Ruffner Finishes First in NordicSkiRacer Time Trial

In a exciting 5km rollerski race held at Kensington Metropark on Sunday, January 7, 2007, Spencer Ruffner beat Mike Muha and Aaron Tarnow to a victorious finish.

The race was based on a complex handicap system to ensure fairness, or the lack thereof. Spencer aced the handicap system, getting time off for being over 40, over 50, for having spent the previous 2 hours in the Hugh's technique clinic, for car sharing to the race, and for having his son Garrett along.

Spencer can be seen in the photo at the right doing no-pole skate technique drills before the race.

Aaron Tarnow did one better by claiming he was classic skiing (he skated), was female, pregnant, over 40, over 50, over 60, was at the clinic, was wearing makeup (or was that a mustache?), and offers accommodations to traveling skiers. But it was only good enough to get in third. (Unless, of course, we accidentally mis-marked his arrival time, then he could have been first or last. Whatever...)

Hugh and Julie Pritchard were fourth and fifth. (Julie, unlike Aaron, actually is female and pregnant).

Garrett decided it was too much work to race 5km, so took a shortcut and a DNF. Susan took one look at the group of racers, grabbed her rollerskis and headed in the opposite direction as fast as possible.

Fun was had by all.

Did you miss-out? No problem: If there's no ski race this weekend, we will defy the gods one more time and have a rematch on Saturday, January 13 at noon. Watch the Calendar!

There's a couple photo below - more photos to come...