Kongsberger Ski Club

  Many of us recognize Alison Arians' name: ski racing classmate of Hashimoto's at Dartmouth, World Masters medalist, top-level masters racer, and friend of Rainey Hoffman, who forwards us this awesome story she told of her adventures in Finland, given at a Trail Tales meeting. Trail Tales March 19, 2024   Intro (Kikkan):   Alison Arians will tell a story about her (mis)adventures traveling to Finland to ski race when she was 15, compared to a slightly different experience traveling to ski race in Finland again, just last month, at age 53.    Alison was born and raised in Anchorage, and started cross country ski racing back in the dark ages before skate skiing was invented. She trains with Jan Buron of Alaska Winter Stars and loves all manner of ski racing, including our local NSAA citizens races, Besh Cup Junior National qualifiers, Masters World Cup competitions, and World Loppet marathons. Her whole family is involved with ski racing, including her husband, Dan, who times th

 The benefit of being flexible in your winter plans: thanks, Rune, for this fun report and pictures from your five-week adventure in Norway! ***** By early February, the prospect of a full scale American Birkie in Wisconsin looked less and less likely.    To the contrary, the Oslo region of Norway was enjoying one of the coldest, snow-rich winters in decades.     So Augustina and I made a quick decision, cancelled the trip to Wisconsin and moved our planned trip to Norway up by a few weeks and left for what ended up being a 5-week trip to Norway.   The first stop was my hometown of Drøbak which is located just south of Oslo.     By the later part of February, the weather had turned to rain and milder temps but still lots of snow left on the local lighted ski trails, which relies heavily on snow-making as well.     As it turned out, we arrived just in time for me to participate in the club championship at the end of February!    Three  laps of 2.5 k skate race on sloppy wet snow, just l