As some of you rabid Fasterskier readers already know, today was the first real distance race of the season. Although advertised as a 15k, it had to have been more like 12 or 13; although he’s fast, there’s no way Leif was skiing 2 minutes a kilometer to win this first SuperTour Distance race in 32 minutes.

“Meh…”

That’s basically the most accurate description of today’s race for the FAST boys. David was the top Junior male by a long-shot for the second race in a row, a feat which continues to garner absolutely zero attention on this website for some reason. Besides that, there weren’t a whole lot of highlights. Actually, Werner probably had the best race of any of us. He rallied his way into the top 10 Juniors overall, which is pretty impressive, considering the field is pretty stacked and we are racing at altitude.

More importantly, the results to the quiz posted two days ago will now be revealed. I know you have all been holding your breath until this moment, but it has finally arrived. We’ve just been told that FXC coach Peter Leonard has generously volunteered to donate a week’s worth of free technique lessons to the winner, which incidentally happens to be David’s older sister Mishelle.

The winning, and correct answers are:

A = Werner         B = Tyson            C = Reese             D = David

Werner taking it to the line!

Other than the race, there were a few other highlights from the day:

Tyson found a sick brain bucket to cover up that mop

We found the Fischer room-service-racing-cart, in a Carbonlite version!

Wicked-est fanny pack EVER!!!!

To top it all off, we scored some free dessert!! Fried Dough and Chocolate Lava Bomb!

Happy Thanksgiving- Today was an amazing day for testing skis and getting set for tomorrow. My first realization for the day was that the racing tomorrow is going to be awesome.

Everyone seems ready to rock, even my bro who came down from Bozeman, and I think we are all looking good. Well after a rough night with the hole ski I am not sure what to say. They did not perform as well as I was hoping. I had to explain to my Madshus that it was just a one night thing and everything seems ok now and we are ready to race in the skate race tomorrow. I also think that the hole needs to be bigger on the fischers and maybe a bit stronger as well.

The hole ski leads me to my second realization that a ski does not need to have holes in it to make it amazing.

As we were eating Thanksgiving dinner tonight I realized that it was one of the great meals of the year.

Also as we were eating I realized that real men can use straws.

My final realization of the day was that Darth Vader is in fact related to an elevader-(elevator) because of the close resemblance in names. Keep on keepin on—-

Today the Yellowstone Ski Rendezvous opened with a 1.6ish kilometer Classic sprint prologue. D Norris posted the most exciting result with an 11th place finish, ahead of many big names. Over all FAST was happy with their results. The unofficial results can be found here. We are all super excited for the two upcoming races on Friday and Saturday.

Do you think you know FAST? Each one of us has brought or purchased items on this trip that characterize the owner. Can you tell who has brought what? Choices are

1) David 2) Reese 3) Tyson 4) Werner

Section A contains

• Multi-vitamins
• Black Oakley Radar sunglasses
• Taylor Swift poster
• Metal Mulisha T-shirt

Section B contains

• Skippy peanut butter
• Wheat bagels
• Squished Rode Violet tube
• White Electric “Stunna shades”
• Orange tinted Spy eyeware
• Reading glasses
• Toko Tape
• Salami bag
• Start MFW kick wax

Section C contains

• Pink Oakley Radar sunglasses
• Fluorescent yellow and green Oakley Jawbone sunglasses
• Purple and Green “The Joker” Scarf
• Maroon and Gray Scarf
• E’ Klar “Tech” head wear
• E’ Klar Headband

Section D contains

• Skida “Block” head wear
• Orange Spy eyewear
• Raspberry Emergen-C
• Crown Royal bag
• Airborne formula
• Echinacea (organic!)
• Zinc mineral
• Soft and Firm pillow tags
• Purell with Aloe
• Purell

Feel free to post what you believe are the answer to the quiz are. Results will be posted tomorrow.

SCANDAL!!!

Thought to be a loyal Madshus fan, Tyson was seen last night at the holiday inn with Fischer’s newest ski. I think this answers Steinbock Racing’s inquiry on November 21st around 6:24 pm on Twitter.

Happy thanksgiving to all! Check out our blog tomorrow, as Tyson will have some explaining to do…

This morning we did a good Lev III session. As usually Tyson’s self control only lasted for the first three intervals then he busted loose on the final interval. Later we waxed some skis and now the team is surfing the web and watching SpongeBob SquarePants. SpongeBob is having a cook-off with King Neptoon.

Tonight’s project is to tape up a Taylor Swift poster over our coach’s bed. This may put the poster in risk of getting torn up. Reese already has the AK flag up on the hotel door so after tonight all the necessary tagging should be complete.

Here are some pics of the no shave November progress:

Tyson-November plus some

Werner

Reese

 Maybe Coach Bill and I can produce some pictures of our no shave-west trip. Sadly because of an important interview with General Electric for the position of CEO, I had to shave during November. Or maybe some weaker reasons, but that ok.

The entirety of the traveling FAST elite team made it into Yellowstone today… From that point on, out activities went like this, and in this order:

Check into hotel. Attempt to convince clerk that we do indeed have a reservation. Wrestle ski bags up stairs onto top floor of hotel. Attempt to convince clerk that we indeed have already purchased meal tickets. Change into ski gear. Throw on some Toko Violet. Go for amazing classic ski on Rendezvous trails. Be blown away at how fast the snow feels. Score some Cliff bar samples in the warming hut. Attempt to convince clerk that we indeed have already purchased meal tickets. Shower. Finally convince clerk that we indeed have already purchased meal tickets. Use those recieved tickets to actually eat dinner. Attempt to go to bed early.

For the remainder of the Yellowstone Ski Festival, we present to you THE STONE; a daily sample of the shenanigans that is happening here in this sleepy little Montana town. So check back here on the FAST blog for each edition. Rumor has it that there might even be some alternate authors besides myself; Werner is threatening to compose somthing, and the elusive David Norris might even make an appearance.

Post workout in Bozeman's Lindley Park

Easily converting the Karst Stage into our FAST Elite van

Whoah! Is this…. glide?

And we thought we were the last ones on the trails… excessively fanatical?

Today completely consisted of hanging out in Bozeman. The highlight of the day was a rediculously out-of-hand drive with a Fairbanks buddy who is going to school at MSU… lets just put “too much gear”, “glazed road”, “switchback corners”, “way too fast”, and “insanely un-maintained Subaru” into the same sentence… but long story short, we avoided at least one accident that should have happened, and made it up to Bohart Ranch to go for our first ski of the trip. Unlike last year, there was plenty of snow, and it was falling hard the whole time.

Curbside wax tech….

Heading out of the Bohart stadium….

Another trick that goes with travel is finding a way to do any sort of strength workout… Luckily, we are staying at the AMAZING Comfort Inn! Translation: I got to try and decipher the cable contaption that they call a “fitness room”….

Who comes up with this stuff? Straight out of a Dark Ages torture chamber…

After reading the complete Body Solid excercise guide on the wall behind it, I decided I would try whichever one most resembled a pull up. Due to its flawless design, the machine has absolutely no means to hold your lower body as you lift a counterwight similar to body weight, so without improvising, you basically swing yourself into the tangle of cables. Maybe thats the idea; you can simultaneously get a leg workout as you strain your quads to brace yourself in the seat.

That machine has probably never seen that much use…

But I was especially encouraged by the idealistic posters on the wall. This one particularly struck me; its true, in a very TeamToday/Vordenberg way.

Often, traveling across the country for ski races can seem like an oddly counter-productive endeavor; Fairbanks always has snow, and everywhere else? Not guaranteed…. So, being a ski racer, the question naturally arises:

Why am I spending a considerable chunk of time and resources to leave someplace with trails that look like this:

for someplace that looks like this:

??

Minutes later, I was slightly reassured when I re-evaluated the Bozeman groundcover and found it to be possibly sufficent:

As long the snow is deeper than the cow-pies are tall, I should be able to hop the barbed wire and poach a few of those fields.

But traveling allows you see and experience things that you never would at home; including things you never, ever want to experience. Possibly the last thing I want to read as Im looking at a picture of two gas-station burritos.

The marketing guru beind this sign shouldnt be getting his Christmas bonus.

FAST is in Yellowstone on Monday.

While the big dawgs are in ripping it up in Beitostolen, Team FAST had a double time trial weekend that was also geared towards prepping for the imminent racing season. With some of us leaving for Yellowstone soon, we needed a few efforts that would get us back in the game as far as pacing and racing feel goes, and also something to turn up the speed a few notches. So, on Saturday we did a 9k classic individual time trial, and Sunday was a skate team sprint.

It can be assumed that D-Norris won the classic day; I say “assumed” because true to tradition, he took a wrong turn and did an alternate 9k course. Spectators and coaches could attest that he looked the fastest though, so the win was credited to him.

Any recollection of the level of pain involved in a team sprint had vanished from my brain over the summer, and Sunday was a chance to remind myself. Everyone looked pretty good, and the teams had to be modified for the A-Final to make things a little more equitable; people were throwing down some blazing lap times. In the end, my cumulative time slotted right underneath Tyson, David, and thankfully, my brother.

I would say were pretty much ready to pull on those bibs. Bring it.

Wait, Im on CXC?

Wern-dog gliding

One Hanneman pursuing another; I had to work to close those 30 seconds

Tyson and David

I was chasing all weekend; here trying to reel in the thugs, Ty-shawn and D-Money

Logan the Convict stalking Mayo-nayze

Logan picked up a FAST trademark in Anchorage during his state swim trip for me (by the way he did pretty darn good).

So I got to work right away…

I actually can sew believe it or not

… and it actually didn’t turn out THAT bad! Relatively speaking of course. “Death or Glory” has been the FAST slogan for 11 months now. This collectors item is not found everywhere.

Death or Glory!

And of course it would not be complete without an action shot.

Action!

Yesterday was the first time trial of the year. We had planned on doing about 10k, but because of the near sub-zero temps, decided to trim it back to 6k so we didnt totally blow our lungs out on the first max effort of the year. Skiing fast on snow is so unlike rollerskiing, its rediculous; I dont know how many times over those 6 kilometers I came into a turn super hot, only to to be launched out the other side back seat and with poles flailing. I realized there is also a big difference between skiing L3 or L4 and a time trial; technique wants to play second fiddle to all-out-speed once you start time trialing, and it takes some mental capacity to hold everything together. But all in all, it was great to be able to put in an effort like that on snow, and it highlights areas that need work.

D-Money Norris climbs up and out of Blue Loop

"Konichiwa!" "Wheres your katana?" I hear all kinds of Japanese jokes when I wear this suit.

A mixed FAST/UAF crew

Almost 20k of lit trails; you could potentially ski 18 hrs a day in full light