Birkie thanks

My 12th Birkie experience will definitely go down in my personal
archives as one of the most memorable. It's not the results (a DNF),
but it's the extreme selflessness that two Birkie skiers showed
during the race to help a fellow skier.

I decided a few weeks prior to the Birkie that I would join the classic
ranks. All was going well until a few KMs past 00. The rest is still
somewhat of a blur, but I will try to reconstruct.

I was heading down a hill, in the tracks, when I noticed some debris (a
foil wrapper). I'd seen debris in the tracks before, and simply
lifted my ski to go over. I really don't know what happened
next...perhaps the foil wrapper caught on my kick zone, or I caught an
edge...but I suddenly found myself down on the ground, hard.

At first, I thought I just broke a pole. But the sudden, intense pain
in my left shoulder told me otherwise. So, here I lay in the middle of
the trail, flailing about and in severe pain. I could do nothing. I
tried to move to the side, but it was dreadfully painful.

I really don't know how long I was on the trail. It probably was only
a few moments, but it seemed like an eternity. Soon, two skiers stopped
and dragged me to the side of the trail.

So, there I sat. I was unable to move my left arm and was in extreme
pain. These two skiers stayed with me until the ski patrol arrived, and
even helped as I was loaded into the snowmobile sled.

I was driven to Gravel Pit, where I was loaded onto an ambulance and
transported to Hayward. The diagnosis was a broken left collarbone. It
will heal, in time. But my skiing is over for the winter.

While it wasn't the way I wanted to finish my Birkie, I was very
thankful for a number of folks, including the ski patrol, the ambulance
drivers, and the volunteers at the aid station.

But most of all, I would like to thank the two skiers who stopped and
rendered aid. In the blur and my state of mind, I unfortunately can't
recall exact names or numbers. One was a wave 4 skier and the other a
wave 3 skier. They both stayed with me even after the ski patrol had
arrived.

I'm still very sore, and in time will heal completely. I will be back
next year. But I will also be back with a renewed sense of what the
Birkie is all about. Sure, finishing times and personal bests are
important. But so is the sense of family that the Birkie brings.

I will never be able to thank those two skiers enough. And I will
probably never be able to repay them for the aid they rendered. I only
hope to carry on their selflessness by aiding my fellow skiers whenever
I can.

Mark Moore