First Boreas Run

Our first skijor run of Boreas Pass this season - yay!

I stopped momentarily to "gather myself" before starting the final 1.5 mile sprint to the finish.
Everybody ready to go, "Yes, let's get going!" say the happy husky pair.

The Boreas Pass Trail almost always has the same profile of conditions: (1) It is heavily used, packed & fast the first 1.5 miles up; (2) It is lightly used & somewhat packed the next 1.5 miles up; (3) It is infrequently used (to unused) the next 3 miles up to the summit. The first 1.5 miles (making for a 3 mile roundtrip) is one of the most popular cross country and snowshoe routes around Breckenridge. But, only the serious cross country skiers venture the second 1.5 miles (another 3 miles roundtrip). The final 3 miles to the summit is only ascended by one of two types - people planning to camp overnight at the summit huts or some weird person being powered up by sled dogs... Today fit the typical Boreas profile, come along for the ride:

Sprinting along the lower, heavily used section of Boreas:

Packed & fast - Siberian Sprint Track.

Flying along the lightly used middle section of Boreas:

Only a couple of existing tracks up higher.

Powder POW once we got to Bakers Tank (3 miles up Boreas). Nobody has been on the upper section in days - wow! Since it was breaking trail in 10+ inches of snow from Bakers Tank to the summit, we did not do the full summit climb today. Instead we did an aerobic 0.9 miles of breaking trail before starting back down.

Breaking Trail at Bakers Tank.

A nice little video clip of us skijoring along the lower section of Boreas - wheeee!

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Max will tell anyone who will listen that it takes forever for the human to get his skis on at the trailhead and release the skijoring machine. Actually, Max will tell everyone, listening or not!

"MOM, How MUCH longer is the musher going to be?!?! It's killing ME!" says talkative Max
giving Nancy a lecture at the trailhead this morning.

We were easily on pace for a 9 mile outing today and then we hit the trail breaking powder POW at Bakers Tank. Oh well, less mileage and more work makes Max & Zorro happy too! 7.8 miles traveled with 700 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 17 MPH.

2014/2015 Season to Date: 18 days on the trails covering 141.8 miles with 15450 feet of elevation climbed.