef of Los Alamos, who is just really learning how to skate this season after attending the SWNSC clinics taught by Ken and Jessica Kisiel. He's really taking to it and even bought an actual set of skate skis in order to quit humiliating everyone he beats on his old wooden ones…=) Actually, Chuck is a very good skier and it's no disgrace to have him finish ahead of you in a race. He did race on his old "non-wooden" fiberglass-core skis from the '80s, called "EPokes". Santa Fe skier, Tom Brimacombe, saw them and recalled that those were endearingly called "SlowPokes." When Chuck got out on his "new" used skate skis, he said that he put his poles in the snow and the skis were so much faster than his old "SlowPokes," that they nearly shot out from under him. That's pretty funny, I don't care who you are...

Moving on...

Awards were provided by FastWax USA, GearWest.com and Enchanted Forest themselves, who did a great job hosting the event, as usual.

What a day. It was an amazing course and the snow made it seem like it was so very easy to ski. It's not normally that fast. The winning time was less than 28 minutes…INCREDIBLE! It was no doubt a little short, but still…this is at nearly 10,000 feet!!!

Hopefully, we'll have the will to put this event on again next year. And hopefully, more of our NM Nordic brood will find the willpower to get out and give it a go. Geoff Goins thought of having a two loop race that would equal 30kms. Wow, it's hard to imagine that, but what an event that would be.

See you out on the trails.

Trail Conditions: update

Let's say that the trail conditions are 'challenging'.   There are 2-3 inches of fresh powder over a base of solid ice.  There are no classic tracks.  If you go out to ski, do be careful.

Grooming report 1/26

Despite warm conditions, no new snow and hard trails the intrepid groomers have been on it and the upper trail system has been groomed well. There is still lots of snow up there. So. Go. Ski.

Looking good team SWNSC

Hey, check it kids. Our uniforms are popping up all over the interwebs. See the examples above and below from Crested butte nordic center and the alley loop race page respectively. I think that is me above and clay below, but who knows.



Lots of racing reports maybe. I am still slogging through my Chama report. Stay tuned.

Uh, conditions are icy and the races are up in Enchanted forest this weekend. Snow may come. Skiing continues. The end

Monday Evening Update

Classic tracks were still good, at least in the woods, and Klister sandwich with VF 50, ie, Purple/Red hardwax over it worked for a kicker.  Hot weather should come to an end around Thursday.

Weekend conditions

Donna tells me that the classic was good yesterday on the trails early afternoon... she was skiing on a  "klister sandwich"  of green klister with Swix VF45 hardwax over it....  Should be much the same today.

Fantastic weekend.

When Clay says get on it. Well hell, get on it. Sundays skiing was fantastical. As was sneaky saturday night following Clay around and skating fresh corduroy. Thanks Clay and all the other groomers for getting the meadow into wide and beautiful status. Wooo!

Here is Darth Clay in action up in the meadow on his Kermit of Doom:







Looked like a hell of a night for a moonlight ski, but I was underdressed and pooped, maybe next month.

Grooming Report 1/10/09

Followed up Ken Kisiel's great blading and grooming work today with some more grooming and lots of classic track setting. All of the main trails, including the outer meadow trail now has classic track.

That storm that hit the Sangres just barely glanced by us, as there was the ever so slightest hint of new snow by about point C, and them some more higher up...not much though.

Get it while the gettin's good.

SWNSC Clinic for Sat./Sun. (10th/11th)

Los Kisiels are hosting the annual SWNSC clinics tomorrow. Ken, himself, went up to groom the trails out for the clinic. See the website flyer for details (http://www.swnordicski.org/).

Make it one of your New Years Resolutions to really learn how to ski =)

Lots of snow, despite some tepid weather this week. Surface conditions vary from sun to shade, bottom to top, but lots of snow, so it's all good if you know what you're doing. Use klister in the mornings or late afternoon/evenings, and maybe a mix of klister and soft wax in the "heat" of the day.

Trails Groomed 1/7/09

Just about everything got groomed tonight. Unfortunately, the wind was blowing out in the meadow, and even in the trees a little bit. That is some cold, dry snow, so it was drifting quite a bit and caused some grooming problems. It's pretty certain that parts, if not all, of the meadow will be drifted by tomorrow. Too bad, as it looked pretty good at 10:00 PM after pulling the big 6 foot Tidd through.

Since it was blowing and drifting, there's no classic track set until the far upper part of the meadow, which will most likely drift over as well. The lower road and the upper tree trails will be quite nice for both skate and classic.

It was quite chilly up there tonight, so everything should set up nicely for a bluebird day tomorrow. Break out the Swix Extra Blue!

If anyone is so inclined, the fencing on the front hill is getting buried by the snow. If you can shovel out the worst sections (5 or 6 of them), it would be really, really helpful!

Thanks,
The Groomers

Trail Report 1/6/09

Trails were packed last night following the storm. Some wind was blowing and drifting the meadow back in, but everything was rolled and some bladed, including some of the cut-offs.

Finish grooming awaits, including setting the classic track. Perhaps tonight (Tuesday).

Don't forget about the ski clinics this coming weekend! See www.swnordicski.org for more details.

PS....

My bad, yesterday's great kick was Swix VF 40 .....  not VF 30!

Trail Conditions: update

Donna and I skiied the woods loop after 3:00 today, and were amazed at how good the conditions were once you got past the coat tree and Point "C".  Doing Classic with Swix VF30 kick wax I had great glide and great kick in good solid tracks that hadn't been skiied to death.  Skate zone looked pretty good.

We didn't ski the road or the meadow, and I expect they were pretty trashed and icy from all the holiday traffic, and will probably benefit from the coming storm.

If this little storm dumps a couple inches on the trail to cover the excess trash, regrooming the woods will probably be pretty easy, for Dave's work with "big red" really dozed the trail into shape and got it good and wide, with good classic track.

Thanks guys for all the grooming and cutting... from all the sawdust we saw, there were a LOT of trees down and you got them all!  We did a more modest effort of clipping aspen shoots along the nicely widened classic track.