Training Log Archive: Bash

Go Canada!!!! 'Bent, Slowrunner, Toby and BulletDog were among the 5 humans and 5 canines who cheered our team to two gold medals in 10 minutes yesterday. Note that 'Bent is using the iPhone Cowbell app instead of a real bell - sooo high-tech. More cheering needed today!

Great ski with 'Bent and BulletDog in Palgrave East. Fast conditions, lots of snow. We ran into PGB and Rick on the Green trail. The trails were more active than usual because everyone wanted to get out early before the Big Game.

OK, time to cheer on our cross-country skiers - one of the two Olympic events I got tickets to in the lottery. Goose and Gosling have them now and we're watching for them on TV. What's happened to poor Ivan? George and Devon are looking great but it's still a looong race.

Pretty cool to hear our national anthem played 5 times in 24 hours! :-)

(Although not so good for my training...)

Finally - a real snowstorm! Our whole family went snowshoeing behind our place to celebrate.

Yahoooo! This is why we wanted to live here - so we could ski out the door on perfect, snowy days! Temperature was -7C so the skis were fast on the trails that we've "track set" over the past couple of days. BulletDog was a great ski buddy. Light snow started falling in the afternoon and is still coming down. Hope it doesn't warm up too soon so we can enjoy it.

Joannie Rochette, your Mom would be so proud of your courage. Well done.

Sure, the U.S. team is having a great Olympics, but...
http://www.thestranger.com/images/blogimages/2010/...

(Thanks, Cristina!)

A little more snow overnight = another fantastic day in Palgrave West. With the temperature above freezing, the fluffy new snow in yesterday's tracks was sticking to the bottom of my skis. After 2 km, I gave up on the tracks and detoured into the woods to bushwhack along wildlife tracks, climb big hills and whiz out of control through skinny saplings. Fun!

It was beautiful in there and when I came out at the Charlevoix trail, someone ('Bent, I assumed) had been skiing with a dog, and the tracks were fast now that someone had skied on them. Nice! It looked like two skiers had been there together - a very rare occurrence on this quiet property. Then I rounded the bend to an awesome surprise - 'Bent and BulletDog skiing with VO2Max, home for a short flight stopover enroute from Italy to Alberta. It was great to catch up on his European ski racing tour and hear a couple of background stories from the Olympics. We undoubtedly ruined his workout though - oh well!

We got 12+ cm of awesome powder snow yesterday afternoon and overnight. About time! It's an awesome wintry scene with big Group of Seven blobs of snow weighing down tree boughs. It's above freezing, and who knows how long it will last, so I went out for a good ski around Palgrave West. Lots of trail breaking, lots of fun!

So excited for Virtue and Moir, the first North American Olympic gold medalists in ice dance. I've been watching figure skating since I was a kid watching it with my Mom, and I remember years when Canada wasn't good enough and later years when the judging system wouldn't allow Canadian ice dance teams - or anyone young - to win, no matter how talented they were. Major progress!

And *wow*, those Canadian male cross-country skiers! If there was ever any doubt, when our young friends VO2Max and BrittWeb compete in North America, they are racing against some of the best skiers in the world. Great stuff.