Kick'n it old school

Date: March 12
Mileage: 27.8
March mileage: 138.2
Temperature upon departure: 29
On the iPod: "When I Grow Up" ~ Garbage

This morning, Geoff decided - rather randomly - that he wanted to race the Kachemak Ski Marathon. The race started at 11 a.m. He got up, got ready, and got to the race start just in time to enter the 25K.

I dropped him off and took my car down to the end of the race, then went for a bike ride from there. The gravel roads were pretty sloppy today, and I'm still recovering from something or other (I don't exactly know what. I'm just not in my best physical form.) So the ride was a bit of a slog. It's strange because I felt great during a snowshoe hike yesterday - felt like sprinting to the top of the ridge because the hiking was so effortless. Maybe I'm just experiencing a touch of bike burnout.

Geoff was already back when I got home. He said he struggled to keep his balance and took a couple of big spills, but otherwise had a great race. He was one of the few - if not the only racer - skiing all-out old-school classic style (because there were no classic/skate divisions, and because it was in fact a race, it obviously made more sense for everyone to skate.) Geoff doesn't own skate skis. And he only recently learned how to ski at all - so skating was out of the question. Despite that fact, he still finished fairly high in the 25K - possibly even in the top 5 (disclaimer - there was also a 40K that most of the top skiers raced, and several finished before he did).

Still, I'm proud. Geoff and I both started skiing this season. But if I had entered the same race, I would still (now seven hours after the start) probably be lying at the bottom of some hill with a face full of snow and pole tip stuck in leg, so far in the back that there would be no racers and no checkpoint volunteers left to hear my cries.

At least I can ski vicariously through Geoff. And go for bike rides in half-frozen-solid slush piles. Ah, March.