Bad Conditions, Good Workout

Played a little hookie today and hit Waterville Valley this morning for some skate ski action. This was a rare instance where my Outlook schedule at work was clear. Dave, Brett and I were all eager get away from various forms of craziness. For Dave, it was still no power as of this morning and still staying at his mom's.

The WV website painted a rosie picture of how wonderfully things were going to be groomed, about how much snow they got and they "know what to do with it." Nothing was groomed when we got there. Two trails received a once-over with the snowmobile groomer while we were there. That was it. 8" of new powder. The two or three skier readers know what this entails. Conditions were tougher than last year's Rangeley race in most places.

With no where to go but up, we went right into the steep Osceola climb. This was Dave and Brett's first time on snow this season. Quite a spanker I'm sure. For me, it's my third time after a nearly two week hiatus biking down south last week. When we came back down Osceola, the snowmobile groomer had come back down Tripoli. It was barely wide enough to skate in some places, not wide enough in others. Catching ski tips was a constant threat. I took a rest day yesterday, so I was looking for some intensity. I found it, but I was ugly slow in the mushy conditions. At least the snow seemed fast for blue wax conditions. We did a repeat on this since nothing else was groomed.

Crossing back over the bridge, we had hoped Livermore had gotten a once over by the snowmobile. Nope. We nearly turned around half way up. I set a new PR on this climb - slowest ever. The new snow was not groomed here at all and was very deep up top. The descent was slower than most of my climbing times.

We finished with about 32km, 795m vertical in 2.5hrs skiing time. It was a thoroughly punishing workout, getting a couple of very nice threshold effort intervals in.

I suppose two weeks ago when I had such a fantastic ski here, it was one of those once or twice per season days. I hope I get one more like it this season. The conditions then were pretty much as good as they get. The good news today was Dave got a call his power was back on, nearly a full week without. Looks like major snow event Friday night for southern New England. We're hoping the north country escapes more or less unscathed so we can ski again on Saturday.