Mar 7, Classic

I love Sharon's reports; they get better and better each week!

Arrived at Cabin Creek on a light and bright evening atypical of headlamp nights, in a parking lot of frothy meringue with frozen ruts, peaks, dips, and tarns.  Joining our adventurous crew this day were fun (and funny) and fine folks from Marmot, Mountaineers, meetup, Alabama, and Canada.  Bill classic skied the Berg for an official race time.  Linda and Allan cleared the Road tracks, while Diana, Eric, and I skate skied the fast, sometimes smooth, sometimes slick icy Road.  While we glided along, a few constellations popped out, along with Jupiter and Venus, the luminous planet-pair gracing our night sky these past few weeks.  After snapping some group pics, we meandered to the Cabin to officially record our names, hang out, and chat with Birkie participants, a Madshus rep, and a few Kongsberger Lycra-clad regulars.  As we walked back outside, a beautiful moon, just one night shy of being full, cast a warm expansive glow down the Road.  Another fun headlamp night.

Classic 5k

Jon Fewster, 41, 14:41
Peter Boveng, 53, 14:54
Brent Turner, 58, 15:32
Christopher Fast, 45, 16:48 (all double poling)
Jeff Clark, 58, 20:53
Ian Whyte, 49, 23:10
Bill Lawrence, 62, 33:30

Just Skiin'

Jason Paur
Joy Cordell
Diana Yuen
Linda Caputo
Allan Walsh
Sharon Chen
Eric Roose
Brian Palm

This week, aleady, is the last week of headlamp skiing!  Skate/classic relay (non-gender specific), or just ski, and potluck dinner with awards and draw prizes in the cabin afterward.  Say goodbye to headlamp skiing and all your headlamp skiing friends for another season ...

Feb 29, Leap Day Relay RESULTS

Just catching up here, with the results from Leap Day Relay night.  It looks like there was one official relay team, and then a nice variety of ski-it-as-you-find-it events going on.  Sounds like fun!

Relay

Sharon Chen and Bill Lawrence, 80:00

Skating 5k

Jon Fewster, 18:56
Eric Kamila, 25:10

Classic 5k

Christopher Fast, 22:10
Max Limb (snowshoeing on sticky skis), 28:50
Jeff Clark, 30:07

Just Skiin'

Jim Cahill
Joy Cordell

Just Stayin' at the Cabin

Jim, Annika, and Anders

Feb 29, Leap Day Relay or Skate

Many thanks -- again! -- to the unstoppable Sharon Chen, for doing the relay and sending me this report.  "Half a foot of fresh fluffiness" -- love it!  Anyone else?  Is there a sign-in sheet floating around, waiting for me?

Compact snow over the pass, and half a foot of fresh fluffiness in the parking lot at Cabin Creek!  A beautiful winter wonderland with large snowflakes falling all evening, though a bit challenging skating in half a foot of snow post earlier morning (~9 am) grooming.   

Bill L and I did the official Leap Day Relay! : )  Bill classic skied in the tracks, and I attempted to skate (actually slog my way) through the deep skate lane, utilizing the tracks whenever I could.  We did two laps each on The Berg with the PK Loop.  This is maybe the first time I've wished to be a classic skier (though I can see picking up this technique some time in my future, maybe.)  Unsure Bill L will be up for partnering again on a relay given my super-epic time, though it was a challenging and good workout.  Still, I think we might have been the only boy/girl classic/skate relay team out on this beautiful snowy night!

Leap Day Relay Update

I love Jeremy's fun idea for a co-ed Leap Day Relay this week, but let's face it: the ratio of men to women on Wednesdays nights is at least 20 to 1, and we're not likely to be able to field many teams!  So here's the plan: if you can put together a team, then great, put down a relay time.   But if you don't have a team, don't let that stop you from coming up and skiing -- we'll do a regular 5k skating race also.

Once again, I expect to be working late, so if anyone can pick up the sign-in sheet for me, that would be so helpful.  Hope to see all of you at least once before the season is over!

Feb 23, Classic

Thank goodness for Sharon -- she and her friends made it up to Cabin Creek on Wednesday night when almost no one else did (is everyone at the Birkie?), and she sends us this report.  Thanks, Sharon!

Rick, Eric, and I skated through fast, but sometimes 'suctiony', and thick, heavy snow on a night with grauple (those little pellets of supercooled water-covered snowflake balls) falling heavily all evening. 

In contrast to last week's hordes of headlampers, this was an unusual almost eerie evening with our group of three running into only one other skier one time on The Road, and only two others leaving the mushy parking lot when we arrived ~6:15 pm.  The Cabin did not radiate its customary warm glow, and appeared mostly dark with only a dim light visible from the sledding hill.  We did not venture up this dark lonely night to officially record our names under the 'Just Skiing' headlampers heading.   

Out on the Road, ~8:15 pm, we were startled by a loud booming thunder -- I was very happy to be with Rick and Eric, and not in the deep dark bowels of the Berg loop by myself, at this time!  Turned out to be avy control work near Gold Creek, and temporarily blocked eastbound traffic.  

An atypical headlamp evening, but still an excellent workout and fun mid-week outing skating on this snow and grauple-filled night, and with a new headlamper, Eric Roose!  

Just Skiin'

Rick Eineigl
Eric Roose
Sharon Chen

A Little Help

Looks like a lovely night for headlamp skiing!  I'm chained to my desk and won't be able to make it again tonight, so if anyone could pick up the results and send them to me, you would be my BFF!

Feb 15, Skating

This week I owe thanks to Peter Boveng, for picking up the race results and sending me an awesome report on race conditions, which I present here in its entirety:

Icy.  Stars.

Masters 5k Skating

Brad Bauer, 38, 11:36 (fresh off his big win at Langlauf last weekend; read all about it here: http://www.xcskigirl04.blogspot.com/2012/02/bauer-power-at-langlauf.html)
Jon Fewster, 41, 12:25
Peter Boveng, 53, 13:05
Jonathan Loeffler, 25, 13:16
Richard McClung, 46, 13:53
Brent Turner, 57, 13:57
Jordan Goldwag, 30, 14:08
Jim Cahill, 49, 14:19
Rob Lehtinen, 31, 14:56
Jim Wood, 29, 15:08
Jeff McGrew, 52, 15:17
Spider Burbank, 57, 15:31
Max Limb, 66, 15:34
Egor Klevak, 27, 15:43
Eric Kamila, 38, 16:20
Sam McVeed, 25, 17:35
Jeff Clark, 58, 17:40
Dale Bohm, 53, 17:57
Jason Cross, 40, 18:17
Peter Turcan, 54, 19:02
Ian Whyte, 49, 19:50
Heidi Wood, 26, 19:50
Joy Cordell, 56, 21:26
Scott Sell, 55, 22:01

Juniors 2.5k Skating

Jordan Guzak, 17, 7:20
Oliver Isik, 16, 7:59
Finley Teutin, 15, 8:10
Dylan Forbes, 17, 8:21
Duncan McFadden, 16, 8:50
Brayden Buchanan, 12, 12:00 (West Ellensburg ski team)
Isaac Korry, 11, 13:00 (West E'burg)
Ingemar Sonnerup, 12, 14:00 (West E'burg)

Just Skiin'

Jason Paur and five Bush School kids
Carrie Hennen
Ellen Welcker
Rick Eineigl
Sharon Chen
Diana Yuen
Brian Palm