A busy week turned into a busy weekend. Not sure where all of the time goes, but each week just transitions to the next and now it is already deep into February and it seems like it was Christmas last week.

Friday evening the Fargo North Spartan swim team traveled to Grand Forks to dual Grand Fork's Central in their pool. The FN team has just finished up what is termed "hell week", the time span 10 days before the Eastern Dakota Conference Championships where tons of yards are swam in anticipation to the tapper 5 days before the EDC meet. The team is tired but still managed to beat up on Grand Forks. Both Matt and Ben swam strong in each of their events. In my opinion and I am just the Dad not the coach but Ben is turning into a long distance guy like his brother as he dropped over 20 seconds in his 500 freestyle.
Check out this score board. Matt was swimming in lane 3. He snuck into first place by 4 one hundreds of a second! Good job Matt!
Saturday morning Kriston and I left early AM to make our way up to Bemidji, MN for the 29th Annual Finlandia Cross Country Ski Race. This is the third year that I have raced this event and I find it more fun every year. The photo above is Jake Richard's of Maplelag and I prior to the start of my 25K Classic event. The classic (traditional) race started 30 minutes in front of the skate racers. All events are on the same course so they give the classic guys a head start to keep the double tracks as clean as possible. The weather was about as perfect as it could get. Sunny skies, temps in the teens at the start and no wind!
Kriston was in charge of the camera and took this nice shot. I am in that group somewhere. As you can see, the tracks were deep and fast. I have skied my share this winter, but only a couple of days skiing over 20k all at once. 25k (15.5 miles) is a long time to be on the boards but I was not worried because I only had two goals....beat my time from last year and ski as hard as possible without hitting the wall. The start of the race takes you up and around the Buena Vista Ski resort which means a tough climb right away. After that, things spread out and smooth out nicely. At 13k the course makes its way through a tunnel under the road going to the ski area and you head out to the second half of the loop. The second half has a lot more climbing and tougher turns which starts to wear on you as you begin to tire out. I felt strong the whole race after eating and drinking plenty of water. A couple of blisters on each thumb and on my right heel at the end but I was able to meet both my goals - beating my last years time by almost three minutes and not bonking from the distance.

One of the highlights of the race is the post race lunch served in a cool log cabin heated with a wood stove. The bread and wild rice soup were excellent. Kriston was a trooper in being so busy but taking the time to join me for the day. We had a nice time.

Anne Ellefson from Park Rapids winning the women's 25k skate race. The Ellefson's are top of the line. I appreciate the fact that their interests are typical of the Wenzel's. Click on the Ellefson blog link on the side of the Wenzel page - good stuff.

Me at the finish line - what a great day!

Kriston bundled up and enjoying the sun. After the race we made the easy ride back to Fargo to finish out the weekend. Next week promises to be just as busy, have a good one.