Skinnyski Race Team Weekend Recap: Birkie Story

The plan for the Birkie this year was to go out a bit harder then my last two Birkies. Comparing the Birkie to mountain bike races, the start has seemed slow. Maybe it is the big draft that is created that makes the skiing effortless when in reality the pace is quite snappy. Sometimes in racing, the top guys will get the gap early and then ski the same pace as the chasers throughout the race. I thought I would go hard the first 10 then try to settle down and maintain a steady pace. At the start, I briefly talked with Dave Nelson and his comments echoed in my mind "the key to a good Birkie is to start out slow, find a train and start picking off skiers." Looking back that probably should of been my plan of attack but I thought you don't know unless you try so I decided to step it up a bit off the start.

The wind was blowing pretty good on the right side so I missed hearing the national anthem and the instructions for the start. Before I knew it, the banner was lifted and the race was on!! I was relaxed and feeling smooth in the beginning and found a few skiers around me that I thought would be good to ski with. In the first few k's I kept Piotr B. in my sights and moved my way up in the pack as he was attacking the hills on the power line and moving up the field. Once we made the left into the woods, we were with a group that included Chip Tabor and I thought this was good since I had skied pretty much the entire 35k at Mora with Chip.

The initial group I was in was a good size one and I was able to stay with this group until Double O. I can't remember when exactly but I think about 10k in, John Munger joined the group with a few other skiers. In my book, he was the skier of the day. We were clipping along and the guy was scooping water bottles on the downhills left from the lead group feeds. I asked John what was in the bottle he said "I don't know, you can have some when I am done". After he gulped some orange colored drink down he passed the bottle to me and I took a swig. It tasted like Powerade or some sugary drink like that. I am a little leary driking stuff like that since my stomach is pretty sensitive but I came through okay and didn't have any problems. Anyways, just before OO, John snapped a pole and instead of hearing some loud profanities, he just kept moving along and you couldn't tell he had broken his pole. He was still skiing strong and smooth and not until the steeper hills just before OO did he lose ground but only by a few seconds. He would pick up a new pole and go on to have a fantastic finish. I was encouraged by his efforts.

At OO, I missed a feed again but still had some water in my holder so I wasn't worried about it. I didn't take much in the earlier feeds so it probably caught up to me earlier. Just past OO, I started to feel the crunch from my early efforts and had to pull pack and wait for the next group to come on by. The first group to come by were the top 3 women with a few guys pulling there draft. The thing about the top women was that they would maintain a fluid pattern on the hills and seem to explode at the to and put a small gap. I lost contact with this group and then the next group was David Nelson who was looking strong and yelled out, "hop on and ride the train to the finish". I tried but I was just not responding and had to peel back. For the rest of the race, my pace slowed and I suffered to hold my position. For the 4th or 5th time near the end I saw Andy Gerlach. At first I thought I was seeing things but I think I saw him 4 or 5 times during the race. Even for the start he was about 500 meters in and managed to get up on the course. He gives Mike Hall with his crotch rocked decked out with knobbies a run for his money. At the finish I stopped and took it all in. Although I could be discouraged by being passed by quite a few skiers at the end, I knew I gave everything I had to get that higher placing. It was a fun race and I look forward to next year.