Here are a few words about my final two days of preparations for the Continuous Pursuit race at the US Master Championship in Marquette, Michigan.
. My hat off to the winning team, they beat us fair and square. BUT I think we should call ourselves “half-champions†(?) or something, since our team consisted of “pure†masters – while a 25+ year-old was snuck into the winning team. </p>
<p>We need something to discuss, and complain about, so why not this?</p>
<p>Should it be possible for three guys totaling the age of 75, 100, 110, 120 to compete with three guys totaling 140? (Please note that I have not seen a result list confirming that we were all in one age category. I’m assuming this based upon the official race-program).</p>
<p>The conditions during the relay were a chilling 6 Fahrenheit and very windy. I told my teammates that it was 5F, but they insisted that is was a lot warmer — at least 6F, so we settled for that.</p>
<p>My relay warm-up was 2.5 kilometer and the post race warm-down was 800 meter. My hands were cold so I hurried in to the warming hut where I ate four great tasting glazed donut-holes before I headed back to my WARM hotel room.</p>
<p>The rest of the day was spent doing “mental preparation†like watching NFL Football playoffs, NBA Basketball and best of all:an MTV special on the rise and fall of Heavy metal Rock and Roll — great program, very informative.</p>
<p>Â I’ll definitely change to CMT (country music television) if I don’t have a decent race on Tuesday.</p>
<p>Monday:</p>
<p>Today I skied both the classic and the skate course on my classic skis. I wanted my skate muscles to rest after back-to-back skate races. The course was good and I’m looking forward to the race. It was still very cold today so more than skiing the course was out of the question.</p>
<p>I went back to my room, went to the hotel’s pool and Jacuzzi and spent some time relaxing as well as some light stretching. I had picked up my stretching the last week before departure and I don’t like to stretch hard the day before a race.</p>
<p>I made sure to drink lots of water today to avoid being dehydrated. I wasn’t good about that yesterday. The red wine we had for Sunday’s dinner tasted great and makes wonder for Italians, but Norwegians (like myself) needs water! The key is to pee CLEAR (not yellow). Clear means that you are not dehydrated. Dark Yellow is not good.</p>
<p>Well, two large water bottles and a coke made wonders.</p>
<p>The weather forecast called for continues cold and windy conditions for tomorrows race so I completely finished waxing my skis this afternoon. SOLDA S-30 over S-20 on both the skate skis and classic skis was my choice. I heated in Green Special and put four layers of green on top of that for kick.</p>
<p>Strategy for the race.</p>
<p>I know the course this time and should be able to start a bit more aggressive than what I did in the long skate race. I also prefer short races and really like to classic so I’m mentally more gung-ho for this type of event. I don’t know the competition and who will show up so it’s hard to plan anything except trying to be more aggressive. I have trained at the Soldier Hollow Olympic courses and have done a fair amount of V1 this season and that might come in handy tomorrow. I have also done some workouts on both skis and rollerskis that combine classic and skating.</p>
<p>I will do the entire race in my skate boots and I know that I need to kick-wax a little longer and a little thicker when I classic in my skate boots. I have waxed that way.</p>
<p>Well at the time of writing this at 10.20 PM on Monday, I have sore neck and slight sore throat. Am I getting a cold? I hope that’s all mental and not for real. We’ll see tomorrow.</p>
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FasterSkierJanuary 20, 2004Here are a few words about my final two days of preparations for the Continuous Pursuit race at the US Master Championship in Marquette, Michigan.
