After a few little flurries of snow in the valley the weather has been pretty settled for a while now and lot's of the snow is starting to disappear as we await real winter to properly start. This hasn't stopped me getting out on skis and over the past ten days I have been out on the skis five times and out running just the once.
One of the best ridge runs near Cham but way too short
The weekend before last I headed off to Tignes with Guillem to do some touring in that area. Due to it's high elevation there was plenty of snow for us to play on from the car. The first day I managed 1600m ascent in just over 1hr 40mins. I must admit I found it pretty hard going. Guillem is pretty strong at the skimo stuff so for me going at a pace just slightly faster than I am used to was quite hard work for me but I was happy with the amount of ascent on day 1.
Cold start in Tignes
Day 2 we planned to do more fitness work. We set off from the car with head torches at 6am with a plan to summit the Grande Motte then have a little explore. However once we arrived near the top of the lift station at Tignes we were told by the ski patrol that we could not go any further as they were doing avalanche control above. The weather on the entire skin up was bitterly cold but we were greeted with stunning views in the morning light gazing around at all the fresh untouched snow that had fallen overnight. Guillem was over to see some friends from the Spanish World Cup Team but given that they are all stupidly fit and fast I spent the rest of the morning skiing back down and skiing back up again and got in another 1600m on my already tired legs from the day before. All in all a great weekend away from Cham and some really nice skiing.
Zero visibility and cold! Awesome morning,
The Wednesday after Tignes was an evening skin up Le Tour with Guillem and Graham after work. It was only 800m but it was a cracking clear night and really not that cold and we were happily surprised to find some boot top powder just next to the piste to enjoy on the descent. My ascents haven't exactly been the kind of metres you will find from a lot of others out doing skimo(Ski Mountaineering) races but I am happy for now just slowly building up to some much bigger days in the next few weeks and months to come.
Below is Guillems soon to be Oscar nominated short film of our little Le Tour outing.....next time he will clean the lens...
Friday I ran the 9km back home from work at night and loved it. I have really eased back on the running now as I try to get into shape for a big winter of skiing so it was nice to get the trail shoes back on and have a blast along the river back to the house. I felt great and really just wanted to keep running for hours more but I am going to try and rest the running legs this season as much as possible in the hope the skiing will keep me strong enough come Easter to start pounding the trails again.
Tete Du Balme with Laurent
This past weekend was spent doing yet more skinning. This time up at Le Tour. On Saturday myself , Guillem and Laurent did a great little loop of the Le Tour ski area and managed to get a good 1200m ascent and then on Sunday I headed back up with Sandy for another little short 800m outing. I'm feeling pretty strong on the up hills at the moment but I really need to work more on technique and speed if I plan on doing any proper races this winter and not finish dead last. Given the start I have had on skis so far I am pretty confident I can go from strength to strength in the coming months.
Top of Aiguilette Des Possettes
In two weeks I find out if I am lucky enough to be drawn into next years Western States 100 or Hardrock 100. Both draws take place on Dec 6th and I will be glued to twitter hoping my name comes out of one of the hats. I have a 4% yes that's a 4% chance of getting into Western. Hardrock has 1900 applicants for the 146 places available so my chances of getting into any of these races is very very slim but fingers crossed. Obviously Hardrock is the one I want the most but I won't complain if it's Western. I have been thinking a lot about next summer. My mind wanders through many ideas and changes very often but I am thinking if I do not get one of those two races I might stay in Europe next summer and do some shorter distance stuff here. I would love to run Ice Trail Tarantaise(France) , Zegama(Italy) and Tromso(Norway) and if I stayed in Europe then this would be possible. I do still want to head to the States again but maybe just for 2 or 3 weeks if funds allow. I really wish I can be at Leadville(August) again to pace but would also love to race The Rut in Montana , Flagstaff Skyrace in Arizona and The Bridger Ridge Run also in Montana but these are in Sept and Oct and I just don't think I can manage three months again without work. I am sure my mind will be changing a lot over the next few weeks but nothing will be decided properly until Dec 6th.
That's me now back in Chamonix and ready for the winter season to kick off. I actually got back on the 2nd of November but moving into a new house , starting work again and catching up with friends has caused this slight delay in posting here.
Back on Euro trails
So the day after arriving I was greeted with crisp clear blue skies so on it was with the trail shoes and I headed off up the vertical km route. I was pretty surprised how easily it seemed and I was up the 900m climb in around 45 minutes. I then continued on up to Col Cornu adding on around another 400m. I stayed at the Col for a while admiring the view , one that I never tire of seeing. It was then along to Flegere and back to Chamonix. In total it was 20km , 1300m+ and I was 2hrs 20mins.
Col Cornu
Running has continued but to be totally honest I have been finding it quite hard to not just relax after work. Having not worked since June has been a bit of a shock to the system but I need the cash asap. I have ran a couple of Les Houches laps(10km) in the evenings and one of which was a rather fun snow run with snow up to well over my ankles after we had a pretty decent dump one evening. It's been pretty good moving to a new house and heading out and exploring some trails I had never ran before. The snow has now cleared from town and we are waiting for the real winter storms to hit before I put the trail shoes to one side.
Fun at Les Houches
I managed to get my first skiing in as well last week. Myself and Guillem headed up to Le Tour on our day off work. It started with a 30 minute hike then we put on the skis and skinned up to the top of Le Tour. I felt pretty good on the up. We weren't going at an incredibly fast pace but we were up the 900m in (I think) a reasonable time but neither of us took our watches. The ski down wasn't the best snow but it was great to just be on skis again. This season I am going to focus a lot on my Skimo fitness and I will be doing a lot of ski touring and fitness work at night in Les Houches with Guillem and Naila. For sure I am not going to be giving up on lift accessed powder days though!
Le Tour
We will be able to ski from our door next month so I am pretty excited and a little nervous to see how my skimo fitness will improve training with these two who have many a years experience over me in the skimo side of things. My legs still feel strong after the summer but it's obviously a completely different technique and different muscles I will be using when trying to skin up hills as fast as I can. The bonus is that my running muscles and joints will be getting a good rest over winter and they will go back into action probably around the end of March. I will be trying to get out the odd run over the season but my focus is the ski fitness.
Near Les Carroz
I think I am going to miss trail running this winter more than I ever had. I managed to get myself into a shape I am so happy and this will slightly disappear over the cold months and I know come March it will be a tough couple of weeks physically and mentally to prove to myself I can get back to the level I was in. This cycle happens at the end of every winter season and I get through it so I am pretty confident I can get to that level of fitness again and with any luck even improve.
