The latest episode of the BirkieGuide.com Podcast is dropping (well, uploading) as we speak (especially if I upload them to the right directory). We talk with Ben Popp, the Birkie executive director, about the current status of the course, the chances of a good race, and preparations and contingencies. He’s realistic but optimistic: the base is solid and helped by rain which solidified it in January and earlier this month. He says there’s a 75% chance we survive the meltdown.

(Model update: the latest US model was very bad, but the latest European model very good. It’s wait and see at this point.)

The forecast high in Hayward today was 47˚.

Right now, it’s 55˚.

This is real bad. It’s 55 and sunny, which is better than 55 and rain, but still baking away at the base. The hope was that fog or low clouds would mitigate the melt somewhat. That looks unlikely.

On the other hand, the European model prints out a direct hit for the Birkie next Thursday and Friday with 12-18 inches of snow falling, starting Thursday night. We’re now banking on that. Here’s my best guess at what may happen next week:

• 6% chance the race is held on the current base
• 18% chance the race is held on the current base, but is shortened to or turned back at OO
• 40% chance the race is held based on new snowfall
• 36% chance the race is canceled due to lack of snow

With the current weather and upcoming warmth, we are really banking on a Birkie Blizzard. It’s not a good place to be. But it’s better than canceling a plane ticket.

We still have a problem. It’s going to be warm for the next week. Five days above 40, potentially two above 50. This is no bueno. It may cool down some evenings. It may rain. The snow may last. But it will be close. It may not.

We’ve had a good run of snow years for the Birkie since 2007: the longest run of a full course being run since the 1990s. Good things may come to an end. But they may not.

I think retaining a good base with the upcoming weather may be very difficult. But if we can retain something on the ground, anything on top helps us a lot. And there’s a strong signal a week out that we may see some snow. Most of the model runs in the past few days have shown this; the ones which haven’t have shown the storm being suppressed south by high pressure. This is what to watch. Today, we’re 2/3 on models showing the storm hitting the Birkie Trail with enough snow to give us a race next week. We’ll have to watch this, closely, over the next few days. For now, if you’re a praying person, pray for snow.

(I’d like this year closest to 1998, when there was 6″ of snowpack and a week of temperatures in the 50s. That year the race was shortened to OO. Hopefully we can get a bit better.)

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure to ski 50k on the Birkie Trail. Along the way, I took out my phone and made a series of “Trail Moment” videos of certain notable features. There’s some video of the new start, and then points of interest (hills, mostly) the rest of the way.

New podcast is posted, this one with Gary Crandall of the Chequamegon Fat Tire Festival. He is also the founder of the drum corps playing up top of the Power Lines. He’ll be out there in February pounding again!

Our esteemed producer, Doug the Subway Fugitive, Not—oh, wait, that’s Car Talk—Sam Evans-Brown has a Podcast. He did an episode about a ski race. What’s easier than making a new podcast (we did that, too)? Playing someone else’s. I had to twist his arm a little, but I think you’ll enjoy it. You should download his podcast, too, and listen to it.

Want to hear his podcast in ours? Download it on iTunes (or wherever) or listen right here.

A all new, hot-of-the-presses BirkieGuide Podcast will be coming soon (Saturday, if we’re lucky).

In 2017, as has been well documented on this page and elsewhere, the Birkie will split off the Korteloppet and run it on Friday, leaving Saturday alone for the Big Race. It’s a question of congestion: the Birkie has grown from 4,500 to 7,000 participants in the past 10 years. The start has been congested, but the real rate limiting factor is the finish; there are only so many people you can process through a town like Hayward, Wisconsin. Which got me to thinking: are there any other large, long-distance races which have such a high ratio of participants to local population? And, no, not just ski races, but races of any kind at least marathon distance.

I found a list of the 50 biggest marathons in 2015, with about 2000 or more participants. The Birkie, if ranked among these marathons, would rank the 11th biggest race in the country. But the other marathons are in big cities. 50,000 people run New York, but that’s just 1/165th the population of the city. Even races in smaller cities (like Grandma’s in Duluth) account for less than 1/10th of the local population. (There’s a marathon in DisneyWorld which has a very small official population, but the park itself hosts 50,000 visitors per day, and is basically in Orlando, so it doesn’t have crowding issues. Also, why in God’s name would you want to run a marathon at 5:30 a.m. in Florida? No, please, someone explain this to me.)

Anyway: Hayward? There are three finishers for every resident of the town. It would be as if 24 million people ran New York, or 250,000 ran Grandma’s. The only other race close is the Bataan Memorial Death March race in New Mexico, but even it has only two finishers for every resident of the town of White Sands (and while an official marathon, many finishers spend eight or more hours on the course, so it’s a bit more spread out). Otherwise, Big Sur has about a 1:1 ratio, and every other marathon is at least 7:1 or more. So by this measure, the Birkie is, relative to the size of the largest town on the course, the biggest race in the country.*

* that is, relative to the size of the town it finishes in.

I got a little fever and the cure was to update the Guide. Lots changing in 2017. It’s not all set in stone (there’s some conjecture about busing, for instance) but there was some stuff which hadn’t been changed in, let’s just say a while. Happy skiing!

A few weeks ago I sat down (electronically) with Birkie director Ben Popp to get the lay of the land for this fall’s race (and to preview the trail run, which has already happened; I’m good at getting these posted, apparently). The trail has survived the summer rains, and now we need some cold and snow. Hear about all that and more on your favorite streaming service, or download the episode here.

Caitlin Gregg has won the Birkie four times. Four.

If you’re keeping track at home, that’s four more times than I’ve won the Birkie. Or you (well, almost all of you).

And she came on the fourth BG Podcast! (See what we did there?) It’s pretty great. Hear about the Birkie, and last year’s World Champs, and all else.

Oh, and when she says the second place woman’s name Dabudyk and it sounds like “dabooty” and I don’t laugh, it is a testament to restraint on my part (or we edited it out, you’ll never know). So enjoy that moment.