Time Trial & ODD

A time trial at last. Great conditions for a race - firm tracks and cold snow. Walt took the win on the men's side, with the top time in both classic and skate. For the women, Sarah jumped out in front in the classic race, but Courtney smoked the skate leg for the overall win. There were a lot of solid performances today - Colman challenged Forrest in the classic race, and Forrest gained on Walt in the skate before fading; Grace was right on Elissa's heels after the classic leg; Matt and Jeff had a close battle; Niko put up an impressive classic leg in spite of feeling horrible. Overall, a good effort by our team, and people were in good spirits afterward. The fitness is there - the only thing we really need right now is a couple more race starts (and for a few folks to get healthy).

Women	CL Time	CL Rank	SK Time	SK Rank	Combined Time
Courtney	20:56	2	18:26	1	39:22
Sarah	20:34	1	19:38	2	40:12
Elissa	22:06	3	19:49	3	41:55
Grace	22:07	4	21:01	4	43:08
Maresa	24:06	5	22:37	5	46:43
Men	CL Time	CL Rank	SK Time	SK Rank	Combined Time
Walt	15:14	1	13:46	1	29:00
Forrest	15:42	2	14:15	2	29:57
Colman	15:47	3	14:57	3	30:44
John	16:47	5	15:52	4	32:39
Matt	17:33	7	15:58	5	33:31
Jeff	17:26	6	16:18	6	33:44
Shem	17:59	8	16:40	7	34:39
Niko	16:18	4	DNS

Nat took a lot of good photos today, some of which will eventually make their way onto this page.

The evening ended with a major production at dinner. We're having a contest for the best dinner of the week, and we've had some great food. We've been hearing a lot about Operation Dinner Dominance - a plan for victory by Jeff, Matt, and Walt. Tonight ODD went into effect - they served some kind of groovy rice/feta/chicken/basil/pine nuts, etc dish, complemented by a high-class salad with craisins, goat cheese, and pumpkin seeds, and capped off with a chocolate cake that required roughly 500 man-hours of beating egg whites. Impressive - but was it truly the best meal so far? The jury's still out, and we still have three dinners left. Stay tuned for the dramatic conclusion.