"Skin the Turkey" Thanksgiving Skimo

Starting line of the 2nd annual "Skin the Turkey"

First, happy Thanksgiving to all.  Hopefully everyone had a warm meal and has slept it off by now.  This will be a brief race report of the second annual "Skin the Turkey" informal ski mountaineering race that we are holding in lieu of flag football or a turkey trot 5K.  

This year's venue was the ever welcoming Brighton Ski Resort and the surrounding backcountry.  We had 13 participants and I'm pretty sure everyone had a good time.  Our course began in the parking lot, followed a mix of groomed runs, cat tracks, and skin track to the Millicent Lift.  From there, we ripped skins and descended to the Twin Lakes dam where we skinned up again and made our way to the pass.  Finding coverage less than desirable, we turned it around and skied back to the parking lot where with skis in hand, we ran over to the base of the Great Western lift for the final climb.  The total vertical was on the low end at 3700ish but it seemed appropriate for the mixed crowd of spandex/goretex and race skis/Manaslus.  

In the end, Jason pulled off the victory after going back and forth with Jared and I for the morning.  The Samurai and I entered the last transition together and a spectacular crash while blinded by snow and high winds left me in third.  The others made their way home as the weight (gear) on their feet dictated and found hot cider  or cocoa and pumpkin pie with whipped cream waiting in the back of the Subaru.  

Out of the gate feeling crappy sans warm up

Pumpkin pie out of the back of the Subaru...Sanitary and Delicious!

It was a pretty enjoyable morning on a pretty enjoyable holiday.  Hopefully we'll plan better next year, get the word out sooner, and see some more of you.