Date: March 11, 2010 @ 8:24 AM
On your marks...
You may not have thought of this, but, it is hard to look graceful when wearing snow shoes. Worse still if you are racing…late at night…by starlight…and candlelight. (You have to like a race that has better candles than some French restaurants.)
Beth Nickel, our resident arbiter of all things stylish, did “Book Across The Bay” last month. Snow, ice, dark of night, (almost sounds like mail delivery doesn’t it?) and snow shoes, 10Km. Imagine a couple of HUGE tennis rackets strapped to your feet…not exactly stylish.
Up in Wisconsin (that may be redundant) they decided to start a race from Ashland to Washburn. If you aren’t familiar with that bit of Wisconsin, you might go to Google Maps. Don’t know it? (Well, it is really cool…actually frozen!) At least they say that they don’t have Polar Bears. (But, if it is all white, and the bear is all white, how can you be sure?)
Maybe there is a word problem lurking in here that can be adapted to grow into a full blown “Puzzler” for “Car Talk.”
Washburn and Ashland are on the coast of Lake Superior. Knowing that the average temperature in that part of the world is about a hundred below zero, the organizers correctly determined that the race could be no more than 10Km (6.2 miles) long. However, their Google Maps (they still have high speed Internet up there to see them through the dark season) measured the distance between the two towns at 11.1 miles (following beautiful WI 13 S then taking a left on US -2). S ince the extra 3.9 miles was certain to freeze even the heartiest souls in their Pendleton “Limited Edition Elmer Fud wool hunting caps,” and they needed to raise money to support the library, they had to come up with a solution.
Remember geometry? The shortest distance between two points is a straight line. The organizers chose to have the racers (after they had paid) head off across Lake Superior.
I am still wondering about the strategy of self preservation in a 10K race over Lake Superior. Is it best to be among the first to go when you might find and fall through a weak point? (At least your friends can be comforted that you were in the lead until you disappeared.) Is it best to be with the main group where the vibrations of so many footsteps could rupture the ice but there would be people present to witness you falling through the ice? Or, is it best to go at the end when all of the thin ice might finally give way to fatigue and leave you drifting on a Superior iceberg?
Beth, whose roots are almost as much in Wisconsin as in Oklahoma, headed out with her friends and 3,300 others, under the starlight, across the lake, and made it look easy. They did stop along the way for hot chocolate, to admire candles, stars, and their snow shoes. They didn’t drink any wine so we can’t ask what wine might be best when your location is “Superior.”
Comments:
- ... still wondering if you offer volunteer opportunities in your vineyards. I'm interested in a slow education in enology, starting, of course, at terroir-level. Now that I find myself working in Napa, the call of the vineyards hearken...
Comment by Kirsti - March 17, 2010 @ 7:56 pm
- Dear Dirk, Thank you for sharing with me with your wonderful blogs every week! you have no idea how much I enjoy them!!! Thanks Again!!! Emma PS: I can't wait for next weeks!!!!
Comment by Emma - March 15, 2010 @ 4:05 pm
