I may have gone for the most treacherous roller ski of my life on Saturday. I needed to do a 3 hour skate ski. I hadn’t checked the weather, but I knew it was supposed to rain all day. I waited around the house all morning for a window so I could at least warm up before getting wet. It didn’t happen, and at about noon I decided to get out the door so that I could shower and relax for an hour before I had to be at work. The first 15 minutes were not too bad, but as soon as I got out into the wind, I was getting pelted with rain underneath my rain visor. The wind was blowing my poles so hard that they were nearly useless in some places. I got a branch the size of a small tree stuck on my roller ski and tripped at around 2 hours when my head was down for too long. The whole thing was pretty much miserable until I was on my way home. I was 2.5 hours into the ski and soaking wet when I turned down Lakeshore Blvd. and skied past a road closed sign. Lakeshore Blvd. goes a few miles along the lake and it is lined with a huge wall of boulders separating the road from the lake. The lake was this deep, mood ring green and it was kicking up the biggest waves I have ever seen in Marquette. Waves were crashing over the rocks and spewing water the size of semi-trucks onto the road. There was debris all over the bike path. Since the road was closed to cars, there were people walking all over the road with flip flops and cameras. Everyone outdoors was as excited to be there as a little kid playing in the rain. I skied along the road and went through several places where the standing water was well over my ski boots. I wish I had my camera but it was way too wet to bring it. As usual, Lake Superior sent me home happy.

Last week was a hard week of training for me and it pretty much rained every day. Now the sun is back out in Marquette and I’m taking it easy before heading to our next CXC Team Vertical Limit camp in Hayward on Thursday.

Some family friends, Mike and Jane Mandli, were up visiting Marquette last weekend and I’m glad they got a chance to see the sun. Mike and I went for a 2+ hour roller ski in Skandia on Sunday before they went home to Germantown, WI.

The CXC Team Vertical Limit just finished its fourth camp of the year in Ironwood, MI.  I have spent a lot of time in Ironwood, but never in the Summer time.  I was pleasantly surprised by how good the training was there.  There are lots of giant hills with very little traffic.  We stayed at the Wolverine Village, directly across from the Wolverine ski trails.  Bob and Debbie were our hosts and they treated us very well, including cooking beautiful Italian meals for us a couple of times.

I’m back in Marquette now doing some working and training.  The 2009 Fall semester starts next week and I will be taking the last class I need for my Master’s Degree in Exercise Science.  It is a one credit Lab course on VO2max.  Since school is starting, all the NMU skiers are back in town and there are lots of people to train with.

Photos from Ironwood camp (courtesy of Audrey Weber, I think):

Garrott, Carl and Bryan on an OD Skate ski

Garrott, Carl, Gregg and Bryan doing L-3 skate intervals

Maria, Jessie, Kelly and Audrey doing a mock classic sprint race

Kristina, Jessie, Kelly and Maria enjoying Lake Superior

Check out my article on www.fasterskier.com by clicking HERE!

On the way home from Colorado Bryan and I swung by Milwaukee to go to Nicki and Jeff Wolf’s wedding (a good friend from my Waukesha K-12 School days). Their wedding was really fun as well. It was great to see Nicki, her awesome family, and some of my other high school friends again.

Before heading back to Marquette, Bryan and I spent the night at the Eloranta residence in Pewaukee, WI, and went for a long roller ski on Sunday morning. It was super hot and humid; however, we were still able to recruit some friends to come along. One of my best buddies, Shane Hoelz, was home from dental school and joined us for half of the roller ski, and my little brother Thomas came all the way from Madison to roller ski with us in the heat. We were very temped to stay in Waukesha Sunday night to check out the Wisconsin State Fair with the Hoelz family but we had to get back to Marquette for work. Fortunately, Shane said that the chocolate covered bacon wasn’t as good as it sounds.