20k

Today was a frustratingly good day. The good part is my legs felt great, the bad was I couldn't catch a break. I started in the second row and a minute before we started the guy in front tells me that this is the first time he has double poled hard since his shoulder surgery... great. So needless to say I didn't come off the line towards the front. Still I had a relatively easy time working my way up to the top 5 after the first lap. Sovereign Lake is a tricky place to do a skate mass start because the trail is always bending a little bit making getting around anyone pretty tough. Today that was made trickier since the outside of the course was rock hard in places and bottomless in others so you never quite knew what you were going to get when you tried to go by.

So one lap into the 20k going thru the stadium I am where I want to be in 5th place. I wasn't very comfortable behind the guy in fourth so I just stepped out to create my own lane and cruise. Next thing I knew I was on the ground. Someone skied over the tip of my ski and I got up in about 20th. #$%#. Time to work my way back up thru the field. I managed to get to around 6th-ish by the top of the course and managed to stay from 3rd -8th until the big climb with about 4k to go where I tried to move up and see if I could break away with a small group to the end. Alex Harvey had the same idea and I got cut off and lost my momentum and by the time I got it back he was off the front. I managed to close down part of the gap and get a break on the others but they closed up to me in the stadium and I was pretty well shot. I gave it another try on the climb before the finish but it was super soft once you got away from the middle of the track so that didn't work and I came in 7th. The way the race shaped up was a little frustrating but the legs were there and now I am looking forward to Saturday nights 15k classic under the lights.

Until then.

Recap

Yesterday was not too bad. 7th place, 2nd American and I got Kuzzy by the 2 seconds he beat me by in the skate race last weekend. It snowed about 10 cm overnight and with some good work by the groomers who passed over it half-a-dozen times before the race started and it set up pretty well. The snow was pretty crazy with skis running very differently all over the course. 

I skied solid which at Silver Star is what you need to do. There aren't many places to rest and there are a lot of sections where you can work the terrain and pick up time so it takes a pretty steady effort. We had two laps of a 7.5k course and racers starting every 15 seconds. I was one of the first of the A seed guys so I had to just go out and ski hard. I was in the lead at every time check but there were a few too many fast guys starting after me and it was a pretty tight race with 2nd-10th place within 40 seconds. One section of the course I had a hard time with on the first lap but other than that I was really happy with how I skied. I feel like my race fitness is still building which bodes well for the second half of the season. 

The races in Whistler were moved to Silver Star so everyone gets to stay here for the week. We had to change houses but if there is a place we have to be for 2 weeks, this is where I would pick. Great skiing literally right our our back door and generally comfortable living. 

The schedule now is a 20k skate mass start on Thursday and a 10k classic on Sunday. Monday we go home and I get to see my girls!

Silver Star pre-race

Tomorrow is the 15k skate here is Silver Star, BC. They ended up changing it from a classic race last night because of thin snow just in time for a little snow storm last night. Suits me just fine. The course is setting up nice and firm and it should be a pretty fast race. The body after a few easy days this week is coming around and I have been starting to feel like myself again. I was feeling pretty wasted on Sunday and Monday but it is amazing what a couple good nights sleep can do!

After the move from Utah to Silver Star, next week is looking like it could be up in the air as well. Whistler has lost their snow and if they don't get a substantial storm by tomorrow night the races will be moved to either here in Silver Star or to Canmore. Both are great places to be and race but the American teams have either blown or stretched there budget a lot with the last change of venue so it will be interesting to see who can absorb another change. 

First thing though, tomorrow. 

A busy week

Considering that I had had only one good nights sleep since Hazel was born, the races went super well. Even if I had been well rested I would be pretty pleased with the results. 4th and a 5th on two pretty flat courses at 8000 ft with no time to adapt is okay with me. It just felt good to be racing more like myself again after last year. 

It's been a crazy week and now am on my way up to Silver Star, BC for next weekends races to replace Soldier Hollow that is snowless. Silver Star will be a great replacement for SoHo and I'm looking forward to the next two weekends on some World Cup race courses!

Annie and Hazel are doing great and today was Hazels first bath! It's been fun to get the updates from back home but it will be so nice to be back with them in a couple weeks. 

Hazel!

Hello everyone! I am proud to announce that at 3:30 am on Nov. 25, Hazel Elizabeth Southam was born! The birth was amazingly smooth and both baby and mama are doing great.

Tomorrow morning I head down to Montana to start the season but I leave Annie and Hazel in good hands with both sets of grandparents in town. 

My own private ski area

Since the rest of the US ski world is in West Yellowstone skiing past each other I've got the full trail system in town pretty much to myself. Not a single soul in sight out at Kincaid this morning but there were two foxes and a moose. 

It is a good thing the skiing is pretty good here in Anchorage since it looks like I most likely won't be in West. The baby is still kickin' it in Annie's belly, and if it doesn't come tonight Soldier Hollow will be my first race weekend of the year. 

Still waiting

Still waiting on the baby but fortunately we have some pretty good skiing here in town. No classic tracks, or even grooming, but the trails are skied in and the skiing is great for this time of year so we are able to get quality workouts on snow. The best part is no driving to Hatchers on a 5 hour trip wondering if I am going to have to hustle back to town if Annie goes into labor. 

November

Not much news up here but things are rolling along nicely up here. Training is going super well and race season is finally almost here. The drive to Hatcher's is getting really old but the skiing is great and we are able to get some creative quality training in town in the afternoons. The rest of the team is starting to pack for heading down to West Yellowstone, but I still have a bit since I won' t be going down until right before the race. Annie is about ready to pop out a baby so skiing isn't quite the top thing on my list which is probably why it is going so well. Hope to have some big news soon!

New sponsor

I am super excited to now have Altolab as my simulated altitude sponsor! Altolab is an Intermittent Hypoxic Training (IHT) device that lets you get the benefits of altitude without having to travel or sleep in a tent and at a fraction of the cost. For an athlete like myself who lives at sea level and has a family it is a beautiful option. Their website has quite a bit of information worth reading (www.altolab-usa.com) Check it out!

October done

This coming week starts with a little down time after two solid weeks of skiing since I got back from Utah. The skiing has been sweet up at Hatcher's. Cold hard tracks, surprisingly clear skies, and no one but APU up there during the week. The driving up there to train every day gets a little old but having the quality of skiing we have up there now makes it well worth it. 

So the training has been going really well, and the ski testing has gone even better. We also had two time trial up there this week, one distance and one sprint. Going steady and smooth I won the long one. I did 15k and the rest of the guys all being sprinters did 10k and my 10k split was ahead of their 10k race times and I managed to hold the same pace for the next 5k. I ended up 2nd in the sprint to Jeff Ellis who nipped me at the line in all 3 rounds, but the rest of the guys were all a bit back (we had some way faster skis than them). There is a pretty good chance that the sprint TT will be my only sprint of the season so it was good to beat up on most of the sprinters.

Scratchin'

No I don't have a rash, but there is just enough snow out at Kincaid to get around on skis. A few rocks and moose to dodge though. 

Once I got back from Utah the timing worked out great for skiing. One day off, then up to Hatchers for some great early skiing on blue hardwax and solid tracks! Fortunately there is enough in town to get by on for some good quality training without the long drive that ends up pretty well eliminating any outside productivity from the day. 

Yesterday was the first intensity sessions I have done with the team for close to a month, some short hard L5, and it was good to bang heads with the sprinter guys and beat up on them a little on their last set, which was my first. Looking forward to some racing before too long.

Winding down

Yesterday was my last hard workout down here, 90 minutes of tempo shifting towards race pace the last 30 minutes around Soho. Ouch. Super effective though. There are only so many ways you can get your body ready to hold up to 30k+ races. There is a level of discomfort that only comes from going long and hard. But that discomfort was balanced out by some great Mexican food from Tarahuma and a soak in the hot springs afterwards. 

I've got one day left before I go home and should be skiing this weekend up at Hatcher Pass (big ups to Mark Strabel for the grooming up there!) The camp here has been a big success. Nothing fancy just two weeks of focused, hard training. Looking forward to getting back to the AK a few days rest. 

Utah

Three of the last 4 years I have come down to Park City in October for some altitude and dry sunny weather, hopefully returning to skiing in Alaska in mid-October. After staying home last fall I figured I needed to come back down. After training in one place for the past 15 years a change of scene can be golden. I started coming down in the fall of 2004 when the US Ski Team had open camps here before they moved back to Lake Placid. That year I decided this place was amazing in the fall. Good weather, long paved climbs, great single track running, and a rollerski track to boot. 

So this year I am back and rolling solo for two weeks on my last pre fatherhood trip. It is a little different not having a coach or consistent training partner with me but a little solitude suits me well. Train, sleep, train, watch the playoffs, repeat. Not a bad life. Here are a few pics from my Friday afternoon mountain bike to the top of the Canyons. 

Fall

Not a whole lot going on right now.  The leaves are starting to fall and I am banging out the training and hoping that in 6 weeks we can be on snow... In the meantime Annie and I have a quick trip to southern Oregon over the weekend to visit Grandma Southam and will be doing a two week altitude camp in Park City in early October like I did from 2004-2006. A great time to be there and hopefully miss the transition from rollerskiing to snow up here. 

Training has been rolling along... the intensity has been pretty high the last couple weeks and the body is "adjusting" to the higher speeds. A little sore in places... I suppose that is to be expected when you are a master, so I better get used to it. 

Cuddy Park

Yesterday was the 3rd Annual Cuddy Park Rollerski Race. I hadn't been to the first two and have never even seen the park before which is tucked right behind Lowe's in the middle of town. Turns out it is a pretty sweet place. It has a really nice gentle rolling paved 1k loop and an Olympic size paved speed skating oval (only the 6th in the country I learned). The race was a pursuit with a 6k classic which we all double poled on skate skis followed 2 hours later by a 1k sprint around the speed skating oval. The morning went pretty well although I ended up 3rd a few seconds behind Anders and a boot behind Bart. I let quite a bit of it with Anders and I switching off, and made the move that whittled the field down to the three of us but couldn't quite close the deal when Anders threw his 185 lbs into me on the inside of a corner with less than 1k to go. Rubbin's racin' and I never caught back up. 

The afternoon was a little less successful, but it was a track race and I am more of a non track race kind of guy unlike Jeff Ellis, our former 400 meter hurdler who one. It was a good chance to learn a few things about what I need to work on coming into the season. 

Back for a bit

It has been a little while since my last post... since then I've been on the glacier twice, and back east in North Carolina and Vermont for 10 days visiting Annie's family and getting a little change of training scene in VT. That made for 3 nights in my own bed over the last month.

Our glacier camps are done now, 30 days of skiing by mid-August... not too bad. It has been sweet to be on snow so much in the summer and get some quality time and ski testing done on snow, but it will definitely be nice to be home for a while. In addition to just being home and settled for a few months there is a lot to get done around the house before the season and before the little one shows up.

Back east was a great break from the cold summer, I didn't wear a shirt training once back there compared with not wearing a shirt one time up here so far. Aside from good weather the training around Stowe was great. Big paved climbs, the alpine hill is mellow enough that it makes for great bounding and the weight room at the SRC at the bottom of my in-laws road make for a solid week of training. I also got to go over to Jericho a couple days and ski on the rollerski loop there. That place was sweet and sparked a little bit of envy. If only we could have a hilly rollerski track like that in Anchorage... 

So this week a little down time and catch up on work and the business side of things before shifting gears next week as the training focus is a little more intense. 

TT, new ski day!

Yesterday was the 3rd time trial of the summer and the second one skating. The course is 5 minutes of flat and rolling terrain before climbing up for the better part of 25 minutes the last 8 of which are spent on steady switchbacks. It hurts. The good news is I was 1:40 faster than I was at the end of May and 0:40 faster than at the end of August last year! I also felt a little sluggish and heavy, so to post a best time was very reassuring. The bad is I did my usual lead on the hard parts routine (like the last 8 minutes) and Lars came by me in the end. I need to stop doing that.

Right after I got home from training the DHL man showed up with a box of Atomics! One of the great things about working with them is I get wet snow skis to test and get to know while I am on the glacier. That makes that first sloppy day of the season that usually coincides with a race day so much nicer knowing that I know the skis.

Camp 2

Glacier camp 2 is now in the books. Another really solid 4 days on snow and now it is time for a little break. Golf yesterday where I had 3 legit pars and didn't lose my ball until the last hole! My short game was really "en fuego" as they say.

Also it is Olympic Trials time for the summer athletes. Always good to watch and get a little fired up to go thru that in about 18 months. It would be nice if they showed the track and field before 11 pm though.

To the glacier and stuff... like babies!

Tomorrow morning we (APU) are scheduled to head back up the Eagle Glacier for camp 2 of 4 for the summer. A short one this time only 4 days instead of the usual 7, just keeping in touch with the snow feeling.

After the last one and my trip south where we saw the sun for the first time this summer I was whooped. Once I got back on my feet after a few mellower training days things started going really well once again. But the highlight came Monday when I saw the ultrasound of the little baby that Annie are expecting in the fall! Little hands, feet, and just watching it move inside was pretty amazing.

... and I'm spent.

The last workout on the glacier pretty much left me completely depleted (glycogen-wise). Monday was off, Wednesday was hard, and today was steady hard. 3x17 minutes was the plan, the first was good pace and intesity were right where I wanted them. The second was slower and harder and I was drained. Workout over. I still haven't quite gotten over the Sunday workout but now I get the weekend off and get back to work on Monday.

Camp 1

So after acting like a fugitive with my bags packed by the door I finally got to grab them and head down to Girdwood on Wednesday right after morning training to get to Alpine Air to fly in to the glacier. We had 4 days of great skiing up there. Typically June on Eagle Glacier means blue skys, red klister, and 30 spf. This year we didn't see the sun until the last day and were kicking on blue hardwax for the first 2 days! I've been going up there since the mid 1990's and used hardwax once and it was more the klister in a can variety, so that was pretty sweet. So 4 days of skiing, 1 distance, 2 intensity days, and 1 long day on great tracks. I really can't remember skiing on that consistently nice of trails up there, good stuff.

I also turned 30 on our first day up there. A great day back on snow and a couple of the girls made a two big cobbler's with a candle 30 on them and my old man lungs managed to blow them all out, a relief...

Now back to dryland for a few weeks before heading back up at the end of the month. I also have a quick trip to Seattle for the weekend for a family reunion and a weekend off from training.

Waiting...

I feel like some kind of special agent. My bags are packed, ready to be off with a moments notice.

For the last 3 days every few hours we have been checking in to see whether the weather will be good enough to fly up to the glacier and every few hours it still isn't ready. It hasn't been bad here in town and the dryland has been good as usual. This has been kind of a nice break since I have been able to get quite a bit of downtime (recovery) in since I have the week off of work and I am feeling pretty good. Yesterday was the first interval workout of the year on one of my standard courses from years past and it was super promising, ahead of where I usually am at this time. Just need to keep the training stable.

If today we can't fly then the camp is off but it is looking the best to get to the glacier that we have seen so far...

Keeping my fingers crossed.

Changing season

After a month or so of getting used to training again last week last week training started up for real. This year I finally did a pretty good job of easing back into running, rollerskiing, lifting, and biking so the soreness and little injuries that can start up this time of year have not. Big ups to the Physical Therapy Place for getting me set up with a balance and stability plan that has made a huge difference!

This morning I am getting the last things together for the first glacier camp of the summer before I fly up this afternoon with the rest of the APUer's. Tons of snow up there and it sounds like the building is in great shape after Erik, Dylan, and Casey have slaved away up there for the last week getting all the systems ready for the invasion that is the athletes. The weather forecast could be better but the skiing should be fantastic.

The other big excitement is I get to ski on some new skis. Atomics! I made the switch this spring and am super excited about racing on the Red Cheetah! This also means that I will be racing for APU which will make things a lot more simple.

Anchorage!

There have been rumors that Anchorage was going to host Nationals this winter and it looks like we got it!

http://www.fasterskier.com/news5401.html

Another spring day...

Lars and I had planned a sweet backcountry day of sea kayaking out of Whittier then a little crust and tele-skiing. It ended up too windy in Whittier so they wouldn't rent us boats so we had to do this instead...

Photos from the weekend

This past weekend I had the annual Ski with Olympians day up at Hilltop and then spent Sunday playing in the April snow.

And Done

Sunday was the end of the year. Usually before the last race of the season there is a playful nature to the whole thing but before the 50k it felt like we could have been getting ready for the Olympic 50k. Everyone was pretty hammered still from the 30k on Friday night and the 50k course was even harder to go along with the obvious extra hour of racing. The course was tough, real tough, but it isn't anything harder than you would see on a World Cup but racing in the US we tend to see some pretty weak courses which is why this one was such a shock to so many. Unfortunately for me though, once again there just wasn't quite enough left in the tank to do much. I was able to keep with the chase pack that was Koos, Newell and Lars thru maybe 20k but then I just started to run out of gas.

The highlight of the day was my coach Frode skiing in his last race before going back to Norway this spring after racing and coaching here for the last 13 years and kicking ass! He ended up 3rd overall and since he has his green card he is a US National Champion! I have learned a whole lot from him over the years like how to race tough which he did and left US racing in style!

Next up for me is a little break although I might delay it until the skiing is gone from the trails in town which should be a week or two away and start planning for next season. Thanks for reading this year!

Ouch!

We just got back from the 30k after stopping by Taco King for the best post race meal out there.

It was a doozy. Tough course and started it out with slick skis. So I tried to double pole as much as I could and keep in contact with the front group but on the main climb of the course they would pull away each time and I slowly fell back. After the 3rd of 4 classic laps I had closed back to within maybe 10 seconds but we hit the big climb again and I never saw the pack again. Luckily for me Noah Hoffman and I were able to ski together for the skate leg. He is a tough and talented junior who I stayed with in Aspen this year. We traded off leading out there and managed to pick off a few guy and with a few k's to go on some flatter sections I took off and he couldn't quite keep up I think I ended up 9th and him 10th, the 5th and 6th Americans I believe. Good day and tough racing. Looking forward to a wicked tough 50k on Sunday and a day off in between.

James

Whistler part 2

I've been back home for a few days and are getting ready to head up to Fairbanks for Long Distance Nationals and a midweek 10k. First, the 15k from Whistler.

That was nuts. Seven people broke skis during the race! That just doesn't happen. The conditions were a big element that day as well with it snowing big, wet flakes on top of a granular base that broke down easily. This meant that down the course there was a hard glassy lane where the new snow had packed down and just off that was really soft. Every so often there would be ruts up to 6-8 inches deep where the hard layer had been broken thru and combined with the heavy falling snow making the visibility less that ideal. Then on some of the more technical downhills there were craters on the corners where people had augered in. Bottom line.... you had to be on your toes.

Since this was a learning week more that anything I started out the first of the three 5k loops harder than usual so I could see if I could get away with that since there was a big downhill after a bit opening climb. Turns out it was kind of a mistake. I felt good on the first lap and could see that I had picked up some time on the guys in front of me but there was a pretty flat rolling section where a lot of time could be gained or lost if you didn't carry your speed well. Those sections aren't usually my natural strong point but I skied that section pretty well on the first lap unfortunately the next time thru was pretty rough. Turns out I started a little too hard and after one lap of 2 big climbs and the flat section in between without many places to recover I went a little under. I managed to hold it together pretty well and still kept George Grey (one of Canada's top guys) who started 15 seconds behind me behind me. On the final lap things started to click again but I had lost way too much time on the second lap to do much in the results but I did finally figure out how to ski some of the the more technical sections of the course and pace the hills better. So I learned something.

Other than checking out the courses and getting a feel for how they ski, the big thing to take away from Whistler is be prepared for anything. With the conditions constantly changing there you just have to be ready to put your head down and suffer.

Off to Fairbanks.

Whistler

We got down here after a surprisingly long travel day due to the 30 stoplights we got to hit coming thru Vancouver on our way from Seattle to Whistler. Once we got thru there it wasn't too much better since they are in the process of widening the road. I also heard they are putting in a train from Vancouver to Whistler which would be a sweet addition to the area. But driving has been the theme of the week. Almost 30 minutes each way and we are staying about as close as you can. Given that they had a blank slate I'm not too sure why they chose an area not too close to anywhere?

On to the racing... I had heard that the snow here is a little funky and waxing can be pretty tricky. I can confirm that it is. The sprint relay on the first day was a good introduction to some faster racing after 5 weeks with nothing under 30k and a good introduction to waxing here as well. It was gray and just over freezing most of the day until our prelim round when it started to snow. We had great skis in the first round and had no problems making it thru to the finals. By the time the finals started 30 minutes after the rounds the kick wax was completely different. Even though we were able to re-wax the skis just weren't that good and we did quite poorly but we figured that it was our least important race of the year, so we slept okay.

There is a bit of luck and guesswork here since the condition on the test track is totally different from the race course combined with the near constantly changing conditions. Also it seems the ski and application of the wax makes a huge difference. One of my teammates Jeff Ellis had sweet skis on the relay day with the same wax combination. That said, Erik and Casey have done a sweet job of testing many combinations and getting us some really good skis. Yesterday in the 10k my skis along with the rest of our guys were as good or better than anyone and the APU girls had the best skis in the field. It is just tricky.

Getting to yesterdays race was a little more complicated that I had planned. My ride to the race (Kevin) is staying with another team and his car was all of a sudden too full for both Annie and I to squeeze in so at 9:30 the night before the race I emailed one of the Canadian teams staying here and we were able to get a ride with them. I called Kevin in the morning and told him I was just going to go alpine skiing and I didn't need a ride, he believed me. He believed me so much that he tried to scratch me from the race and when I got down to the race most of the races thought I was going alpine skiing too.

Like the relay day, wax once again was changing all the time so we had to make a call on race wax about 10 minutes before the start, just enough time for a quick test and a little adjustment and off to the start. Out of the start on the first of 3 laps my skis rocked! I was skiing relaxed and smooth and quick and all those things that you want to do up to the top of the course (4 or 5 minutes) before dropping back down for the flat and s-turn sections of the course. I never heard it while I was out there but after the race I heard I was in 2nd on the first lap. After that I started to fade a bit. The skis got a little slicker and I started to feel the effects of the relay some soreness and stiffness started to creep in... and I ended up losing about 15 seconds on the last lap... Other than the lost time on the last lap pretty good classic race for me and it bodes well for today's 15k skate. Until then... Some venue photos...

Headin' out

I did what was pretty much my last hard workout of the season the other day, feels a little weird. A 10k tempo workout on the Junior National course after 2 days of intervals. So the last 2 days I have been getting body work done, massage, active release, and acupuncture, along with the usual pre-travel routine of getting my skis zeroed (putting the same wax on all of them for testing) and laundry. So tomorrow morning up at 4 am to get to the airport. Annie will be down for this trip so I'll try to have some photos and video up from the week. Bon voyage.

Back to work

Well... I got sick this past week and so did my computer. The computer is in the process of being replace and I am back to healthy now and getting back to doing some hard training after a few days off following the Tour. After two 50k's and two 30k's in the past month it is time to get some faster hard training in before a 10 and 15k next week in Canada. So this week is back to some old fashioned intervals. Find the longest hill in town not being used for Junior Nationals (about 4-5 minutes up the Spencer Loop) and hammer up it 5 to 6 times a day, then rest up a few days before I leave on Saturday.

I've also been getting back to work at Skinny Raven a few days a week to keep the place running while the boss is in Hawaii for to weeks. I'm an enabler. Which has been good since while the intensity is up the volume of training has been pretty mellow.

Southam on top at home

50-K: Anchorage Olympian gets a break to finally win city's premier nordic event.

By BARRY PISER
bpiser@adn.com
Published: March 3rd, 2008 02:39 AM
Last Modified: March 3rd, 2008 01:10 AM

James Southam has had his share of skiing glory in the past. Among the highlights: winning back-to-back 10-kilometer U.S. National Ski Championships and representing Alaska and the U.S. at the 2006 Olympics in Turin, Italy.

The Tour of Anchorage hadn't been quite as kind to the Dimond High and Alaska Pacific University graduate. For whatever reason, Southam could never put it all together for Anchorage's showcase nordic skiing event, and one unlucky thing or another kept him from success on his hometown's biggest stage.

A few times he ran out of energy or "bonked" as he put it.

Another race he "pooched the wax" or messed up prepping his skis for the trail conditions.

One year he felt he might break through but got sick and couldn't compete.

"I just never had a good day," said the 29-year-old Southam, who also has missed a few Tours while competing overseas. "I've been over in Europe this time of year, but this year there's no World Championships or Olympics, so I'm just racing in the U.S. this year. I wanted to try to finally win this thing."

Luck (and possibly his Olympic-caliber athleticism and skill) was on Southam's side Sunday when he took home his first Tour of Anchorage title in the men's 50-K freestyle with a time of 2 hours, 7 minutes and 12.1 seconds over Norwegian Thomas Oyberg, who will ski for UAA in the fall.

It was Oyberg who had a run-in with bad luck under Sunday's sunny and blue skies.

The duo broke away from the lead group pretty early. Southam was game to feed off the Norwegian, who won the Pia's Classic 30-K in February, for the rest of the race.

"I knew if I could have him with me it would be a much easier day. I was like 'Come on, dude, stick with me and let's ski away from everyone,' " said Southam, who trains year-round as a member of the APU Ski Club and Rossignol teams. "We got over the top (of Spencer Loop) together and he took the lead for a while, which helped me out so much. I was hoping we could ski away from everyone and duke it out toward the end."

One of the quirks of the Tour of Anchorage, which had a field of more than 1,500 racers, is maneuvering through the mass of skiers clogging the trail. Along the often narrow trail between Service High School and Tudor Road, Southam and Oyberg made like speeders in rush hour traffic, darting in and out of their slower compatriots.

"We had been bobbing and weaving, bobbing and weaving," Southam said.

With Southam in the lead, Oyberg misjudged his speed and collided with a 40-K skier.

"I crashed so bad," Oyberg said while examining some damage to his skis. "I thought I braked."

Southam looked back and thought about waiting for the fallen Norwegian but decided to push on alone, not knowing how close the rest of the lead pack was. The decision paid off as he beat Oyberg and the rest to the finish.

Oyberg, while stricken with some of the bad luck that had plagued Southam, wasn't sure it would've mattered if he had fallen or not.

"He was stronger than me," he said.

In her first Tour of Anchorage, Holly Brooks, an assistant coach at APU, won the women's 50-K freestyle in 2:25:15.7, just ahead of two of her pupils, Kasandra Rice and Kate Arduser.

Brooks, a standout skier at Whitman College in Walla Walla, Wash., was ecstatic to be racing after spending a lot of races on the sidelines coaching.

"It's so fun," the 25-year-old said. "It's sunny and beautiful and people are cheering each other on. I just wish we could do it more than once a year. It's important to get out and race yourself every once in a while to remember what it feels like."

Brooks, who normally misses the Tour due to coaching duties, still managed to school her two APU charges.

The trio went ahead from the start, taking turns leading and following. Like Oyberg, Rice fell on the top of Spencer Loop but caught up 10 kilometers later.

Using some of her coaching knowledge, Brooks, who admitted a sprint is not her strong suit, decided to make a move on Sisson Loop with three kilometers to go.

"Both girls are really good sprinters, so I knew I had to make a move early," she said. "After I made the move, I thought it might have been too early, but somehow I was able to hold it till the end."

The move pays off with more than just the glory of winning: Now Brooks has bragging rights and with them, just a bit more sway in training sessions.

"They'll listen to what you say a little more when they see you do well," she said.

Contact ADN sports reporter Barry Piser at 257-4336.


American Ski Marathon Series

21st Annual Tour of Anchorage

Sunday

Finish at Kincaid Park

Men's 50K freestyle

1) James Southa, 2:07:12.1; 2) Thomas Oyberg, 2:07:39.6; 3) Martin Rosvall, 2:07:43.6; 4) Dylan Watts, 2:08:09.1; 5) Anders Haugen, 2:09:55.0; 6) Bart Dengel, 2:10:42.8; 7) Seth Downs, 2:10:55.4; 8) Brent Knight, 2:12:04.8; 9) Christopher Clark, 2:15:28.1; 10) Peter Kling, 2:17:15.9; 11) Frode Lillefjell, 2:17:15.9; 12) Adam Verrier, 2:17:22.0; 13) Paul Schauer, 2:17:37.9; 14) Cory Smith, 2:23:14.4; 15) Chet Ferhmann, 2:23:15.9.

Women's 50K freestyle

1) Holly Brooks, 2:25:15.7; 2) Kasandra Rice, 2:25:44.1; 3) Kate Arduser, 2:25:56.1; 4) Rachel Steer, 2:34:04.3; 5) Kate Fitzgerald, 2:36:59.1; 6) Christina May, 2:40:14.3; 7) Becky Hauser, 2:43:18.9; 8) Diana Johnson, 2:45:39.2; 9) Shannon Donley, 2:51:09.9; 10) Nancy Pease, 2:51:27.6; 11) Erika Downs, 2:52:15.6; 12) Carly Reimer, 2:52:43.0; 13) Shannon Brockman, 2:54:08.9; 14) Rosalyn Singleton, 2:55:15.7; 15) Kelsey Cooledge, 2:55:41.0.

Finally!

Finally I won the Tour of Anchorage!

I have had so many really bad races at the Tour over the years to finally win the thing was pretty sweet. Best of all I got to do it the way I would have hoped to, a 40k breakaway. Frode set the pace out of the start and after switching off a few times he retook the lead going up Spencer Loop which is a really hilly 7k stretch of trail. Then Thomas Oyberg took off shortly after we got onto the climbs and got a small lead that I let grow a little bit while I sat behind Frode waiting to go. Once I did and caught up to Thomas I took the lead and tried to pull open a gap on the rest of the field. I felt really, really good on that part of the course and had to hold back a bit and tell Thomas to stick with me and we can ski away with this thing.

The Tour has about 10k of hills at the start then about 38k of flat before some climbing up to the finish at Kincaid. We made it to the top of the climbs and I was pretty sure if we worked together we could hold off the rest to the end and make it a two man race.

After the decent he took over the lead while we dodged, bobbed, and weaved thru the 40k skiers that make the Tour somewhat of an obstacle course. Once it was my turn to lead again I passed a group of 40k'ers and Thomas got tangled up with one of them and went down hard... $@%#! I looked back and knew the other guys couldn't too far behind and decided just to go for it.

So from there it was just a mental battle of keeping the pace up on the long, long, long flat section. Fortunately the skis were running quite fast other that the stretch of trail the people use as a doggy bathroom and is quite brown... Another big help was the little tailwind I had along the coast that just as easily could have been a headwind. Also my wife was out on the course handing me drink bottles about every 12k which made huge difference when you are doing a solo effort for that long, no way I would have mad it without those. Almost didn't anyways. At about 3k from the end my legs started gettting pretty wobbly and things started getting a little blurry. Fortunately I had a good sized lead and was able to finish off my drink and get my legs back under me a cruise on in. It felt so nice to come into the stadium filled with people with big lead and have the luxury to enjoy the finishing lap.

Also- Thomas was able to hold on for second outsprinting a group of 4 I think.

What I did with my day off

Ski or not?

Towards the latter part of the race Saturday my arch started bothering me, I figured it was just from ski racing for 2+ hours, which it pretty much was. I didn't think much of it but last night it started to bother me a bit so I popped a few ibuprofen and went to bed. This morning it still is there so the question came... to ski or not to ski? Skiing easy most likely won't hurt it, but an extra day of rest after a lot of travel and racing isn't the worst thing either so I am taking the day off. This week is planned to be pretty easy with one 2 hourish ski per day and some light runs and then put in some harder efforts Saturday before the Tour to warm the body up for racing. A day off in the middle in the big picture doesn't make much of a difference and over the years I have tried to do too much when a little flare up like this happens and sometimes it ends up okay but that is also why I have issues with pretty much every appendage in my body. So I like to think that today I made the smart decision.

The Birkie!

We woke up at 5:30 am to the thermometer reading -8. All week they were saying that it was supposed to be around on Saturday which it got to but it started about 20 degrees colder than they had said. For these big World Loppet type races when you have literally thousands of people showing up to relatively small areas within at about the same time it pays to get there early and also be affiliated with someone who in the industry so you can have a parking pass. While we drove in the last mile or so before the parking lot the road was lined with racers walking from the satellite lots in the sub zero weather. Glad I wasn't one of them. We got there about an hour before the start and tested skis as usual picked the fast ones and finished warming up before getting in the start pen. The pen is divided into waves and the Elite wave of 200 skiers lines up behind the start banner that gets lifted when the start gun goes off. The next waves banner gets lifted 2 minutes later, and so on. So we were all in the pen with our warm ups off 10 minutes to start and the announcer says the start is delayed 10 minutes due to a big traffic jam of everyone trying to get there at the same time. So now there were 200 guys running back and forth in ski gear trying to stay warm for 10 more minutes. It wasn't that bad though.

Once the race got going it was pretty mellow of the start. About 1k of flat/rolling skiing before we head up about 1-2 k of climbing along a powerline before we head into the woods. At about 2k I was up near the front when a guy stepped on my pole and broke it. (Turns out he broke another guys pole a few minutes later and his coach came up to me that night and appologized. Apparently he is just real bad at skiing around other people.) A mild sense of panic took over but calm eventually came back when I heard there was a pole station about 1k up the trail. When I got to it there were a bunch of poles in a pile and the guy at the station picked up a short pair of turquoise ones which weren't going to work so I got to stop and go back and grabbed one that was a bit longer. Turned out it was about 6 inches taller than I ski on... but at least I had one and I was back in the race and skied my way back up to the front over the next few k's.

So the race was on. But no one really wanted to push the pace. This was a mixed blessing for me since I was skiing with one pole that was way way to long until about 25k, also I wasn't able to get my second drink bottle at 15k like I had hoped/planned and from about 25k to 38k, when I got my last bottle, I was pretty close to running out of energy. In that way the slower pace was a godsend, but big pack sprints are not my specialty. That meant that with 5k to go I made a move to try and separate things a little bit. Lars caught up and so did Babikov with the rest of the field. Then Babikov went and I tried to go with him since that was my best hope by far if I could just hang on to the top of the climb. He was just too strong and a pack of about 20 ended up forming coming across the 3k flat leading to the finish and I just didn't have enough to do much in the sprint. Looking back I am a little disappointed with the place (12th, I think) but I went where I though my chance was best to try and get away and maybe win the thing but it wasn't to be.

So now I am home for three weeks! The skiing is great in town and the Tour of Anchorage is coming up this weekend. Looks like it should be a battle between the top 3 from the Sven Johansen last weekend and two Norwegians, one from UAA who had to sit out the NCAA season for some eligibility reasons and one who was 6th, I think, at the Birkie. Should be fun!

Pre Birkie day

Yesterday I got to do all the Birkie had to offer. Really just two things, the sprints and the Birkie dinner. The Sprints went okay and almost as well as I really could have hoped considering what the course was and I had woke up thinking there was no way I was going to race them. I ended up 4th... okay, but 3rd would have got me $200. The Birkie dinner was another last minute addition to my schedule and well worth the time. Prime rib, free drinks, good food, prime rib... and I got to hear quite a bit about Birkie's gone by. The Birkie is really a very cool event.

I ended up not getting back from dinner until 10:15 since the dinner was about 45 minutes away and was pretty exhausted after the travel the day before. So I crashed out hard only to wake up 20 minutes later a could not get back to sleep...! and only managed maybe 5 hours of sleep. Still today I felt pretty good considering the lack of sleep and tested some skis and checked out the expo at the Telemark Lodge which is madness. Ski selection was pretty easy since the conditions have been pretty cold and stable. One pair for cold hard track, one for slightly softer if the snow doesn't have a chance to set before the race starts.

Off now for a short ski to check out the finish.

To the Birkie

After traveling all day yesterday from Anchorage to Minneapolis to Hayward, WI I woke up this morning to a thermometer that read -18 F. Ouch. It is warming up fast though and this afternoon are the Birkie Sprints, 100 meters out and back on Main St in Hayward. I wasn't sure if I would do them after the cold cold temps this morning but my temp cutoff was 10 above and now it is 11 so I think I'm in.

Home

I finally got home last weekend after 6 weeks. I figured it out and over those 6 weeks I flew 21 hours and drove 50 hour to get all the places I needed... too much. The furthest I have gone since I got back was 15 minutes to ski on at the Hillside trails when I wasn't driving the 5 minutes to Kincaid.

Yesterday was the Sven Johansen 30k skate out at Kincaid. Not the biggest race in town but definately the best. After an easy 5k to start it covers almost all the hard trails in the park. Combine that with the snowstorm we started in made for a tough day. This past week I had planned on putting in some quality training but I have just been exhausted. My plan if I was feeling 100% was to try and drop everyone at around 10k and ski the last 20 on my own, if that didnt' work I was going to try to drop everyone again at 20k. I knew I could outsprint everyone but I wanted to win by a lot and take away any chance of getting tangled up. I put a 15 second gap on the field at 10k but that got closed up when we came thru the stadium into a pretty good headwind and the guys behind me closed the gap. I went again at 20k and put a pretty good gap on the remaining 4 guys (Frode Lillefjell, Brent Knight, and Lex Treinen) and thought that might have done it. Unfortunately Frode was there and it took a few k but he finally caught back up and we both relaxed and the other two caught back up not too long after. So I figured Frode and I had done our work and had the other two come to the front and set the pace for a bit. They both took their turns admirably and then with 3k to go Frode took the lead and picked up the pace getting rid of Lex. Then it was the 3 of us and with 1k to go I took off on a gradual climb and got enough of a lead to eliminate a true sprint finish.

Considering how the body felt (steep climbing felt awful) it was a pretty good day. It would have been nice to win by more but looking at two 50k's the next two weekends it was a good warm up. I didn't have any cramping issues and it was a solid 30k workout with some pretty hard efforts but I didn't have to dig too deep. I travel again on Wednesday to Wisconsin for the Birkie which should be a pretty good field with most all of the top Americans and a few foreigners that Rossi is bringing over. Should be fun...

Rocky Mountain High

I'm up in Aspen now for the last two races of a 6 week trip. Not a bad place to end it. We have a 10k classic tomorrow followed by the Owl Creek Chase on Saturday before I head back to Denver to fly out early Sunday. Given the totally outrageous housing cost here ($425 a night was the cheapest I could find) Noah Hoffman's family has been kind enough to open their house to me and a couple other skiers for the week.

After what has felt like a week spent in the city and traveling it was a real nice change to settle in here yesterday and just go ski... slowly. We are at about 8500 feet up here and if you go too hard your lungs let you know. Fortunately there is a fair amount of mellow skiing terrain off ther race course that I was able to cruise around on yesterday. Once in the sunshine which was a nice change and the other at night which is just fun.

Today is just an easy ski on the course and getting the skis ready for tomorrow.

Also here is a link to some photos of the Madison sprints

http://madcross.smugmug.com/Madison-Winter-Fest

Madison

I spent the last week at a cabin in the woods up in Hayward, Wisconsin training and resting abit after Canmore. And today it was time to get back to racing with the Capital Square Sprints in Madison, WI. The race here goes 1/2 way around the Capital Square in an out and back U and they estimated that for the mens race there were 10,000 people out watching making a pretty sweet atmosphere. Today was the skate sprint relay, 2 skiers per team, each skier doing 4 laps. Anders and I teamed up as we usually do but this time we switched things up and had me lead out and him anchor. Worked out pretty well.

I started out slow... we hadn't been able to ski on the course during the womens race so none of the guys had skied for 30 minutes before the race. I ran a bit but in the middle of a city to keep from getting too cold but still started pretty cold. After lap 1 I was at the back of the leaders in about 5th just cruising. Anders came thru in third and after that it was a battle between the Factory Team, CXC, and us, just like we figured it would be. The second laps everything stayed together. Then on the third Andre Golovko from the Factory Team and I opened a gap on Brian Gregg the CXCer only to have Kuzzy close that up and take the lead going into the final legs with Anders right behind and a small gap on Lars. Our plan from the start was to ski relaxed and not do any extra work then I would try to give Anders a lead going into the final lap and he would just fly away like he can we he gets rolling. I tried to open the gap on Andre but he was just a bit too strong and we came thru the final exchange together. Then Anders just unloaded and came in with a huge gap on Lars and Kuzzy. Pretty impressive and tactically magnificent if I do say so.

We just returned from a little cocktail party at the top of one of the hotels on the Square, they do a great job taking care of the athletes around here and it has been really amazing to see the energy that Madison has for ski racing.

One more tomorrow...

Canmore 15k

Today was a good race. I really had no idea where I would end up, I was hoping to finish around or ahead of where I was in 2005 here (31st) but after Nationals where I was in the 20's something much worse wouldn't have been a huge surprise. I was looking over the results from the 2005 race and I was very conservative out of the start so that was the plan today since this place can eat you up if you go out too hard. I managed that and by the top of the course I was within a few seconds of the leaders to that point and had almost caught the guy who had started in front of me without digging too deep. Coming into the second lap the first of the red group was starting. When you are lapping and a guy is starting just let him go and thenif the next starter catches up try to go with him. So that is what I did. I let one guy go but tried to keep him in sight once he settled in. About 3/4 of the way to the top of the course Kris Freeman came by on his first lap and so I pulled in behind him. After a few minutes the pace became just a bit too high and I had to let him go and try to regroup and get back to my own rhythm. It took a little while and really I didn't ever feel quite the same but I managed to get back in the rhythm behind Kuzzy who had a sweet race for himself before he pulled away in the last couple k's.

Internationally it was not a great race but considering I where I was a few weeks ago I am pretty fired up with it and am looking forward to the second half of the season.

30k

I went into yesterdays race pretty relaxed. No expectations but definitely some hopes and it was a little less than I hoped. It has been cold here and was a little warmer yesterday but still -15 C in the morning so I dressed how I usally do for cold but not too cold. Turns out the air temp to freezing shortly before the start and I was way overdressed. As I've mentioned before the hills here are big and the snow is abbrasive. We ended up waxing pretty warm whick means it isn't as durable also I made the mistake of not going on a stiffer ski which would keep the kick wax off the snow so it would last longer.

My plan was to ski more relaxed out of the start than I usually do in the mass starts and ski my way up. I managed but in the chaos that the first laps are I ended up missing the first 3 feeds. Still I was skiing around guys with bibs in the 20's and 30's by the second lap (I was #48). They my kick started to go. I could still kick up everything but not as effective and I should and I started to slip back from the pack.

Coming out of the exchange I was skiing with Lars Flora, Mikey Sinnot, and a Canadian or two and once the skate skis got on I started to feel good. Mikey got out quicker that the rest I and caught up to him and was lokking to keep going but then the warm clothes and the missed feeds caught up and I started to cramp up. Once that happens the only thing to do is ski within yourself and take all the feeds you can and hope you can come back around. After a while the cramping went away but there wasn't any pop left so I called it a day knowing that my skating is feeling much better and not wanting to put myself under for the 15k on Friday.

After the race coach Frode made my day saying I was looking like the old James out there. It's coming...

Canmore

It is the morning before the pursuit and it's -24 degrees C outside. Tomorrow is supposed to be about 10-15 degrees warmer and we don't race until 12:30 so it won't be too bad. So I've had few cups of coffee watched Sports Centre a few times before I go out to test skis and do some light intervals to warm the body up for tomorrow.

Myself and the crew from APU got to Canmore two days ago after a long long drive. It's usually about a 6 hour drive but we did it in about 8, thanks to some snow that slowed things way down. We were also stuck in traffic 40k from Canmore for an hour while they cleared the road after an accident. Long day.

Yesterday I just tested classic skis and skied easy for an hour which in Canmore means walking around the race trails. They are huge! Big, big climbs that are all skiable thanks to snow that is virtually bulletproof. I don't think natural snow could handle these courses since it would probably break down and get soft. Off to test...

A little video Jeff has been working on...

The end of Silver Star

So now I rest... The last week has been what I needed. 8 hard workouts that I finished it off yesterday with an long pursuit pace workout an easy little ski in the afternoon a hottub and a beer. That pretty much put me in a coma. With each workout I felt like I have been getting stronger. I knew that I would I just needed a chunk of time to get some training back in so I can get back to this...

Silver Star

Myself and the rest of the APU athletes going to the World Cup in Canmore next week plus our rehabing Canadian translator Jeff Ellis are doing alittle training camp here in Silver Star, BC (www.skisilverstar.com) This place is hard to beat. Our house is right on the ski trails and there is another set of trails a few minutes down the road at Sovereign Lake where the World Cup came back in 2005. Tons of snow, temps in the mid 20's and easy living... great place for a camp.

After US Nationals which were a total disappointment I have been getting in some hard training while we are here. I just wasn't feeling like myself out racing and decided I had rested enough and needed to get some quality training back in. So since we got here after a long but easy three days of traveling it has been nothing but intervals and I have been feeling stronger and stronger with each workout. So I've got a few more hard workouts in the next two day, and then I rest up for a couple days and see what happens. Excited about it and also curious to see how much better they will go...

Race morning

The first race of Nationals is coming up this afternoon so I'm killing some time in the hotel while the snow is blowing sideways outside... Yesterday they were calling for up to 10 inches of snow but we lucked out and got maybe 1 or 2.

So far the trip has been pretty smooth other than sleeping on Alaska time (4 hours earlier) until last night. I've had a few light pace workouts, one yesterday and the other Friday around the course just to get a feel for how it skis. Also I've been testing out skate skis with Frode which has been good but odd. I have some very good skis, but what is running the fastest always seems to be changing even though the weather until last night has been pretty stable and some grinds that you would not expect to be even close among the best. But with the new snow overnight and coming thru the day conditions will be totally different than anything we have seen this week. Which means that we get about twice as many skis ready for today than we usually do.

Annie is here and will be taking some pictures at the race so there should be some up later.