last days of 2007

Yesterday I decided to ride my single speed to the west side of I-90 bridge from my house so that I could figure out my bike route to work. I could have taken my road bike but I was in no hurry and did not want to get it dirty since it looked like it would rain so I took the single. It was not the easiest ride to do on a single - it is pretty much rolling hills the entire way. Totally no big deal on my road bike with all its gears but on the single I was standing a lot to climb and I just could not go as fast even on the flatter sections. It took me about an hour to reach the west side on I-90 bridge. I had to take a picture to prove I did it :)
The ride back was pretty low key though I started to see other people out on their bikes. There was one really steep hill in the eastgate area that just plain sucked but otherwise the ride was not to bad. The worst part was my toes froze - I had toe covers but for some reason I did not put toe warmers in and by the time I got home they were ice cubes. I took a really long very hot shower and took a short nap. It was a good day :)

Today Kyle and I went skiing. It is so strange because we have not been free skiing in the last few years and last year we both were just burnt out on it - but both of us were really excited to go up and free ski on our home hill. We both pretty much grew up at Alpental skiing, we met skiing at Alpental, and the first winter we knew each other we spent all our time skiing together there. So It was really fun to go up and just go skiing to have fun. The day was perfect mostly sunny but still cold so the snow was dry (well dry for western washington). My new fat skis have not shown up yet so I skied on my "spoons" (slalom skis with really big tips). Kyle was nice enough to not rub it in that he had his fat skis and skied his new progressors (a cross between a gs and slalom ski).
We did not waste any time on the lower mountain and went straight up to chair 2 - who really needs a warm up lol. There was a bit of a line but nothing to bad (just always go to the far left - it is way faster).
We wound up skiing the top of the mountain most of the day. Kyle found a cliff or two to jump and we skied some of our favorite runs that even at the end of the day still have untracked snow :) Every run made me happy. It felt so good to be on skis again. I was surprised how good my legs felt - the first run my quads were a bit sore from my ride but after that it went away and I felt great.My form was good - I could have been more forward but I had to keep my tips from going under to much - I found my rhythm and had a blast. For our last run we skied all the way down via International and then Felsen.
When I was an instructor I would try and get 2 run tops to bottom non stop in during lunch (good memories). The entrence is always crap but the rest of it was good - really good coverage for this time of year.



I have to say it was really fun to do something that I'm good at - I mean I always feel like I'm so far behind on swim/bike/run stuff but skiing I have done since I was really little and now it is just easy and very natural. Maybe if I'm lucky someday I will feel the same when it comes to triathlon. It is also a nice plus that Kyle and I are pretty much equals at skiing so we can easily ski together - whereas he is much faster than me on a bike or running which makes it hard to train together.
I wore my garmin for fun and just let it run the whole time we skied. My heart rate stays pretty low - good base training - which explains why I always lost so much weight every winter.

In all the last day of 2007 was a Very good day.

2008 goals coming soon - I register for Vineman today :)