6 hour Spearhead (ish)

Daily Vert: 1900m

Total Vert so far: 60,750m

Seeing as there has been a weekend since the last time it snow, I figured that there would be plenty of skin tracks all the way around the Spearhead, so today might be good day to try and set a good PB.

What I didn't count on was the strong winds last night blowing all the snow around and covering up every tiny trace of old skin track.

About an hour and a half in, I felt the trail breaking was really slowing us down, so I suggested we ski the Curtain Glacier instead, and come back in a week or so when the snow is faster. But Vince has skied the Curtain before and wasn't that bothered about doing it again, and he was still confident that despite the trail breaking we could still crack 6 hours.

Here are some of our times at notable points along the route:

Decker/Trorey: 56 mins

Pattison south shoulder: 1 hour 24 mins

Tremor shoulder: 2 hours 9 mins

McBeth Glacier: 2 hours 57 mins

It appeared that an overnight group had been camping on the Naden Glacier just behind McBeth, so luckily we had their skin tracks to follow up the big climbs over Iago and to Benvolio.

Boot pack Ridge: 3 hours 2 mins

Top of Iago: 3 hours 34 mins

Benvolio col: 4 hours 17

At this point I was fairly hopeful that I might finish in a clean 6 hours. Unfortunately I overlooked a few issues. Firstly, the overnight group skied down Overlord instead of across it, so we had to break trail again. Second, I'd forgotten how long the flat skin across overlord is, and third, in my exhausted state my transitions had totally gone to pot. By the time we got to Whirlwind I let Vince go ahead so that he could finish as soon as he could, and I skied Whirlwind and Cowboy solo, for a final time of 6 hours and 18 minutes, which all in all I am pretty happy with, especially considering the conditions.

There are still a few areas where we could have saved time-

Most importantly next time choose a day when you don't have to break trail.....

I feel like I lost some time between Decker and Trorey on that crappy ridge line. Don't be afraid to stay further right- well away from the ridge, there are way fewer rocks that way. Other than that our route was pretty good, I just need to be more on the ball with the quick transitions even when tired.

Trying to really push yourself all day definitely feels a lot different from just attempting to maintain a solid pace, but I'm sure in time I'll get better at maintaining that speed, and to do the full circuit in that time really opens your eyes as to what can be achieved in a single day.