Hot off the heels of securing my permanent bib at the Canadian Ski Marathon, I found myself once again boarding a bus, skis in hand, ready to tackle another great adventure. Less than 6 days after finishing the 167km journey of CSM, I was set to race two days back-to-back at the 40th Annual Gatineau Loppet! Day 1 would be the 51km linear Classic race, followed by repeating the exact same 51km course the next day, but this time on skate skis. Beyond the challenge of just mentally preparing for such a feat less than a week after CSM, this […]
cross-country skiing
6 posts
Hello friends! Seems like my blog posts are becoming fewer and farther between, but I assure you it is not for a lack of my being active. On the contrary, I’m still up to my tricks, training and racing whenever the urge strikes. However, I find these days with other platforms around, I often just scratch out a short FB post instead to summarize some of my exploits. However, sometimes, it’s still worth me archiving results in a more permanent way with a full story. This post it such a time, as it will talk about my recent [successful] completion […]
Every year, while I’m in the middle of it, I swear I will never do it again. I’m of course speaking about the venerable Canadian Ski Marathon, now in its 49th year. The event is pretty much unique in its nature. At the core, it is 160km of cross-country skiing, split over two days. Each day is split into 5 sections, with varying degrees of challenge, from easy to hard, depending on whether there are big climbs, tricky descents, or wide open fields. Participants have the option to tackle the whole event as a coureur de bois, or just be […]
A week has gone by. The soreness has passed. The tally of toenails I’m likely to lose is up to three. I’m ready to tell my tale, and I almost think I’m ready to contemplate doing it all over again next year! Yes, I’m speaking about the Canadian Ski Marathon. The yearly pilgrimage between Lachute and Buckingham. 160km over two days of pure classic cross-country skiing bliss. This year I was tackling my Coureur des Bois Gold pin. This entails doing the entire thing with a pack carrying all your food and camping gear, and sleeping out under the stars on a […]
Howdy everyone! I hope that everyone is enjoying the long overdue spring weather that we may be finally getting. Just today, I finally noticed some buds appearing on the branches, so I *think* we may finally have bid adieu to winter! However, it does appear as though I was a tad premature in my final post when I indicated that it was my last race for the winter season. As it turns out, thanks in part to late snow, I had one final crazy race to try my luck in. XCZone’s Camp Fortune Nordix Skier-Cross Races. Yup, quite a mouthful, but if you’ll bear with me, I can explain (and show) it all. To put you in the right frame of mind, imagine if Red Bull put on a race downhill using cross-country skis. Oh wait! THEY DO! This was the ‘local’ version of that kind of thing. Before you read on, please feel free to look at the pictures I took (embedded below), then hear my story.