Skinnyski Race Team Weekend Recap
By Bruce Adelsman
March 9, 2003
Only a few weeks left on the normal racing calendar and things
are starting to wind down a little. Brian and Abbi May and family
ventured across the border to race in the big Sibley Ski Tour.
While Brian notched a top placing the 50K race, their daughter
Rachel was making her early bid for the US Olympic team by racing
with her mom in the 10K event.
Jay Richards has started the transistion to the mountain
bike season, but managed to squeeze in one more ski race in
between his heavy schedule at Maplelag.
Meanwhile, Grant, Dave and Josie Nelson took the weekend
off from racing to enjoy the spring skiing with some backwoods
skiing in far NE Minnesota.
Race report from Jay Richards, and tales (with photos) from
their adventure skiing by the Nelsons.
Race Team Results
Mar 6th Sibley Ski Tour
Brian May 6th male 50K freestyle 2:04:16
Mar 7th Rainbow Rendezvous Deux
Jay Richards 1st male 10K freestyle 0:28:25
Team Member Reports
Rainbow Rendezvous Deux Report from Jay Richards
This past Sunday Rainbow held their third race of the
year on the 10k and 6k loops. The 10k loop has some really
fun hills and to race on this loop is a rush. Trying to
easy ski is difficult because the hills are pretty intense
in the start so racing is fun as you get up the hills a
bit quicker then have the exhilarating descents to bomb.
Once again it wasn't so much the race that made the
story but the race to get to the start line. With 1-3"
snowfalls the days leading up to Sunday, grooming was keeping
me busy the days prior and I was pretty toasted from grooming
close to 100k and early morning wakeups to get things fresh.
I didn't have much motivation to race the day before but
thought I would see how I felt Sunday and give it a go.
It is amazing how you body will switch gears when it comes
race day. Race day morning started out early grooming about
25ks. Somehow the radio in the groomer was turned to country
which was fine but not with the Dixie Chicks blaring. I
wanted to run home and get Jonell's cd's and drive them
over with the Pisten Bully. After grooming it was smorg
time at the lodge, stoke the old sauna, a quick ski lesson
then a few checkouts. The checkouts were a problem as you
ramble on with guests. I looked at my watch and had 45 minutes
to race time. I was 20 miles away. I stopped by the house,
got dressed put my ski boots on and loaded up Jake. I appreciate
Rainbow putting on these races as it will be the only race
I can lace the boots at my house and arrive to the site
less then a half hour. The roads were not the best but winter
isn't over so what can you expect.
Jay Richards at Buck Hill last spring |
I arrived about 15 mintues before the start. Picked
up my bib, and did a short warmup. When I crested the hill
towards the finish, the 6k race had started. I panicked
at first as I saw the likes of Marc Walters and Kris Nielson
and thought maybe they were doing the 10k but they went
straight on the 6k loop so I knew I was okay for about 30
seconds. Thanks to the head starter Ray Thorkildson, I was
able to get my warmups off and make the start. My goal was
to better my time from the last time I raced here and go
for the course record. But with the new snow the night before
and temps only dropping to the upper 20's I figured the
surface conditions would be a little soft and maybe a bit
slower. I tried out some of the Fast Wax Flite #11 for the
first time and I thought my skis were gliding quite nicely
so that was cool.
Off the start Justin Hayes bolted off the front and
was skiing fast. After not really doing any intensity work
since the Birkie, I wasn't really prepared for that kind
of pace. It was probably more mental then anything. I forced
myself to stay on his tail up the first few big climbs.
About 5 minutes into the race he seemed to slow down quite
a bit and I wanted to maintain the steady pace so I attacked
the next hill and opened up a gap. I maintained the pace
most of the race only have a few lapses now and then. A
check of my watch with a few k to go I knew I wasn't going
to break the record and was just trying to better my time
but I fell short about 30 seconds. All in all, it was great
to be pushing myself in the northwoods and savored the breaks
in the clouds now and then that blasted out some bright
sunshine.
After the race, Jake and I skied about 7km and we enjoyed
the beautiful day. At the awards ceremony the Rainbow folks
had a nice spread of bars, cookies and Doug came in with
some pizza for a party for Jill Troutner who recently returned
from service overseas.
Weekend Report from Grant and Dave Nelson
Foreward by Grant:
It seems like sometimes the hardest part of weekend skiing
is planning for the upcoming weekend. Obviously, the planning
usually starts with which race or activity I plan on doing.
I was prepared for another marathon ski race this last weekend,
and was deliberating over the Great Bear Chase and the Sibley
Ski Tour. During the last week, I think I changed my mind
about 10 times between the two races. To help with the decision
making process, I called up my brother and sister-in-law
Dave and Josie. After some more deliberating, we decided
to ditch the marathon races and plan our own marathon skiing
adventure. "Crust skiing" was our main goal for
the weekend. We had it all figured out. Because of the warm
temperatures and the cool projected forecast, we assumed
that a nice ice sheet would form over the snow which would
allow for wonderful fast skiing just about anywhere we would
choose to go. There are a limited number of times when good
"crust skiing" is available, so we decided that
this weekend we would take advantage of it. In addition,
our plan would allow us to spend some adventure time with
our parent's dog, Duchess, who will be on spring break with
us while our parents are down south for the next three weeks.
As the three of us awoke Saturday morning to falling
snow and powder conditions, we knew that our plans for an
exciting "crust skiing" marathon would need to
be rescheduled. Thank goodness, we had also brought our
wide backcountry skis and proceeded to plan our day. We
considered heading up to the BWCA, but decided that the
area near our cabin was just as remote and would allow for
even more daylight skiing. Using a Superior National Forest
road map (not designed for offroad travel) we plotted a
route. The plan was to drive to the St. Louis River, and
using rivers, lakes, and snowmobile trails, ski back to
the cabin before dark.
Spring Adventure skiing by Dave:
We packed a backpack full of food, dry clothes and plenty
of water and were ready to go by 10am. Unfortunately, when
we got the the St. Louis River, we found it was mostly open
water. We quickly fabricated a backup plan to drive a forest
road to a spot which would bypass most of the St. Louis
River. The road would have made great skiing, but it wasn't
wide enough to park or turn around so we had to drive to
the end. We waxed up with Special Purple (turned out to
be too warm) and headed off. We skied a quick section of
hilly hiking trail to Stone Lake and then across the Lake
to a small creek (see photo 2). The lake skiing was perfect
with a hard pack underneath ~3" of powder. Then we
skied along the creek out of Stone Lake and saw countless
otter tracks and even some fish bones on the snow. We imagined
how much fun the otter must have had, making the tracks
which slid across the snow in and out of open water on the
creek. We were able to ski on top of the 2' base of snow
without falling through. Our yellow lab, Duchess, was able
to walk on top most of the time, but she fell through on
ocassion and had to work much harder than us.
When we made it to a widening of the St. Louis River
called Long Lake, we headed east toward Seven Beavers Lake.
On the way we stopped for lunch at a canoe campsite (see
photo3). We feasted on MREs (Meals Ready to Eat) donated
to us from Josie's sister who served in Iraq. Our lunch
spot was exposed to the cold wind, so our favorite part
of the MREs was the heater packet intended to heat the meal.
As our meal was cooking we placed it down our pants, which
felt nice and warm. This led to some joking, as we warmed
our hands by sticking them down our pants. We finished up
quickly and made our way down the river. Around one of the
first bends, we all stopped in awe as a moose gracefully
high-stepped across the river just in front of us. The moose
is certainly well-suited for travel through the deep snow
in the north woods. When we got to some rapids, the river
was open and it was extremely scenic (see photo 4). At one
point Grant and I skied down a narrow spit of ice with water
on both sides (see photo 5&6). At the end of the spit
was a piece of ice that had at one time joined up to shore
but was now floating in the river. A couple of quick steps
brought us across the floating ice to shore! We saw a group
of snowmobiles as we crossed their trail and as we smelled
and listened to them leave we were thankful our route was
out of their way.
We finally made it to Seven Beavers and skied south
to Round Lake. Our last big adventure was finding the railroad
tracks south of the lake. We couldn't find the trail, and
from looking at our hand -copied-non-detailed-map it appeared
that the tracks were only a half mile south. We headed south
into the thick brush and worked for quite a while following
a guesstimate compass bearing. Grant jokingly commented,
“It sure would be nice if a train would come by and
blow its whistle.” Not more than two minutes later,
we heard the unmistakable (but quite faint) sound of a train
blowing its whistle! It sounded a lot farther away than
we expected, but we continued on. Luckily, we ran into a
nice hiking trail, which was approximately ten times faster
than bushwhacking, and led right to the tracks!
The last part of our loop to get back to the cabin
was down a snow-packed forest road which was mainly used
by snowmobiles. We had figured it was only about 5 or 6
miles to the cabin, but we had to stop a couple times for
snacks because we were starting to run low on energy. We
finally made it to the cabin by 6:30pm, just as it was getting
dark. What a great adventure!
To complete the day we drove Grant's truck back to retrieve
Dave's truck and stopped at Hoyt Lakes for some supper.
Sunday was a lazier day as we got 3-4" more snow
and it looked mighty cold from the nice cozy warm cabin.
We finally did venture out and found another great loop
which was a hiking trail at Otto Lake by our cabin. It seems
with snow like this, the options are endless for spring
adventure skiing!
Nelson's adventure photoset: 
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