Mini Tour De Ski

Right now departure for a European Tour de Ski is imminent. At Area 143 2 snow towers need some TLC and the Groomer is beached due to track malfunction. Training loop is 1/2 way to completion.

Currently delayed and have to fly backwards to get to where the action is. Why does Washington DC area need snow?? Who knows??

Plan is to do 15km Skate Mass Start, Sprint Relay, 25km Patrol Race followed by 50km Skatte World Loppet Wed-Sat. As part of the Italian Military Ski Championships in the Sud Tirol then the KLL, Konig Ludwig Lauf.

That will give my Wife time to fix all and get the training loop completed.

Voodoo Man

Right Before I Devoured the Voodoo Man

Found this man at the 1980 timing hut on top of Algonquin Hill at the high point on Porter Mtn loop.(LakePlacid)

Was out doing a post race harder then race classic session on my favorite loop. (7x last weekend)

The VooDoo guy got revenge by making me put too much sticky stuff on my classic skis the next morning.

Question of the Week

Why doesn't the Harry Eldridge Memorial ski race go up Harry's Hill?

Take Home Lessons

#1 Do not put so much goop on bottom of skis

#2 Do not do races on flat courses when I can go train on real terrain. It gets in the way of training. A 3-5 hour ski on Porter Mtn loop was negated. although the race was fun.

#3 Get the race to be 3x East Mtn with Harry's hill.

Take Home Points

Confessions of a Training Addict

My New Training Partner

He constantly heckles me

"Is that all you got?" , "You can't wipe me out!!", As He Wips my leash "GO Horsey GO!"

Warning what follows is perseveration. To proceed may alter your thought patterns.

I'm not kidding.

Sounds simple at first. Addicted to training. Not Exactly. Definitely not addicted to plodding along through anything. Not a Day, not a second, not any workout, ski, bike, hike, run, kayak. Abhor even wasting a second. Am on a mission to achieve excellence in all its varying aspects and forms.

Understand??

JackedUp are you addicted to training? Definitely!!

Not plodding though. Am forever seeking the state where the mind is in control and the body just responds. The "Flow", " Nirvana" , and or "Something".

Don't assume that I'm crazy, yes driven but not crazed. If I really wanted to make the Olympic team I would have quit my job, sequestered myself from my family created a support team to facilitate peak performance.

Does anyone realize what goes into obtaining orchestrated peak performance. Analyze the support staff behind most successful athletes.

Don't think or assume that this implies that I did not give 100% in order to tryout for the 2010 Olympics, with my limitations and constraints I gave 110%. Through this journey I have received unfathomable support from my Family, my Coworkers and National Guard Biathlon. Not forgetting help from Friends and Acquaintance's. ( For some strange reason, probably prefer to remain anonymous.)

As one gets older we get distractions, commitments, and limitations for me that is a family and a job. Yes I would've been thrilled to race in another Olympics and would not have tried if it wasn't possible.

The truth of the matter is that I just love training and racing. This is a similar situation to back when I would bring extra stuff home that I would collect a the dump then return 90% of it letting my wife think that she had won. When the actually I had claimed the Victory and Wife never knew it.

Remember as Tsen Tsu taught in the China 5th Century BC " When a Victorious Warrior is Victorious: No one knows he has attained Victory"

Training to make this Olympics in a way was akin to the dump analogy in that it allowed me to train logarithmically more then if I wasn't training for something big.

In a Machiavellian way the ends justified the means. Due to the enlistment of Wife and Kids was able to train copious amounts of hours. Now I need some outlandish justification to go on another training mission. Right now I have JackedUp's version of the "Tour De Ski" and the World Military Championship at the end of March.

While I have heard countless so training maniacs say that if they were to become paralyzed, lose a leg that they would rather die. For me a die hard training addict I find those statements repulsive and spurious to my training mission for life. No matter what the handicap there would be a new training mission and an odyssey for excellence. If I was locked in(means totally paralyzed, not even your eyes move. No way to communicate your alive except brain scan) with only brain waves functioning I would just imagine excellence and live it through some alpha waves working on a virtual perfection of sport. Never say die, never give up.

Unfortunately Racing is a necessary evil but it can get in the way of optimal training. Now I can train for training sakes. Optimal training.

Stay tuned for elaboration on the Training Wars.

Next???

Stay tuned for elaboration on training Wars.

Training War

Its all about training. Victory is measured by total system destruction.

To a training addict.

More to follow.

Maybe? We Will See

Finally after at least 6 years of "NO WAY" . We have a "Maybe".

That is the answer to the question, suggestion, encouragement to one "Chambo" to try Biathlon out.

I have been following Chambo since his college days where he was tearing up the tracks as a collegiate skier when I was coaching at St Lawrence. Later racing against him over the years.

It is too bad that he has not trained for Biathlon these past years.

Biathlon is an addictive sport. Very humiliating also. One can wonder why extremely talented skiers such as Lars Berger, and Ronny Hasfas compete in Biathlon where they constantly get punished with penalty loops when they will for sure have a chance of a podium in a "Special Race".

As Josh Thompson would say: "Biathlon is a sport where you have to be smart enough to figure it out and STUPID enough to keep doing it"

Maybe I do not like Chambo and want to watch him to suffer painfully doing Biathlon.

No actually, Chambo would be a kick ass biathlete. He is fast strong skier.. His Wife, Beth Ann is a National Class Biathlete and he still has many good years of skiing in him.

As has been demonstrated a Biathlete can do well in a ski race, but a Skier would have a hard time excelling in a Biathlon Competition.

Hopefully he will take the plunge.

Itasca Biathlon Trials

Gravestone GeneratorThey are not dead till they are warm and dead.Do not believe everything you see.The Nerve
Although it has it has warmed up from subzero temp to the low teens it is still cold out here. While some people may lose focus towards the end of a tryouts. JackedUp knows it is go time.
In 2006 a faction of MWSC and the USBA put up a gravestone in Fort Kent Maine. Marking the end of BIathlon for JackedUp. I missed that team by 3 places working full time as an Anesthesiologist and as a National Guardsman.

To seal the deal on June 26th 2006 due to a mechanical during a bike race I suffered a fractured Acetabulum and Pelvis. Was relegated to crutches for 2 months. For awhile it was questionable weather I would be able to run again yet return to a competitive level in any sport. Due to the timing of this missed a deployment to Iraq in its stead had a Sept till Dec training camp in Boston with the US Army doing an active duty stint and with CSU(Cambridge Sports Union) After all clawed my way back so that:In spring I returned to Fort Kent and took home 2 National Biathlon Championship medals.
Now it is the last hour of tryouts. So far shooting has been ok. Skiing speed has not been as fast as expected.
Ready to $^&^$ on that F@#$% Gravestone during the next race.

Leaving Canmore's Paradise at O'Dark Hundred

Pre- Race; receiving race instructions from the "Institute" and while Simultaneously deriving Unfathomable Mental, Physical, Social, and Psychic Euphoria from watching Tim Burke REPEADETLY make the European's and the "Grown" Men who coach them cry.

Chasing the Montana Mountain Man Dan Campbell

(Wouldn't it have been awesome to actually finish on the summit of one of those peaks?)

Dan and I passing some junior racer's on our last loop. Notice the "Steam" coming off all of us.

Canmore Nordic Center did it. They made 2 separate race loops. Although it wasn't the exact loop that I lusted for, the 3.3 km loop there is a gas. They did an excellent job. It is amazing how they got so much dine in just a couple of days time. The last races before the tryout series are over.

Photo Credit to Brandon Adams. Utah National Guard.