Tuesday, February 20, 2018

It was just on Sunday that I played in the snow

On Sunday, I went to Alpine Valley (about 1.5 hours from Chicago) and experienced a picture perfect day for skiing. The temps were in the mid to upper 30s, the sun was shining and there was plenty of snow. Monday, however was a winter weather disaster with rain, slush and temps in the 50s. Luckily, I decided to go on Sunday of this long President's Day weekend and not Monday!

My long and skinny 20+ year old skis look out of place
with the new fangled shaped skis

Outside the ski chalet at the base. Seems like almost everyone else
 wears helmets to ski nowadays.

About to go down the snowboarding obstacle course on skis

Chairlift at AV

More than halfway through my day on the slopes, I turned my Garmin watch on and selected the ski/snowboard tracking option. Here's what my graphs look like:

Who knew Garmin watches tracked your skiing?

Hopefully, the colder forecasted temps by the end of the week mean that the local ski places can make enough snow to get them through to March. There was just an article in the New York Times this week about how all the businesses and towns that rely on snow are feeling the hurt in a major way with these short winters. For now, I try and savor these old Midwest winter ski places, which can hopefully stay around on for a few more years.

Friday, February 9, 2018

Yay Snow!

I finally got to break in my new cross country ski boots today in Horner Park! The soles on the old boots came unglued when I went skiing in -10 degree temps in Lake Geneva.


They were brand new and were so much more comfortable then the old ones.  Anyway, the hill in Horner Park had about 200 sledders and snowboarders on it, even though the average trip length down the hill is about 15 seconds. Of course, I went down on my skis for a little downhill practice!

Hill in Horner Park
I have taken about two weeks off from running (except puppy sprints and the MRC three mile run on Saturday). I haven't even been to the gym once. I'm trying to catch up on my sleep after my F^3 training cycle. Snow throwing, shoveling, skiing and resting are now my new workouts!

Lovin' my new gear!