My first time

My first time…

Well, as the Sandia peak snow shoe race draws closer it sounded like a great idea to actually get some snowshoeing in. The Dread Pirate invited a few of us up to the peak for some pre-race practice so we could get a feel for what we were in for. Good thing...

I really don’t do winter sports so this whole fall down get wet, cold, and freeze parts of your body thing is new to me. I think I actually obsessed over what to wear for the training session! I must have learned something over the past x number of years cycling during the winter because I actually got the right layers of clothing on! Yeah for me, I didn’t even freeze or lose any parts of the ‘ol body.

IronOutlaw and I went to REI to pick up some snow shoes the day before our training sessions. And not knowing anything about snowshoes picked a brand shoes that I thought had a good reputation, and the sales guy said were reasonable shoes. Plus, they were on sale, all the better!

We picked up some Redfeather Rainier shoes. These things were the biggest pieces of junk on the market. IronOutlaw’s strap clamp broke in the parking lot. Both of my clamps broke about 10 minutes into our trek. Then, at the turn around point the entire plastic attachment for my shoe broke off and I had to hike back to the car sans snowshoes.

For the brief ten minutes that the shoes worked I had a great time! Although everyone else looked comfortable, I felt like I was struggling just trying to keep up. I'm not sure if was equipment, fitness or altitude but I was definitely having a hard time staying with everyone! Overall it was a wonderful experience, I might even start to like this snow thing!

Pirate, thanks for showing us the ropes!