“There are only two seasons -- winter and Baseball.”

I figured I'd start this post off with a quote from baseball player Bill Veeck. Since the Red Sox just won the world series (instead of the Yankees, who we all know should have won), it is now time for the snow to start falling and the intensity to start picking up in our training.

I got the first official snow report back from Lake Placid today, and tracks were spotted going up the Whiteface tollroad this morning. I'll be heading home this weekend, so i'm hoping the snow holds and i'll be able to get in my first tracks of the season soon! The snow was reported as wet and mushy, so skiing would best be done in the morning in order to avoid the always unwanted faceplant caused by your skis coming into unexpected contact with the pavement underneath.

This week is the middle of my intensity week, and today I did a nice time trial on the pumpkin hill road. The course is an out and back, basically all uphill on the way out with a steep downhill right before the turn around (always convenient), and then a fast, mostly downhill, race to the finish. I was on my own today, and of course I put my heart rate monitor strap on as I was about to head out the door, took off my normal watch, set it down on my desk, and totally forgot to grab my other watch before i left. So i started skiing, went to start my watch, and there was nothing there. I knew this was going to be a good workout when that happened. Next as I went to take off my warmups, I stepped down on my binding and broke off part of the binding plate. Sweet. but nothing a little tape can't fix.

So I finally started my race at 2:06 or about then according to my back up watch, aka my cell phone, and got into a good rhythm from the start, focusing on not starting out too hard and keeping a smooth, even tempo throughout the tt. I finished at approximately 2:29, so by my exact calculations, i figured i was somewhere in the high 22's or low 23's, which I was definitely happy with. I did this same course Sept 22nd in a time of 24:10, although I was on slightly faster wheels today, I felt that progress has definitely been made since then.

I believe the team did some skate drills and uphill double poling today, and I'm waiting to hear about the Time Trial that JT$ was talking about doing on River Road today. maybe he'll put up a post later ;)

Anyways, I'm leaving with a few pics from my roller ski yesterday at Brown's Bridge.
MD