It wasn’t a show-race with sponsors or spectators, only a basic skate rollerski time-trial on a cold and rainy Monday morning October 3.
Only two athletes showed up for our 9.30 am start skate time-trial from the base of Mtn. Dell reservoir and up East Canyon (between Salt Lake City and Park City, Utah) on Monday, October 3. We might need to consider better advertising and weekend instead of weekday for our next race…
We were a little concerned when the snowplow passed us at full speed going up the canyon (where we were planning on racing up) during the warm-up. Did they know anything we didn’t know? Was it snowing higher up?
The course:
Roughly 8-9-minutes of solid uphill right from the start (that hurts), 3 minutes of flats, 1 minute of fast downhill, 2-3 minutes of flats, 1 minutes uphill, 3 minutes of flats and the remaining section solid uphill.
Our goal was to ski as far as you could make it in 25-minutes. The altitude at the start was at roughly 1600-meter and we finished at roughly 1900-2000 meter. And no, it didn’t snow, just a little rain and fog.
The start was by the way less than 500-meter from where the 1989 December World Cup race was held at Mtn. Dell golf course where Bjorn Daehlie to most people’s surprise won his first ever World Cup race. US skier Leslie Hall (Thompson) was 19th in the women’s race.
The race:
The two athletes were Anders Haugen and James Southam. James ended up roughly 1.30 ahead of Anders. We got some good video, took some photos and hopefully learned a few things. Just another workout…
