It was a snowy Friday morning, but the pistenbully tracks were amazingly fast and secure. Thank you, Tom Helmers! Even at -25 deg F, the firm tracks made it possible to ski fast enough to keep all the appendages thawed and warm.
Today’s discoveries bring the SCUM total of LOL ornaments past the halfway mark. We have located 7 of the 12 ornaments for this season.
Hopefully, the recent accumulation of almost a foot of fluffy snow doesn’t conceal the five ornaments that we need to find.
A deep inversion had temperatures a balmy -8 deg F in the stadium and -24 deg F in Shannon Park at the bottom of Birch Hill Road and City Lights Blvd. However, Bill Husby set beautiful classical tracks on the Black Loops yesterday, so we were lured down into the chilly depths where we found three more LOL ornaments.
In the black loops, there are a number of cutoffs so the SCUM group scattered, so only Bill, Greg, and Mom found ornament #3:
The other SCUM found LOL ornament #8 when they were lost in the Black Loops but Jerome was able and willing to go back down so we could document his find:
Even on a cold day, Bill’s tracks were a delight as on the N40, you could glide entirely up the uphills after tucking the downhills in the tracks. It was also possible to stride up the Competition Loop in Bill’s clean and deep tracks. As we were finishing up, the grooming crew was heading out the blue loops so likely by now they have new clean tracks, too. The Outhouse Loop really needed new tracks after the recent winds had filled the tracks with balsam poplar leaves.Today was a good day to not be skiing on skins as you enjoyed more free glide.
Enjoy the inversion and the beautiful tracks.
Preparing to do the military transect (down Sunnyside and Cliffside and up the Sonot Connector) meant protecting SCUM noses and faces from the cold. Here are some of the novel approaches to this challenge (top 4 photos by Joanna Fox)
These SCUM actually made it up to the White Bear loop where en route they were treated to the moon rise over the Sonot Connector:
It was chilly but a beautiful day on the trails.
The SCUM quickly found LOL ornament #6 as it was on one of the Strava segments named for a primordial SCUM. This ornament is gold, not a very easy to spot color, and is located above Joanna’s right shoulder.
Here’s a close up with Thumper, who was visiting from Reno:
Mom was skiing with just one pole to avoid further aggravation of cartilage connecting her ribs to her sternum. Thus, she was looking around while she waited for the SCUM to chase Robert and Jeff downhill and spotted LOL ornament #5:
The photo makes this LOL ornament a giveaway for anyone skiing the trails regularly.
It may be chilly on the trails, but the newly set tracks allow one’s skis to glide so you travel more effortlessly than before the recent snow.
Although the Super Tour Races moved to Anchorage, fantastic skiing still awaits skiers in Fairbanks.
SCUM raced on three different Turkey Day Relay teams on Friday and despite one broken pole during the race, and a fall or two, the TDR skiers showed up on Sunday.
We found the Tower Loop to be much more enjoyable with the SCUM rest stops that weren’t available on Friday.
Come join us on Tuesdays and Fridays at 1030 a.m. and Sundays at 1000 or 1100 a.m. We won’t be meeting next Sunday because of the Super Tour Race being held at Birch Hill. Volunteer to help out and you’ll get to watch skiers who don’t need to stop for rest breaks.
With cold temperatures and very little snowpack on the trails throughout the Fairbanks North Star Borough, the SCUM need to be resourceful to find snow that geezers with broken body parts can safely ski. Although counterintuitive, the black loops have been less skied so the trails had a little forgiveness in them in the form of untracked snow. Today the “no Y SCUM” outnumbered the male ones. Nobody fell but Mom, but she’s learning to get up more quickly.
Negotiating the Outhouse Loop to access the Flat Black loop proved no challenge to the guys among today’s SCUM. The trees were magical with their hoarfrost icings, but the trails were not the beautiful corduroy that we become accustomed to by mid winter.
Join us at 10 am. or 11 a.m. Sundays.
With enough snow to groom the Birch Hill trails, the SCUM met for the first time this season on Tuesday and Friday.
We were just getting our snow legs, so trying to get the entire group together was challenging. Please join us on Tuesdays and Fridays at 10:30 a.m. Note this is a change of time on Friday, which will allow SCUM to take FXC Masters yoga and ski on Fridays.
When the SCUM started back in the 1995 to 1996 winter, most of us were in our 40s. SCUM offspring were skiing for high school teams. Thirty years later, most SCUM are in their 70s and many are grandparents. In our first two decades, the 50 km Sonot Kkaazoot was our end-of-season goal and our “final exam.” However, by 2022, winters precluded the Chena River staying frozen to late March, so the Sonot Kkaazoot was moved entirely to Birch Hill. The new course traded 20 km of flat terrain on the river for 20 km of challenging hilly trails. Fewer of the SCUM were able to ski the 50 km course.
Now the SCUM can no longer ski and volunteer for organizing the Sonot Kkaazoot. With no race director for 2026 stepping forward to date, we will continue to ski and volunteer, but at an intensity and duration that is feasible given our advanced age.
Many years ago, Bill Husby, a SCUM and longtime NSCF groomer, issued the challenge for the SCUM to complete 4 ski walking ascents of the Fort Wainwright alpine hill by the Fourth of July. This season, between travel and air quality issues, only three SCUM (Bill Husby, Eric Buetow and Dave Prusak) successfully achieved that challenge. Five more SCUM (Joanna Fox, Mom, Robert Hannon, Bernardo Hernandez, and Tim Wooster) did their 4 ascents in the week following the 4th of July.
Carl Hemming, who spent much of the early summer rebuilding an outhouse at his Quartz Lake cabin and then spent several weeks in Michigan visiting family, finished his 4 ascents today. They weren’t fast, especially compared to those we’ve done in the past, but they were done under brilliant blue skies and golden leaves. Instead of mosquitoes, only a few no-see- ums flew around our faces.
Although negative splits would be desirable for well-trained athletes, for SCUM who are closer to 80 than 70 years old, and injured, we were happy to do 4 ascents.
Our workout included 735 m (2414 feet) of climb and a total distance of 9.24 km. The average climb on the chairlift ascents was 22% (170 m climb over 0.84 km).
So, please let us know if you know anyone who is willing to take on the organization of the Sonot Kkaazoot. Bad Bob Baker and the rest of the SCUM will be happy to help you out. Woodels for this year have been cut and sanded already.
Note from Scott Brucker, Minto trail builder, skier, musher, and teacher:
If you know any skiers or outdoor enthusiast, there’s a Middle School and/or Sci-Math opening in Minto. It would be nice to share these trails with another person.
Thanks
Scott
If you have any questions, you can contact Scott at: sbrucker@yksd.com
Sonot Kkaazoot 