Flying

Zooming along the trails behind Zorro the Flying Z - Wheeee!

I love this section of trail as the morning sun is at the perfect angle to showcase Flying Z!
Out-stretched & airborne flying sled dog!

It was an interesting start to the day as the trail had been groomed by a skinny groomer. A skinny groomer is a heavy sled with a groomer platform on the bottom that gets towed by a snowmobile. The groom track it lays is only as wide as a snowmobile - that is a skinny groom track. Here is my slight problem with a skinny track behind a fast sled dog... If I put both skis in the track, then they have to be parallel and there is no room for either ski to move and provide any braking or friction. Now, I have taught Zorro that if you feel no friction from me, then you can go as fast as you want.

Now, let's think about this. If I put both skis together in the skinny track then I provide no friction. So, if I provide no friction then Zorro uncorks it to full throttle. But, if I am trapped in a skinny track then I cannot provide any friction to keep us (okay, ME) safe. See the problem? :)

So, what you get instead is the photo below. I have one ski (right leg) in the groomed track and the other ski (left leg) out of track and in side powder. If I shift weight to the right leg then Zorro gets the frictionless feel and floors it. But, if I shift weight to the left leg, then Zorro feels friction and slows to my pace. Needless to say, my legs were quite sore after today's fast & furious skijor :)

Weight to the right = Zorro flying.
But, notice the left leg hanging out in the powder as the "emergency brake" should I need it.

After a few miles on the skinny groomer trail and we transitioned onto your typical "widely groomed" nordic track. From this point on, Zorro was flying around the trails as we hit 24 MPH as a top speed for the day. Zoom!

In the morning shade on super fast groomed terrain!

Eventually we transitioned out of the heavily shaded forest you see above and into the morning sun. Once into the sun, you get great flying and shadow shots like the top of today's blog. Come along for the video counterpart of this intro photo as Zorro kicks into high gear as we fly along in morning sun. Wheeee!

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

End of the day's run and here comes today's comical Jack entry. We did not hook Jack up to run along Zorro; but did hook him up for a gentle "walk" to end the outing. We always end a fun day of skijoring with "pork treats" for the hard working sled dogs:

"Such a fun day, ready for end-of-run treats!" declares super happy Zorro.
"I may not have run; but I can taste the treats already! Yum!" demonstrates silly Jack who is
very ready to receive his treats :)

Fun day on fast trails:

"Zoom - I had a blast!" declares happy Zorro at a turnaround point on the trails.

Zooming Zorro Day: 7.9 miles traveled with 450 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 24 MPH.

2017/2018 Season to Date: 26 days on the trail covering 186.3 miles with 16,050 feet of elevation climbed.

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