More pictures from Val Thorens

Val Thorens was wonderful place. I must say that by the end of the second day I could already feel comfortable on snowboard and I hurt myself only couple of times after that time. It does not mean that I stopped falling, but I fell much less and somehow naturally new how to fall in soft way. So third day I felt already OK to bring with me my relatively expensive and heavy photo gear. Carrying the load was worth it, or at least I think so.



One track was from the left upper corner of this picture to the lower right corner, some 900 meters of descent.

More pictures in Smugmug.

Winter Xdream and marathon

A week ago I participated on a wonderful event called Winter Xdream. This specific Xdream is different from regular Xdream which consists of various tasks on feet, bicycle and canoe. Winter Xdream was at least this time basically a Rogain (specific long orienteering type) event with 7 hours time limit and during this time a team of 3 had to find 20 control points on lakes in Southern part of Estonia. Wonderful idea.

Then reality kicked in. It was -20 degrees to start with (got warmer during day) and lakes were not properly frozen. Even my specifically bought GoreTex (waterproof) shoes did not help but got very wet so by midway I started to have problems with my large toe. This problem got solution when I changed socks (thanks to my team-mate). The other problem was with my left knee, which started properly aching (it was strange already before the event), so I could not run much any longer. But on positive side, our team found all points and we did pretty good. Total 41 km. Here is map with track of winners. We chose to use more roads, so we covered longer distance but avoided thick snow. Here is the team:

More pictures:
http://funding.ee/xdream/imagepages/dsc_0496.html
http://funding.ee/xdream/imagepages/dsc_0497.html
http://funding.ee/xdream/imagepages/dsc_0498.html
http://funding.ee/xdream/imagepages/dsc_0500.html

Anyway, this weekend me and Eva participated in Tartu Marathon - 63 km in classic style in very nice Otepää region. We both made it, thought time could be better (my time was 6 hours and 25 minutes). Improving time is task for next time. I already know that I need to have my knee fixed, I need new skis for classic style and I need to properly apply grip to the skis, because first 22 km without any grip was good for training my hands but very inefficient use of energy. Profession ski service was useless this time somehow, perhaps because of changing weather conditions.

Now I am happy and can forget sports for a while to cure my knee.

Most skillful snowboarder

Val Thorens is a wonderful place high in the Alps. Very enjoyable and I would suggest this experience to anyone.