When I last checked in I was in Fort Kent, Maine at the 10th Mountain Lodge
(the more northern of the Maine Winter Sports Centers’ world-class ski
venues). My car had not started in days due to the "extreme heat"
that Fort Kent is known to experience in mid January, but hopefully my luck
would change and I would be on the road to Quebec for the last two weekends
of the Nor-Am circuit. I had assembled my team of ace mechanics. Jason Lemieux,
Dave Stewart, and Eric Meyer, all better known for their skiing abilities, had
volunteered to get the Jetta back on the road. After several unsuccessful attempts
at jump-starting the car by way of the cable method, it was decided that a rolling
jump-start might do the trick. Jason chained my car to his truck and pulled
it to the top of the hill on the ski areas’ access road. The hill was
snowy, rutty and had a bend in it at the bottom that threatened to send my car
sliding into a ditch if it didn’t start. As they say, you could cut the
tension with a knife! I hopped into the driver’s seat and my pit crew
gave me a farewell shove. The car built up speed as I bounced down the rutty
decent. There was no turning back now. I popped the clutch and feathered the
accelerator. The engine sputtered, groaned and then spectacularly roared to
life. Vroooommmm! Vroooom! Hell, yeah! I pumped my fist out the window, gave
the horn a couple honks, and much to the delight of the victorious mechanics,
I was on my way to Quebec!
Chris Jeffries was on fire in the skate races
Saint Anne, Quebec
The weather in Saint Anne, Quebec mid January was darned cold. The 10km classic
scheduled for Saturday was pushed back to Sunday when the thermometer refused
to rise above the FIS limits. It’s odd not racing after going through
the normal pre-race routine. All dressed up and nowhere to go. Sunday the temperature
climbed into the upper single digits, an utter heat wave in comparison to the
preceding days. The race coarse that was used for the weekend’s events
was challenging with steep climbs, fast downhills, and a tricky section of hairpin
corners in the final kilometer. It was racing…on squeaky cold snow…in
a place where everyone speaks French, and I think, on principle, refuse to learn
their other national language. More power to them! Who doesn’t like a
good language barrier? Unfortunately, the Sprints on Tuesday were also cancelled
do to cold weather. I admit anticipating the race’s misfortune and had
gone stateside the night before. The only disappointment of the weekend was
that I didn’t get to go to Quebec City’s excellent Discotheques.
Tasha Betcherman was second in St. Anne
