Girdwood

Racing was on our docket for this past weekend, at the Government Peak ski trails about an hour north of town. But our recent snowstorm hit Anchorage and Girdwood, south of town. It missed the Mat-Su Valley north of town. So the Government Peak races were canceled due to a lack of snow. In their place, we got together with Alaska Pacific University and University of Alaska Fairbanks for a couple of time trials. Saturday was 8km classic in Girdwood. Sunday was 9km skating at Kincaid Park. 

In terms of competitive fields, Saturday's race in Girdwood might be the toughest race we'll do all year. On the men's side, several APU skiers are headed off to Europe tomorrow to spend their winter on the World Cup circuit, including Gus Schumacher (who was seeded first yesterday, with just a measly two FIS points). And on the women's side, it's tough to find a faster skier than Rosie Brennan, the top-seeded skier in Saturday's race.

Deb Essex is running the show at the Girdwood Nordic Ski Club, and she's got tons of energy and enthusiasm. When we asked her if it would be OK if we had our time trial in Girdwood, she fired up the grooming equipment and set a classic track for us, and welcomed us with huge jugs of sport drink, hot cocoa, donut holes and pastries. She also brought Girdwood Nordic Ski Club hats for the podium finishers, and wool socks for everyone there that day. Deb and the Club went WAY above and beyond - she turned an early-season time trial into a bona fide ski race!  Thank you to the Girdwood Nordic Ski Club - it was a great way to start our racing season!

Check out some photos from Girdwood, below. Gunnar Knapp, the renowned (and retired) UAA economist, was out on the trails taking photos and he was kind enough to send a bunch of them to us.  All the good photos of our Skiwolves on the race course were taken by Gunnar. All of the blurry and poorly-framed ones were taken by me. 

That's Deb Essex on the right. She turned our little early season time trial into a bona fide ski race! Gus Schumacher is on the left.

Trond and Chase, waxing up the classic skis

Matt Seline. Ready to race!

Girdwood Nordic Ski Club, in case you were wondering where we were on Saturday.

Henry Skjønsfjell on the starting line.

Murphy Kimball

Ethan Eski

Hermod Bangstad

Parke Chapin

Erling Bjørnstad

Garrett Siever

Corbin Carpenter

Matt Seline

Henry

Hermod

Dashe McCabe

Hedda Halvari

Constance Lapointe

Alex Otto

Marit Flora

Marlie Molinaro

Here's APU Head Coach Erik Flora thanking Deb Essex for hosting us all in Girdwood. Thanks Deb!  And thanks to the Girdwood Nordic Ski Club!

Typical Friday

 This team frequently gets together multiple times per day for ski practice. It's a big commitment, being on an NCAA athletic team, in any sport. It's a rare occasion when I can make it to practice twice per day, let alone once. After all, I do need to go to my office every once in a while and do some work. But on Friday, I felt like I could let things slide at the office for a bit, and I made it to a full day of Skiwolf training - all three sessions. Here's what happened:

Session 1:  Skiing at Kincaid. With new snow, spirits were high. 

Session 2: Afternoon session in the weight room.

Session three: Classroom session with the team's sport psychologist, Jon Osborn. He told us that, just like you have to do physical training every day to gain proficiency at your sport, you also need to do regular mental workouts to build the strong neural connections that allow focused, peak performance. In our classroom session, he taught us how to do these mental workouts.

So there you have it - a day in the life of a Skiwolf.

We're All Smiles Now

 It snowed in Anchorage last week. Looks to me like around six inches at Kincaid Park. (The Ski Club says eight inches.) The forecast for this coming week is stable weather with temperatures staying below 0 degrees C.  So I guess the ski season has begun here in Anchorage! We're pretty happy about it. Rollerskiing was getting kind of old, especially as the roads and paved trails were starting to get icy.

Meanwhile, the alpine team loaded up the trucks and rolled out of town yesterday morning, headed for their annual early-season training camp in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory. They'll be there for the next three weeks, getting good quality slalom and giant slalom training every day at Mt Sima.

Wet Pavement

Day in and day out, the roads around here are rarely dry.

Getting ready for a little sprint training. Kincaid Park.

Marlie, Constance and Hedda

Ethan leading the field.

Erling leading the field.

Hedda leading the field.

Marit. At Potter Marsh.

Kendall Kramer. She was never a Seawolf. But she was a Nanook. She trains with us sometimes. She's leaving for the World Cup circuit in a few weeks.

Henry and Erling

Matt

Corbin and Henry

Corbin (airborne) and Parke

Out before sunrise. Potter Marsh. Hermod, Marit, Henry, Corbin, Garrett, Matt, Kendall Kramer, Ethan, Parke, former Seawolf Ari Endestad, APU skier Buster Richardson, Erling.

Li & Erik!

 The duties of the volunteer assistant coach are varied and nebulous. One thing was clear, though. When word got out that Seawolves Li Djurestål and Erik Cruz planned to get married in Catalunya this past week, attendance at the event was clearly a job for the volunteer assistant coach! Especially as we're in the thick of it in Alaska, with fall dryland training going on and the annual Ski Swap this weekend, the other coaches couldn't get away to be in Barcelona for the weekend. Nobody needed to twist my arm to get me onto a plane to Catalunya. Trading out Anchorage's rainy gray weather for the Mediterranean sun seemed all right by me. 

Li & Erik

Erik & Li

I've never been cycling in Spain before. But it seems like wherever else I've gone in Europe and raved about the good riding in France or Italy or Germany, the locals always say, "No, you really need to go to Spain; that's really where the best drivers and the best riding is!"  So I finally got my chance to spend a couple of weeks riding in Catalunya. Girona was everything I'd heard it was, and more.

Just outside Girona. Great roads. Little traffic. Unhurried drivers.

Costa Brava.

Loads of well-paved farm roads near Olot.

Every hill and knoll in Catalunya has its castle. This is Madremanya.

There are plenty of good climbs.

There's good riding on Montserrat.

One of the very best things about being associated with the Seawolves is the chance to get to know and become friends with so many interesting and wonderful people who come through this program. Given the chance to be in Catalunya to hang out with this group for a few days, there was no way I was gonna miss it! Thank you, Li and Erik, for treating us to a week together that we'll never forget!

Seawolf Mike Soetaert

Seawolf skiers at Li and Erik's wedding in Catalunya: Me, Dom Unterberger, Nicole Mah, Charley Field, Alix Wells, Li Djurestål, Erik Cruz, Georgia Burgess, Chloe Margue, Austin Huneck, Didrik Nielssen, Mike Soetaert, and friend of the team Ryan Toney.

Here's wishing the best to the newlyweds, Li and Erik, and their happy future together!