Rock Salt Slurpee anyone?

I'm determined to stay off the trainer again this winter. Having ridden only once this week, I had to get some more spin in my legs, lest the cycling bits complete atrophy. With one of my new Nokian studded tires on the rear wheel and an old one still on the front, I went out for a ride after the plows were mostly done cleaning up the latest dump. When I rolled out, I didn't know the temperature had risen a lot, to around freezing. That meant the tons of salt laid down would be going to work. I didn't bother putting a rear fender on and regretted it.

Nokian Extremes are designed for winter travel. That means they have tall knobbies widely spaced apart to punch down through the snow and channel slush away. That also means they can pick up about two pounds of slush. The temperature was such that the tires picked up maximal slush and hurled it at me. Tasty stuff. Americans have a palate for sodium. 7-eleven could do brisk business with Rock Salt Slurpees. Just add some HFCS to sweeten it up a little.

It was still good to get out. My legs were pretty useless from nearly 100km of skiing this week. The conditions at Waterville Valley on Saturday were quite good even though snow fell all day further south.  I went up with SteveG and got in another 40km hammerski. Half of the skiers I saw were cyclists.

Trying to firm up a couple cycling trips for the first half of 2010.  Third weekend in March is looking like an extended weekend trip to Tucson. Tough call with that one, as that is the same weekend as the Sugarloaf ski marathon. I need to schedule these trips around my off-Friday weekends to stretch my limited vacation days. I'd like to go earlier, but that would be too disruptive to the ski season, and snow is more likely to be a problem at lower elevations in February.  The last week in May is blocked out for potential trip to Italy. This would coincide with the Giro in the Dolomites. It is a little early in the season for some of the high mountain passes. Stelvio is at the top of my list, the highest paved pass in Europe.