Excellent snow coverage for Black Mountain Classic

Thu, Mar  4, 2010 - By Denny Paull

Excellent snow coverage remains at Black Mountain and should be expected for the 7th annual Black Mountain Nordic Classic 31 km classic and 10 km freestyle/tour scheduled for this Saturday March 6th. Late registration will be available from 7:30 until 9:00 a.m. at the Black Mountain Lodge (aka Chateau North). The freestyle race/tour will begin at 9:30 am with the 31 km classic beginning at 10:00 am.

We have been experiencing day time temps in the high 30's with night temps in the teens. Skiers should expect transformed snow with deep classic tracks and granular snow skate lane to the left.

There are an abundance of hills on the course with the vast majority being nontechnical. The main two technical corners will occur at the 8 km and 9 km marks where skiers will have to turn moderately hard to the left after two fairly steep but short downhills. The skate lane should allow skiers to snowplow these hills for safety if desired . Personally, I would recommend anyone skiing near me to snowplow. You can never be too safe! There is only one technical corner in the freestyle race and this occurs at the end of the race where there is a hard right from the hill onto the lake. Snow plowing will be in order here as well.

We will not be able to set tracks on the lake for the start finish hence classic skiers will have to double pole or do there best without tracks for the first and last 200 yards of the lake. I would anticipate a start temp for the long  and short races of about 29 degrees with a finish temp of about 36 for the long race.

A wonderful course, excellent grooming and good comraderie under blue skies should make for a perfect "Black and Blue" day on Saturday.