Counting Down!

I was very lucky to arrive in Anchorage earlier this week without any flight cancellations or delays. The Seattle airport was complete mayhem as I frantically ran through it to catch my flight to Anchorage. I was greeted with a fresh dusting of snow and nice, cold Alaska temperatures.

Racers at Kincaid Park

The next morning I was up bright and early, ready to go for a ski at 9am…except, it was still dark! I waited another hour and half for the sun to rise and finally strapped my skis on at 11am. I was off! I enjoyed a wonderful ski at Kincaid Park, the venue for the U.S. Cross-Country Ski Championships starting next week! Due to some trail maintenance and remodeling in the past year, I felt like I was in a new place and had never skied there before! With the help of a map, I figured out the race course for the sprints and the distance races. Within the first ten minutes of my ski, I ran into a moose chomping on a tree. That was when I really knew I was skiing in Alaska!

One of many moose I've run into on the ski trails

It snowed 8 inches on Christmas. The ski trails are in pristine shape and Kincaid Park is bustling with people as they prepare to host U.S. Nationals next week. The countdown is on…seven days till the first race! I will keep you posted on how things go. In the meantime, I’ll be trying to keep warm with temperatures getting as cold as 10 below zero!

Check out www.anchoragenordicski.com for a link to U.S. National info and results