Thursday, March 7, 2013

Vertfest Alpental Report

Race day greeted everyone with mild temps and drizzle.  Despite the rain, the skiing and skinning was good.  No Traslin brothers this year, guess they were sick, Heather didn't participate as she was sick as well.  Luckily (?) I just caught her bug the day before so I felt crappy but not bad enough to miss out on some suffering.  With Seth and Holly sick it seemed to be the common theme of the day for a lot of people.  Despite the Traslin brothers no show, Jason Dorais (they miss spelled his name) simply destroyed the competition putting down pretty impressive times at what was probably a comfortable pace for him.  Jason is the current Grand Teton ski speed record holder among many other accomplishments, pretty talented dude, and pretty humbling watching him just amble off into the distance.  The second place dude was a twenty something fast guy from Canada.  Another fast guy was the BD rep Alan, who Seth knew from bike racing, he was with Seth and I the whole race, and looks to be even faster once he gets more efficient.  Alan actually was ahead of me towards the end of the second lap but got off course a bit thinking the Snake Dance gate was a turnaround.  This was an opportunity I monopolized on, although I think that I could have caught him on the downhill anyways.  All in all it was a great day, making the podium was cool.


And we're off (photo courtesy Francine Curd)