An update

Here are some random thoughts:

1. One of my classmates that I spent Dec. in Hibbing with sent me a pic that he took while we were up there. One of the last nights that we were there we went out to the lake (there was no snow on the trails) and skied around. Two of them had never skied before, but one of my classmates in dental school is Renee Kinney (skied for Stillwater HS, U of Vermont and Team Birkie), and so between her and I there was equipment to use. It was fun to all get out on skis together.

2. I was very sad to hear that Cindy Brochman had passed away after her long battle with cancer. She ran with Nichole on the run n fun team, and I only ever heard good things about her.

3. I did the TC Championships this past weekend, and it was a ton of fun. I am looking forward to skiing it next year, and hopefully I will get out on classic skis a bit more before that race. This year I got out great at the start (and avoided the large pile-up), but I did not have the fitness to stick with the leaders. This kind of worries me, since I signed up for the long race at all of the big races this year (COLL, Mora, Birkie). It also could be because I am not as good of a classic skier. The skate race on Sunday went well. Even though I still lost more time to Bjorn and Matt than I would have liked, I was able to post the 5th fastest skate time of the day and catch a number of guys who beat me in the classic race.

Vakava skiers (and others we claim as our own) at TC Champs:

Men: 2nd overall-Bjorn Batdorf (1st in classic, 2nd in skate), 8th-Nathan Porath, 19th-Derek Wallen, 27th-Andy Schakel, 32nd-Dave Christopherson (1st in age group), 33rd-Ryan Atwell, 38th-Per Nelson, 50th-Kevin Ivens,

Women: 1st overall-Jojo Winters (2nd in classic, 4th in skate), 3rd-Kathleen Dewall (1st in skate), 5th-Angie Robinson (3rd in skate), 8th-Cheryl Dubois, 10th-Margie Nelson, 13th-Mel McMillian, 18th-Sara Conrad, 22nd-Katie Anderson, 24th-Allie Rykken

4. Bert Blyleven misses the baseball HOF by 5 votes. Seriously? Go Twins.