nothing to do with frisbee.

yes, it's ski season, and you know what that means. what did i have for lunch. where, and how much did i ski. what am i reading. how is the juggling coming?

first of all, the overview. I spent 6 days in yellowstone over thanksgiving at a ski camp. We took 15 hs students, plus another 10 or so who are dually enrolled in a ski training program that trains for both hs races and JO's (junior olympics).

We ski'd 2 times a day, for an hour or so. The rest of the time was taken up, getting ready to ski, winding down from skiing, and eating. By the last 2 days, the desire to ski overwhelmed skiing, and i skied like 30 or 40 km per day. That took 3 ski's per day, over an hour sometimes.

(that was 6 days of nordic skiing).

Then I moved into a new house, about a mile from summit (my work). Accessible by a well plowed bike path, my studded gary fisher kaitai (1996) with the new fenders is serving me well. This has been a HUGE boon to my work, as it frees up over an hour per day. The house also has 17 foot ceilings, a true boon to the juggling.

I attended a 2 day clinic that a US Nordic Wax Guru, and general skiing stud, (and his wife is a Gold/Silver/Bronze medalist... all in the same event... can you tell me who that is), that helped somewhat. Then skied, tues/wed/thurs/fri/sat, including some epic full moon skates. I also spent a lot of time updating my HS Website: You can see what i'm teaching, if you like.

Then I took Sunday and Monday off to concentrate on a tight IT band (my poor skating technique aggravates a general tightness), before skiing Tues, Wed, Thurs, and Friday. (We go up after school, about 18-26 miles, dependant upon venue.

Today was a race, a 10K. I skied it in 37 something, 7 minutes faster than last year at this time, 35% off the winner, about 15% off where i'd like to be in the next year or so. It was also about a minute faster than my spring time on the same course, on what was slightly slower conditions for me. I wanted to go 36, but I blew my splits (my bad, lack of experience in race tactics (maybe the big minute or two), questionable wax / base prep (worth seconds, not minutes), and fatigue from lots of skiing, and a bad night's sleep from a good deal of work related stress. Last year in this race, I was the 'overall most improved skier in bend.' To repeat will be difficult. The race is filled w/ sandbaggers, and a comporable 15% improvement will be 5.4 minuntes, and a really difficult 5.4 minutes. I think I can approach that w/ improved technique (drills and video), longer slower days that the improved technique will allow, rest and intervals in the last 3 weeks prior to the race, and an effort to nail the wax and base prep.

So, 16 days of skiing (and like 24 'ski workouts'). I'll either take sunday or monday off as a rest day, and start working out again (i stopped lifting for yellowstone, getting use to skiing stress, and a mild back strain from moving that i didn't think squats/hang cleans/ and dead lifts would really help.

I'm racing a classic race in 2 weeks (10k) and maybe a 5k in a week. It's tough for me: as a relatively new nordic skier, jumping into longer races is tough. The 5 K should be more my speed: at least it won't kill me. I was wrecked today, barely able to keep on my ski's for the 1 or 2 k ski back to the lodge after the race.

In other news, I bought a new waffle iron, and a bread maker. This may cost me getting that digital camera i had my heart set on, at least for the next month or so. I also bought a new guitar (a cheapie) as i was using one belonging to a housemate at the old place. Right now there's a 'bananna / wheat' bread cooking that looks, to my uninitiated eye, to be going swimmingly. Tommorrow may be french toast.

Oh, and at my house-mates insistence (an no real resistance from me), we got the cable internet w/ the cable and the sports package. Hello, english premier league soccer. Tommorow, I think Chelsea is playing Arsenal.

I've done a poor job on the french with the move, but look to get back into it tommorrow....

Um. A buh, A buh, A buh, a that's all folks.