HalvVasan

Before the Christmas break, Jennie and Richard and I talked about doing a ski race in the spring.  Although we agreed that the full 90km Vasaloppet might be too much for us, we thought the 45 km HalvVasan would be entirely reasonable, with some training.  We had each enjoyed the early and plentiful snowfall in December, and Jennie coached me in biking with my skis so that I could get to the trails MUCH faster.  Graham and Jennie both encouraged me to get some new/fast skis so that I would get some more glide out of my double polling for all those kilometres.

So over the Christmas holidays I bought some kickass new poles with awesome straps and springy new waxable Fisher skis, which I had waxed for -10 C since that is what it was like when I left.  However, I came back to slushy -5 in the evening and above zero when the sun is up.  This means the top layer of snow gets melted a little bit and then freezes at night, making for my least-favourite icy conditions.  Ice is fast, but hard to control especially on downhill corners and although enthusiastic  I am not the most killed skier.  I expect this is temporary and we will be back to cold weather and fluffy snow.

At any rate, I am not exactly training for it twice a day now when I am working at the airport half the week and long days when I am in Gävle. It is too bad that Jennie and I alternate time at the airport because then we can’t train together.  She is a really experienced skier so I was hoping to pick up some tips from here.  Hopefully I still get a chance before the ‘big race’.