Conditions: Damp loose corn, still clean.
Soft but fast. No dirt. Damp but no wet spots. Classic tracks soft but serviceable. Toko yellow klister worked well.

(Zach Handler)

Conditions: Like sand or sugar on the skate ski area. But it's still snow!
Just glad to get out and ski on my day off!

(Susan Woods)

Conditions: Classic skiied at 6 p.m. The surface was fairly firm considering the conditions. I was surprised that the tracks were in reasonably good condition. Plenty of base.
I used waxless skis which worked quite well. Tracks were fast. I did a lot of double poling. Was able to climb the hills without much slipping. Only a handful of skiers were out. The skaters seemed to be going pretty fast. A nice evening for a ski.

(Mark Basiletti)

After reading the report this morning I headed to Elm Creek at 4PM with some trepidation, but I had no choice. I found quite good conditions; I classical skied and the track was fine. The skate lane had some sugar on the uphills but nothing too bad. It was worse Friday afternoon. Maybe they regroomed, but the course is in good shape and worth the trip.

(Ralph Schwartz)

Conditions: Don't waste your time.
Did the 10k race this morning. Warm ups were already a little soft. After one lap, most of the course was trashed. It was skiing in sugar sand. Tracks also destroyed by racers. Not a good day for skiing at EC.

(Andrea Ochmann)

Conditions: Overall pretty good conditions for classic, hardly any ice, good kick with a hard wax, skating looked decent, too. The trails starting to become well used with high school kids coming for a meet.
I had an enjoyable ski this afternoon at Elm. I got out there a little late, and the high school teams began arriving from all over the metro. I couldn't believe all the young people into nordic racing. It's great to see how the sport has grown over the years.

Photos:

(Bill Lundberg)

Conditions: Skied starting at 10 a.m. Light snow falling at the time. Varied conditions for classic skiing. Overall quite good and fast. I found Swix Blue extra worked well.
More than the usual number of weekday morning skiers were out but not crowded.

(Mark Basiletti)

Conditions: Varied but good overall.
Skied classic and skate starting at about 10am. Classic tracks were shallow in places (it looked like the track setting equipment was not able to dig a full-depth track into the hard man made snow in several places). Tracks seemed a bit soft here, hard there. I slipped a lot with Swix Blue (-3C to -8C) and switched to Skintec waxless rather than seach for a waxing solution. Another skier reported having good kick with a mix of VR30 and VR45. By mid-day, there was intermittent sunshine and the skate deck was getting grabby where the sun was shining on it, a bit hard in the shade, and a bit of sugary/ mashed potatoes on the uphills. All in all, good skiing though.

(Leif Irgens)

Conditions: Varied...snow guns on.
Skated at Elm at 2:30. Snow guns were blowing new snow onto the trails in three locations, creating three soft deposits of new snow (and three local micro-blizzards) and some blowing snow elsewhere on the trail. Skate deck was a touch firm/icy in a few places but the man made snow was getting around and covering up most of the old snow. Overall, the loop was in very good shape. A high school meet was getting started at around 3:30 pm so there was an enormous amount of traffic starting around 3:00 pm.

(Leif Irgens)

Conditions: Very good and getting better with each lap.
Skied at noon. Multiple cannons are blowing snow on the manmade snow loop and it looks like they will keep the snow coming for as long as conditions allow. Aside from getting the cannon snow blast, skate conditions are delightful with about 1-2 inches of fluff to cover any icy spots. Classic tracks are nonexistent where the cannons are blowing, very good in other spots. Definitely worth the journey-thanks Elm Creek!

(Sandy Schreyer)