More pictures from Georgia

Here are some of Nancy's pictures from our trip:

That's the view that Nancy had for the first several days of our trip - me working. Nice cheese platter though. This was taken at a restaurant in Munich where we grabbed an afternoon snack and beer.
We arrived in Tbilisi at 4am, and typically Kevin and/or I would just hop in a cab and head to the hotel. This is what Nancy and I were planning on, Irakli surprised us by picking us up at the airport and bringing this massive bouquet of flowers for Nancy. I was previously aware that everyone in Georgia was looking forward to meeting Nance, but this solidified it.
This is a very old church in Tbilisi.
This is an old-looking church, however it was build very recently and is in Tbilisi.
Left to right - Irakli, Sylwek, myself and Kevin - we're on way to a "heavy" dinner with some customers and their wives.
Sylwek, Nancy, myself and Kev.
This is a shot of the feast we were at. On the right is Ivane, Roini, Mikel (both really important customers and Mikel and Irakli's wives.
Nancy and Nana (Ivane's sister) in front of a very old church - there's a theme here, there are a lot of very old church's in Georgia.
Don (a co-worker) and Irakli in front of a massive plate of meat and cucumbers.
Nancy, Nana and a friend of Nana's.
Nancy and I.
Nancy, Ivane and I. As you can see, I'm also representing Nancy's Fathers' side of the family in this picture - I gotta figure that I was the only one sporting an Oregon Duck shirt in the Republic of Georgia that particular day!!

Georgia recap with pictures

As I mentioned in my previous post, Nancy and I just got home from Georgia. I was there for work, and Nancy went along to do some sight seeing with the wife and sister of our local partner (who she had met when they visited Rochester last October). It was a very busy week, but there were the usual Georgian dinners and socializing, which are always enjoyable. On the way there, we had a 12 hour layover in Munich. If I was travelling alone (like usual), I would have alternated between doing work in a hotspot somewhere and walking laps around the airport. Since Nancy was with me, we decided to take a train into Munich, which was a city neither of us had been to. Below are some pictures from the trip.

This is from a tower in Munich which we had to take a long elevator to the top of.

A picture from the other side of the tower overlooking the City Center of Munich.

We signed the guestbook in the tower. This layover was the bulk of how we spent our first Valentine's day as a married couple. Not your average dinner and a movie, eh?

Nancy in the Center City Square.

My buddy Scott Schneider (from Philly) told us to check out his namesake's brewery in Munich. We found it, but it was closed until 5pm and we didn't have time to stop in to sample the local brew, as we had to head back to the airport to catch our flight to Tbilisi.

During all of the week days that we were there, I was tied up with work and Nancy was being shown the sights of Tbilisi and the surrounding areas.

Nancy was able to experience several traditional Georgian dinners as well. In addition to my good friend Kevin, who seems to live in Tbilisi these days, Sylwek (a Polish engineer who works for us) was also in town doing some work for us. Over the years, I've spent a lot of time with Sylwek in Poland and he's a good friend. It was great that Nancy was able to meet him as well for the first time. The next few pictures are from one of the Georgian dinners.

Left to right is Sylwek, myelf, Nancy, and Irakli (who works for our local partner and is always a gracious host).

Kevin and Bata (Ivane's friend). Bata has no business relationship with us, but Kevin and I have hung out with him socially a few times over the years and he's a great guy. It always amazes me how warm and welcoming Georgians are from the very first time you meet them. Bata is a great example of this as every time he sees Kevin or I, since the first time we met him two years ago, he always greets us with a big smile and a hug.
Mamuka (another of Ivane's friend's who we've run into at many a Georgian feast) and Ivane, who's apparently thinking very deep thoughts.

Temuri, Sylwek and I. Sylwek is very well respected by our customers here as well as in Poland. Usually one of the first questions I am asked when meeting with an end user is "when is Sylwek coming back? We have more questions for him."

Myself, Kevin and Sylwek. Sylwek convinced the bar tender this particular night to make Polish "Crazy Dogs" for everyone, which is a mixture of raspberry syrup and vodka and taken like a shot (it layers in the shot glass like the Polish flag). I've had many of these in Poland, but this was my first in Georgia, and Nancy's first ever. Sylwek officially certified Nancy as "tough enough to bring to Kielce." Kielce is a very small town in Poland which hosts a trade show that we attend every year - there are a lot of crazy dogs that happen there.

The Saturday that we were there, I finally had a break in the work side of things and Nancy and I were able to walk around Tbilisi, Georgia to see some of the sights. She had already been given the full tour of the major sights in Tbilisi by our hosts and most likely knows more about Tbilisi than I do at this point.

Nancy in front of a major traffic square.

Me in front of a massive statue. The statue is looking down on me and I have to admit, I was a little intimidated.

Later that night, Ivane and Bata took us to do some more sight seeing and then took us to dinner at an "Elvis Bar". The Elvis Bar served all of the following Georgian food, pizza, sushi (first time eating sushi outside the US for me), Chinese food and ice cream and had a live Beatles cover band playing. It was a pretty unique experience for sure! The picture below is Nancy, myself and Ivane in front of the theater in Tbilisi, outside the Elvis Bar.

I know Nancy has many more pictures on her camera, so maybe I'll be able to do another post with some of those. Overall it was a really good trip and Nancy had a great time seeing the sights and experiencing some excellent Georgian hospitality.

Still here...

It's been a while since I updated here. I was in Georgia last week and it was wall-to-wall action. Nancy was able to come on this trip, which was very nice. I have a lot of pictures and will post a much longer recap of the trip as soon as possible. Now, I'm currently in a jet-lag induced fog and am looking forward to getting back on snow for the next week, then I am headed out west on vacation for a ski race in Montana and some back country skiing with a couple buddies in Utah.

More to follow soon.

SLOW DOWN...50km as in 5-0km is a long way!!

Ok, so my 2nd try at the Lake Placid Loppet didn't go quite as well as the first go-around last year. Jason did a nice job summarizing everything from our team's perspective on the RNR website, so I won't repeat everything here. I will say that Jason had an amazing day to finish 3rd, which is the first podium result in a American Ski Marathon race for any of us, so congrats to him.

For me, I think a combination of things derailed my race. The first and foremost was that Ithink I skied the first 5km (which is almost all uphill) as fast as any 5km I've skied this year, I just kept telling myself to push, push, push, things will slow down. Well, they did slow down, the only problem was that it was I, who slowed down and the leaders who skied away. The middle 25km or so, were pretty brutal. It felt like I was skiing in slow motion, just trying to recover and get back into some type of rythym. I did manage to ski the last 10km relatively strong (emphasis on relative) and was able to pick up a few spots near the end, which was a solid way to end the race. When all was said and done, I finished 13th. I'd be lying if I said I would have been happy with that at the beginning of the race, but by the end, I was just happy it was over. I guess that's the thing about doing these marathons, when a day doesn't go great, it's still an accomplishment to gut it out and drag yourself to the line, or at least that's the rationalization I'm using. I do know that I had to dig deeper and be much tougher mentally this year than last year. I guess it's possible that I was simply in better shape last year (which is a harsh realization considering the amount of training I've put in). I would like to think that the effort over the first 10km put me into the red zone for too long to recover from while trying to still ski fast and simply bonked (whoever invented the word "bonk" was a genius by the way).

Just like last year, we had the full A-Team in the feed zones to help us out. One of the other problems I had was that I didn't follow my nutrition strategy at all. Here's a picture of Libby's hand-written notes before the race on what each of us wanted at various points during the race:
Please note that Jason's final Gel is "Jacked up with Caffeine" (with 2 underlines)!!

Since this isn't completely legible online - My initial plan was:

- take 1/2 an Odwalla bar and a new water bottle with GU sports drink at 17km (I only took the bottle)

- take a Gu gel and my last GU drink bottle at 25km (I only took the gel)

- take a final gel with 8km to go (I didn't take anything).

So the only things I put into my body while skiing 50km up two big mountains was two sports drink bottles (about 200 calories total) and one gel (about 100 calories if I had managed to take the whole thing, which I didn't, because - honestly, it's not that easy to ski and operate a gel at the same time)...that's about 300 calories, while my heart rate monitor said I burned about 3000 during the race...not my most intelligent maneuver, but it's really easy to not always use your brain when your heart is beating through your eyeballs and it feels like your entire body is about to cramp up...

anyways, I love ski racing, have I said that recently?!?

Oddly enough, I think that going out too hard also led to me refusing so much of my initial nutrition plan, I'm not sure my stomach could have handled anything more than what I put into it, but my body needed it.

So, now that I've completed my 4th ski marathon I've experienced all of the following:

- screwed up kick wax and had to double pole for 40km of a 50km race (Tug Hill Tourathon - 2008)
- made mistake of relying on gels and a water bottle in sub-zero temps AND learned the harsh necessity of doubling up on wind briefs during marathons in cold temps - (Fishcher Loppet 2009)
- went out too hard, refused too much food/drink and was seeing stars for about 20km while trying to ski - your basic bonk - (Lake Placid Loppet 2011)

I'm told by the elder-statesmen from the Rochester area that have done a lot of these marathons that these are all pretty common mistakes and not to worry.

Ok, here's the more interesting portion of this blog post, the pictures:

Here's the start, the RNR crew and the Jacked Up old man are all on the right side of the front row.

That's me going out for my final 8km, skiing past Nancy's outstretched right hand, holding "bottle #3".

Much like last year, we had a few others come up including Jane, George and Jane's boyfriend Matt. We stayed at the High Peaks Cyclery Guidehouse in town. Following the race on Saturday, we went out for some festivities that included the Brewpub, Lisa G's and some fooseball at Wise Guys.

This is Derrick and Chad taking on Matt and Jane. Never, ever take on anyone that went to Clarkson in fooseball...they didn't have much else to do up there in Potsdam!

Jane and her boyfriend. After the race, Nancy and these two when on a snowshoe that somehow led to them snowshoeing down an abandoned bobsled track. I'm not sure how that's possible, but I'd like to see some pictures.

This is George watching some speed skaters cruise around the 1980 Olympic Oval.

Overall, it was a very fun weekend. I would have liked to have a better race, but it was definitely still a rewarding race and I feel like I gained some additional experience. I'm definitely going to tweak a few parts of my strategy before my next marathon, which will be the Rendezvous Yellowstone Ski Marathon in West Yellowstone, MT in three and a half weeks.

Quick update

Last weekend's races went pretty well overall. Saturday's race would have been a pretty average race until I crashed on my last lap, got the wind knocked out of me, and limped home to the finish. I didn't feel great skiing, but ok, and my shooting was also frustratingly average. Thankfully, I escaped the crash with no injuries and no broken equipment, it was quite a face plant I'm told. After the race, the guy we were staying with for the weekend gave me a tour up to the Marcy Dam on back country skis. It was a fun little detour and got my mind off of crashing and missing targets, definitely recharged me mentally for the race the following day. Sunday's race went substantially better, my shooting improved, especially in prone (90%) and I felt much stronger skiing than the previous day. It felt as though I was skiing smooth and under control. Since that was most likely my last biathlon race of the winter, it was good to finish on a high note, as that was probably my strongest all-around race this year.

It's been a busy week after getting home, I've spent the week so far cramming in work and unpacking, repacking and re-waxing for this weekend and the week's already almost over.

This weekend is the Lake Placid Loppet 50km. They just got some new snow, which should slow things down a little, but it should be a good one. We've got a big group going up and should have some excellent race support in the feed zones. Hopefully I'll have more time to update next week. Lots of big things coming up and lots of different places I'll be visiting over the next 6 weeks!

Eventful training in Rochester

I was able to get in a good solid weekend of training this past weekend in Rochester. One long, slow classic ski and one hard, threshold skate ski. I'll be gone the next several weekends, so it was nice to ski locally in the daylight, a pleasure that I don't often get to indulge in.

On Saturday, Chad, Jason and I went out to Harriet Hollister Spencer State Park for a three hour classic ski. It was pretty cold (single digits), which makes for great classic skiing. It also typically makes the kick-wax very straightforward. The wax of the day was Special Green. I think they call it "Special" because it lasts forever, seriously. Any cross country skier who sees the bottom of one of these guys is putting in some serious kilometers, I don't even think it's possible. I've had this since I was in high school, and sadly, that was a long time ago.
About two and a half hours in, while skiing down a trail called "Bear Trap" which used to be called "The Pit", Jason hit a bump and remodeled his ski's!

I don't think it's supposed to do that!

This trail has a long, storied history of causing stuff to break. When I was in high school, they used to put mats on trees at the bottom because they were worried about racers crashing into them (granted, the mats were very thin and when frozen, likely offered less padding than the actual tree bark) and nowadays, the high schoolers don't race down this trail. Anyways, Jason was ok and wasn't all that concerned about his 12 year-old ski finally going where all good skis go when their time is up. He did proclaim to have "Bomber kick" while skiing back to the parking lot with the broken ski.

This weekend, Jason and I are making the trip up to Lake Placid for two NorAm cup biathlon races. These are trial races for the Canadian national team and the US B team will be back from Europe, so it should be super competitive. I'm looking forward to it.

P.S. - according to blogger.com, this is my 100th blog post.

Lake Placid Super Tour weekend recap

I will start by stating that last weekend was an absolute blast, and I truly love ski racing and training. I just wanted to make that clear, as the rest of the post may not give everyone the impression that I'm actually enjoying all of this. I am. Now on to the rest of the story...

Chad, Jason, Sam (Chad's college buddy) and I split the kitchenette unit at the Jack Rabbit (which apparently is now called "Tmax-n-Topo", but I refuse to call it anything other than the Jack Rabbit).

I went into it thinking that I would struggle in Friday's classic race and do better in the skate race. That's why you race I guess - my classic race ended up being pretty good (at least compared to other classic races I've done) and my skate race was kind of a disaster. The classic race was held at the ski jumps in Lake Placid and was essentially five laps of a 2km course that was uphill for 1km and downhill for 1km. I actually felt very strong on the striding sections of the course. I lost some time in the turnaround section at the bottom of the course and had a pretty weak final lap, but for the first time I felt like I skied strong in a classic race and felt spent at the end. So, that was a positive sign for sure, and somewhat of a relief that maybe I'm finally making some progress with my classic technique.

Picture couresty of FasterSkier.com - this was taken at the bottom of the course, we made a right at the end of the bleachers and started making our way back up to the top of the hill again.

On to the skate race - the race was 3 laps of a 5km loop on the biathlon side of Mt. Van Hovenberg. I didn't feel great warming up and it only seemed to get worse, not sure what was wrong, just didn't have any energy and felt like I was spinning my wheels a little, meaning I felt like I was working really hard, but not getting anywhere. I knew about 90 seconds into the race that I was in trouble and the tough part about XC skiing is that there is nowhere to hide when you're having a bad day, so I spent the next 47:30 thinking about being anywhere other than where I was. Not to get too statistical, but my average heart rate for the race was identical both days (178), but on Saturday, I basically only had one gear and couldn't recover at all. It seemed like I was pegged the whole time, but going nowhere. Definitely very frustrating as I'd had that race circled on my calendar since September. I left the race not knowing what to think, but it was definitely one of those days where I didn't need to see the results sheet to know that it wasn't a good one.

Hopefully this next part doesn't get too philosophical - I've had a couple similar races over the last couple years that just don't seem to make sense to me - one day I feel great, super strong and the next I just don't have anything in the tank - perhaps it's lack of recovery, or bad nutrition, or a flukey bad day, or not enough sleep, or maybe I just need to train harder or maybe I need to not train as hard or maybe I'm getting sick (more on that later)? So, based on all those possibilities, it could be anything, so what do I make of it? Anyways, this is one of the challenges that I think endurance athletes have that I never had playing baseball. In baseball, there are a lot less variables that you actually have control over (there are a LOT of variables, don't misunderstand me, but the amount that an individual baseball player actually controls are really pretty limited) and if you're struggling with one aspect, the solution is pretty simple - you need to work harder at it, more swings, more time in the weight room, more long toss, more groundballs, etc, it usually always boils down to MORE of something. With skiing (or biking) I've found that it could mean you need to train more, but it could just as easily mean that you need to rest more, or that you need to change something in your diet, or you just need more sleep....it's easy to see how this can mess with one's head...once again, I need to remind myself to stop thinking meat, it can only hurt the ballclub.

Given all these questions and frustrations running through my brain, I decided to chalk it up to the "flukey bad day" reason listed above and forget about it. So, with all the racing done, the four of us headed to the LP Brewpub for some dinner and UBU.

On Sunday we headed out for morning ski to do a little preview of the Porter Mtn Loop which we'll be racing on in two weeks at the Loppet. It was absolutely awesome out, any remnants of my bad race from the previous day were fully flushed from my brain following this morning ski.

Jason took this snapshot of Chad, Sam and I at the top of Hi-Notch, which is an extension of the Porter Mtn loop.

Once I got home, unpacked everything and pretty much went to sleep. Monday afternoon I got hit with some type of stomach bug and was out of commission until about 9am this morning and I mean totally out, couldn't get off couch for a full day, haven't been that sick since college. It's possible my body was trying to fight something during the race on Saturday and then finally lost that battle, or it's possible that pushing hard while having an off-day broke my immune system down to the point where I picked something up, or it's possible that I just had a bad race and it had nothing to do with me getting sick. But, taking the same approach that I explained above, analyzing all the possibilities may be a fruitless endeavor, so I'm just going to go with the old slogan "When it's your day to get sick, it's your day to get sick." Quite philosophical, isn't it?

No races this weekend coming up, so hopefully I can shake the rest of this bug and get out for some good skiing to prep for some NorAm Cup races and the LP Loppet.