Mark writes:
Mark D. Ross,
20K KkaaZoot, 1hr.11min.40sec.
-Long live KkaaZoot
Get your KkaaZoot 2020 poster at the Birch Hill warming hut- on the porch-bench
Mark Ross skis 20 km virtual Sonot & creates special 2020 Sonot poster
Reply
Thank you to 33rd Denali State Bank Sonot Kkaazoot sponsors and all the virtual skiers!
In the midst of COVID-19 pandemic, I want to thank all the Sonot Kkaazoot sponsors, who allowed us to safely celebrate spring by sliding our feet over snow.
Although the 33rd Denali State Bank Sonot Kkaazoot was canceled, we were able to conduct a “virtual” Sonot Kkaazoot (over a period of 10 days leading up to and including the scheduled race day), thanks to several of our event sponsors.
Denali State Bank has been the Sonot Kkaazoot title sponsor for 33 years. Their sponsorship allowed us to cover key event expenses again this year.
Fairbanks North Star Borough Parks and Recreation manages the Birch Hill Recreation Area and did so safely during the 2020 Virtual Sonot Kkaazoot. We appreciate their extra cleaning efforts in the warming hut (now closed) and their diligence in safely removing snow from parking lots, walkways, steps, and overhanging roofs.
Nordic Ski Club of Fairbanks groomers (Tom Helmers, Bill Husby, and Ken Coe) created awesome trails for virtual Sonot Kkaazoof skiers in spite of gusty winds and record snow. John Estle, NSCF race director, set up the new ChronoTrack registration system for the Sonot Kkaazoot, and provided detailed written instructions that Anna Sorensen helped Frank Soos and me understand. Eric Troyer tallied the virtual Sonot Kkaazoot skiers’ times and distances.
Other Sonot Kkaazoot sponsors were ready and willing to assist (as they have in the past) when we cancelled the event because of COVID-19 safety concerns.
Also, a huge thank you to all skiers who skied during the Virtual Sonot. Seeing so many skiers (safely distanced from others) over the 10 days meant that some of the magic of the Sonot Kkaazoot was retained. Weather and trail conditions on the Sonot Kkaazoot race day (and last day of the ‘virtual” Sonot) couldn’t have been nicer.
For the SCUM training group (and Sonot volunteers), the Sonot Kkaazoot represents our final exam. Normally, on the Sunday after the Sonot Kkaazoot, we still skied to move our seized up muscles and aching joints. Because of the COVID-19 shelter-in-place policies, we can no longer meet as a group this season, but thanks to generous contributions of skiers to the NSCF grooming fund, we should be able to keep skiing as long as our snowpack remains.
Finally, to Sonot Kkaazoot founder and race director, Bad Bob Baker, thank you for dreaming up this amazing ski event and for all your Chena River trail grooming efforts and overall race organizing. It is so much easier to ski this event (even at 70 years old with two bionic knees) than be in the hot seat as race director.
This morning, Joanna Fox took this video of Norma Haubenstock and me enjoying the Outhouse loop—taking care to keep at least 6 feet apart. Thank you, Tom Helmers, for such wonderful tracks.
JJ Frost’s virtual Sonot ski
JJ writes:
Yesterday March 28 I skied the Birch Hill portion of the 50 k course, in sequence beginning with White Bear. Best I can tell I skied everything, except the Sonot Connector down to Ft. Wainwright. My phone froze up so I don’t have any documentation other than:
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start time 3:05 pm
end time 5:20 pm
(2 h 15 min)
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This was a great way to spend a sunny afternoon – thanks for promoting the virtual Sonot!
Birch Hill warm-up hut is now closed
The Birch Hill warm-up hut is now closed because of the COVID-19 statewide shelter in place policy.
Hopefully, skiers who wanted a 2020 Virtual Sonot Kkaazoot poster were able to pick up one before the warm-up building was closed. If we learn of other options for obtaining a poster, we’ll post that information.
Sam Delamere & Ti Donaldson ski “Tour de Fairbanks” virtual Sonot 100 km
Sam Delamere and Ti Donaldson did a “Tour de Fairbanks” virtual Sonot. Starting at Birch Hill, they skied 100 km to UAF via Creamers Field.
This course was completed with 100% classic technique, however, the final 30 km were double pole. Trace amounts of remaining binder were detected on the skis.
Sam reported good kick for the first 70 km.
Wow!
Shalane Frost skis virtual 50 km Sonot
Shalane writes:
Great trails! Could have picked a more imaginative route, but 5x white bear did the trick.
While Shalane’s course may not have been imaginative, her time will definitely be one of the fastest.
Donna DiFolco, Bad Bob and Sharon Baker ski virtual 40 km
Bad Bob writes:
DiFolco/Baker trio finish virtual Sonot 110 km
Donna DiFolco, Sharon and BAD BOB Baker complete the Sonot Kkaazoot 40-K…sort of… We combined a 15 km Sonot course from yesterday with a 25 km course we skied today to complete the SONOT KKAAZOOT 40 km Virtual 2020…
Here’s how we did it..Yesterday we skied on our home course here at Moose Mountain, which I had just groomed. It was 15 kilometers worth of soft, beautifully white snow with an uphill section that would make the regular Sonot course seem tame. Skiing right from our home, we skied up and over the top of Moose Mountain, then continued up and down, mostly up, to the next summit, did a short loop around that top, then headed back down to home, with one little out & back on the way up. That took us 2 hours and all in the CLASSIC technique.
Today, we arrived at Birch Hill at noon and found possibly the nicest grooming job of the season!! SUNNY, PERFECT TRACKS, AND TEMPS IN THE TEENS. We choose the SKATING technique today, and although a bit slow, it was ok, when you compare it to the snow speed we all experienced most of this winter. We chose a course that would take us around a potentially future course that may be in store for FUTURE Sonots.
Part of our course today involved skiing down SUNNYSIDE and CLIFFSIDE, then up the SONOT CONNECTOR. What we found was Cliffside had only a moose trail down to the Ft. W/W ski lodge, and once we started up the Sonot Connector, we had to pull off our skis and walk up to the White Bear, as not a single groomer or skier had been down the Connector since the last snow storm. The snow was about a FOOT deep. For those 2 kilometers we averaged about a 20 minute per/km pace.
Trio who hadn’t read our grooming posts head up Sonot Connector
Once back on top, we continued around the White Bear, Moilanen Meadows, finishing back in the stadium.
Our journey was just shy of 24 km, so we continued on around the Medivac loop to put us over the 25 km mark. Exhausted and satisfied, we decided to add our Moose Mountain course from yesterday to complete our 40 km Virtural SONOT KKAAZOOT.
Da man, Sonot Kkaazoot race director, Bad Bob Baker
Time for today’s 25 km portion was an amazing 3-ish hours. SO…our official Virtual Sonot Kkaazoot 40 kilometer finishing times was 5 Hours FLAT! SO….completing the 40 km virtual Sonot for SHARON and I , completes our SONOT KKAAZOOT TRI !! We did the 50, 40, and 20 k’s. That’s 110 Kilometers of VIRTUAL KKAAZOOT….
Bad Bob and Mark Ross holding the 2020 Sonot Kkaazoot poster
The 2020 Virtual Sonot Kkaazoot Posters (created by Mark Ross) can be found in the Birch Hill Warm-up Hut, throughout the week. I believe that that are about 75 copies, one per person please. Trail donations welcome but not required to obtain one of these posters.
Lisa Stuby skates “normal” virtual 20 km
Lisa writes (with blogger’s notes in purple):
This morning (Saturday) I skated a more “normal” 20 km Sonot at Birch Hill.
Lisa had previously skied a virtual 16 km on classical skis and platform snowshoes:
https://sonotkkaazoot.org/2020/03/25/lisa-stubys-16-km-virtual-sonot-on-skis-and-platform-snowshoes/
The weather was cool and breezy and the trails a bit slow, but groomed to a fine corduroy. After 5.5 miles in 1 hr 8 min, I had to stop and warm my cold toes. I stopped my GPS watch for the approximately 10 minutes and then started it again and was on my way. When I finished, my watch was not working.
So I’ve had to guesstimate my time based on the pre-toe warming and my finish time. So, I assume I took 2.5 hours to ski 21 kilometers and did the course of Blue, Outhouse, Tower Loops, Rollercoaster, White Bear and extension with Moilanen Meadows, and Warm up Loop.
Overall a nice ski and day and saw many smiling faces on the trails. I’ve enjoyed reading the other Sonot posts.
Eric Buetow skis virtual 40 km
Repurposed Eric Troyer photo with Eric, Mike, Pat, and Dave (L to R)
On March 18, Eric Buetow and Dave Prusak skied the virtual 20 km Sonot Kkaazoot on the traditional Chena River course that runs in front of the Buetow home.
https://sonotkkaazoot.org/2020/03/19/prusak-and-buetow-finish-virtual-20-km/
Today, Eric writes:
Pat Reinhard, Mike Schmoker, Dave Prusak and I did a grand tour—minus Sunnyside—at a proudly SCUM-ish pace with multiple stops for conversation, reveling in the wonderful trail conditions, enjoying virtual feed stations, and waiting for the now 1 1/2-armed Prusak.
They called it a day and I cobbled together another 13-or-so km, encouraged by Jerome Jackson, who was in leisure mode with grand kids and Sarah.
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All in all, a great day!
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No photos because my phone died, but just wanted to get on the board. Total time for Eric: 4:10.
We’ll put the Eric on the board for 40 km and Pat, Mike, and Dave on for 27 km.
Anna Rix skis 80 km virtual Sonot Kkaazoot
Anna writes:
I finally got around to doing my longer ski, the wind last Sunday and blisters yesterday stopped me from doing it sooner. I cut it shorter than intended when they closed the Warming Hut, so only got 80 k instead of my intend 100 k to complete the “Virtual White Mountains 100”. I managed only about 118 k at Birch Hill during the virtual Sonot (skied on 3/21, 3/27, 3/28, total time about 12:20). I did ski 86 k at UAF during the virtual Sonot, but I not going to calculate that total time.
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Anyways, for today, I was going to break the ski into the first 50 k, which was all classic. My 50 k route was a tour of all the groomed trails. I started out with the black loops, then West Ramp, Blue, Outhouse, Sunnyside to Clifftop, rest of Outhouse, rest of Relay, Tower (including Classic Tower), Medevac, East Ramp, Rollercoaster, White Bear with Moilanen’s Meadow, and Warm-up. After one lap, I stopped to wax a different pair of classic skis, shed some layers, and refill my drink belt. I said hi to Donovan. For the second tour lap, I started off trying to get a few of the bits that I was missing: Main Ramp into the part of Relay I was missing by doing Blue, up the sprint wall to the second half of Green Dot, Rollercoaster bypass, somehow ended up taking the sprint elbow downhill, then I started another Tour lap. Tower, Rollercoaster, White Bear with Moilanen’s Meadow (more enjoyable when the kick wax is still kicking), got Sidewinder and the Roundabout on the way out of White Bear Access, at some point I did Loki and the other one in the stadium (could have been before with Rollercoaster bypass), Warmup, and onto the Black Loops. I hit 50 km just before finishing off North Forty’s Corkscrew. 50 k classic total: 5:18 total time, 5:05:45 ski time.
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For the next 30 k it was a mixture of skate and classic. I finished by Tour lap finishing with the trails with more debris, so the rest of Black Loops, Blue Loop, Outhouse (which was pretty clean and not many people ventured onto the full version), Sunnyside, and Relay. I went back to the Warming Hut to change socks, coats, gloves, headband, and boots. Onto skate skiing! I started out by taking White Cub and all of White Bear (Shalane zoomed by me) to the Groomers Ramp, Warmup, White Bear access out to the biathlon range (since I hadn’t ski that trail), took Zoomer’s Cutoff back and went to change to my other skate skis when I heard that the Warming Hut was closed, I grabbed my stuff out and skied part of North Forty, then Green Dot, Rollercoaster Bypass, and a lap in the stadium to bring my total distance for the day up to an even 80 k. That way my stuff didn’t freeze and I didn’t feel like changing into my other classic boots in the cold (my original plan was to change to my classic skin skis for the last 10-15 k). So, for the 40 k add the 13.2 k I did on Friday on my skin skis, the black loops, blue, outhouse, sunnyside (stopped and tried to readjust my boot), and relay before quitting to stop my blister for getting bigger (I put moleskin around it today). 40 k mixed techniques and day’s total: 5:04 total time, 4:44 ski time.
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For the next 30 k it was a mixture of skate and classic. I finished by Tour lap finishing with the trails with more debris, so the rest of Black Loops, Blue Loop, Outhouse (which was pretty clean and not many people ventured onto the full version), Sunnyside, and Relay. I went back to the Warming Hut to change socks, coats, gloves, headband, and boots. Onto skate skiing! I started out by taking White Cub and all of White Bear (Shalane zoomed by me) to the Groomers Ramp, Warmup, White Bear access out to the biathlon range (since I hadn’t ski that trail), took Zoomer’s Cutoff back and went to change to my other skate skis when I heard that the Warming Hut was closed, I grabbed my stuff out and skied part of North Forty, then Green Dot, Rollercoaster Bypass, and a lap in the stadium to bring my total distance for the day up to an even 80 k. That way my stuff didn’t freeze and I didn’t feel like changing into my other classic boots in the cold (my original plan was to change to my classic skin skis for the last 10-15 k). So, for the 40 k add the 13.2 k I did on Friday on my skin skis, the black loops, blue, outhouse, sunnyside (stopped and tried to readjust my boot), and relay before quitting to stop my blister for getting bigger (I put moleskin around it today). 40 k mixed techniques and day’s total: 5:04 total time, 4:44 ski time.
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Might be too tired to explain what I was thinking, to remember my course, or edit my write up but I attached proof of my ski.
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Anna, I’m tired just reading what you skied. Congratulations!
