UPDATED Wed. 2/4: The organizing committee for the Henchey Memorial Eastern Cup at Craftsbury Outdoor Center, held this weekend, Sat. Feb. 7th-Sun. Feb. 8th, has decided to implement the following contingency to help manage the forecasted cold temperatures:
Saturday: 10k Skate Ind. Start format remains unchanged in format.
Sunday: Race will now be held as a 10k Open/5k U16 Mass Start Classic Start race for all age groups.
Both Henchey Memorial races are being managed carefully throughout the week to ensure a race which is safe for all participants – racers, coaches, supporters, and volunteers. Skiers should monitor the Race Packet and Detailed Schedule for live updates, and keep watching their inbox for messages via email.
This decision has been made in consultation with NENSA’s Athlete Development Committee (ADC). In conjunction with the change to Sunday’s race, the first day of next weekend’s (Feb. 14th-15th) Oak Hill Eastern Cup competition will now be a Classic Sprint. The one-for-one swap between these races will allow the Eastern Cup to maintain its originally scheduled eight race format including two sprint events (a Sk. sprint at Holderness, and a Cl. sprint at Oak Hill), and thus, maintain the approved Junior Naitonal Qualifying criteria for this year.
Why a 10k/5k Mass Start? – With any racer there are hundreds, if not thousands, of perspectives that have to be considered for how each racer, coach, supporter, and volunteer manages the factors inherent to doing a winter sport (read: COLD). However, Organizers can you make one decision. Switching the race format to a distance format greatly reduces the time needed to run a full race to conclusion from a sprint format, and thus allows our organizing committee to exercise more creative options to hold a safe and enjoyable race for everyone. With this format, we can delay starts, condense start intervals, and overall, afford ourselves the necessary tools to run a race within legal racing temperatures.
Wed. Update: Why a Mass Start? – After additional consideration, the race jury has decided to run a mass start 10k/5k U16 Classic race. The mass start format will allow Craftsbury to prioritize the safety of both racers and dedicated volunteers by running the most efficient program possible within the allotted weather window where race temperatures are warmest. Both races will utilize a 5k course, with the Open completing 2 laps, and the U16 race completing 1 lap.
Just Cold Enough to Play – A Note on the Cold
As the Eastern Cup resumes this week, it finds winter in a very different place than it was when we last all got together at Quarry Road. New England is covered in a thick blanket of snow. A polar vortex has beared down for weeks. Start Green supplies are dwindling. BKLers are learning how to kick wax with hard wax rather than klister!
Somethings, however, don’t change in a very cold New England winter. The Patriots are back in the Super Bowl. The Eastern Cup still continues towards its Championship event at Junior Nationals in Cable, Wisconsin.
Those two facts might not seem to have anything to do with one another. But, indulge this Program Director as I make the connection…
As the final run-in of the Eastern Cup season comes into view this Super Bowl week, our Championship, Junior Nationals in Cable, Wisconsin, is starting to come into view. What can skiers expect to find there? Well, this is where the homespun mythology about the place begins…
When you grow up in Wisconsin one of the foundational myths you learn about – like Johnny Appleseed or Champ in New England – is that of the Ice Bowl. In 1967, the Green Bay Packers were on their road to a Championship of their own, the NFL Championship, for the third consecutive year in a row. On the morning of their game against the Dallas Cowboys, it was -15 degrees Fahrenheit with a -60 degree wind chill. It was cold. And late in the game, the Packers were down. Bart Starr, their Quarterback led a game-winning drive which included a 1-yard sneak by him on the goal line, because his running backs kept slipping on the ice and he couldn’t hand it off to them.
The Packers Left Guard (read guy who did blocking) on that Ice Bowl day was a man named Fred “Fuzzy” Thurston. Fuzzy won 6 NFL Championships as a player, second of any player ever behind just Tom Brady. Fuzzy also happened to have grown up in my hometown of Altoona in Wisconsin. When I was a schoolkid, he would come in to talk to us about his career.
Naturally, when placed in front of a bunch of us school kids, the question we all inevitably asked him was about the Ice Bowl. “Just how cold was it?”
My two memories from his response are 1) the apocryphal claim that he still couldn’t feel his fingers fifty years later, and 2) his first response, culled from a wit as strong as his blocks, “oh you know, just cold enough to play.”
The lesson, cold is a real concern when doing an outdoor sport. No way around the fact that it presents a set of risks that need to be managed. But, it can also lead to the types of days competing which become mythos, and laced in nothing but good memories and a warmth radiating out from the human spirit (call it Fuzzy!) of having fronted the winter together.
As we head into this Eastern Cup weekend, here’s to our own Ice Bowl, just cold enough to play.
