iceboating.net Minnesota Ice Sailing Association

Thanks to 5214 for posting a report re the regatta. Wanted to come up to watch (the worst kinda way) but personal circumstances wouldn't permit (no, not the wife!!!).
So really appreciated the photos and learning of the White Birch Lodge. Checked out their web site too.
Have an old (OLD!!!) DN that this site has inspired me to recondition. Know it can't be competive...just for fun!!
Best regards to all the racers and hope all get back home safely. Gene...Cincinnati, Oh.

FYI, smaller ponds/lakes west of Willmar, MN are snow free. Lakes around Willmar still have snow drifts on them but could be gone by Sunday if it rains. Lac qui Parle, a large lake near the SD/MN border,(near Montevideo) would have been sailable today but a little rough. 7 on a scale of 10.

The problem for the snow free zone trending SW of the Twin Cities is there are few large lakes!

We just got done with the registration and it looks like;

40 boats in gold
34 boats in silver

The ranking cut-off was around 33.

The ice is great here on elk lake, mi. It's got a small dusting of snow and it's got a slight bumpy surfice. It's supposed to be 10mph wind tomorrow and around 40deg so it should be pretty nice.

The venue is a great venue. We are in the white birch lodge and have the boats parked right in front of the hotel. We are sailing just out past the point. It's the first time I've been to a regatta where you can launch right from your hotel room.

I'll point the web cam towards the lake tomorrow.

Elk Lake, Mi

new web cam technology going...

this time it's an actual web cam.. with 3sec updates..

http://iceboating.net/live/webcam.cgi

Wisconsin Stern Steers is having a regatta at Green Bay. It starts Saturday morning. Location is to be posted on the Four Lakes web page after one today. It promises to be a good weekend.

Sorry, but the gtiyc.com site is down untill sometime tomorrow. My host server gave me some incomplete information on a required server hostname change last week which has temporarily resulted in A SCREW UP!

We will be following the NA's and posting lots of photos - stayed tuned.

Corey Hughes
gtiyc

After last week's melt & refreeze, are any parts of Minnetonka decent?

I'm an outdoors writer working on a story about ice boating -- its challenges, frustrations but also its thrills. I'm also desperately in need of photos for the story. Anyone interested in chatting, please contact me. Further, can a site editor let me know if it's OK to use the photos posted on this site? Please contact me. Thanks much!

Megan Parker
Outdoors Editor
The Country Today
Eau Claire, WI

(800) 236-4004, ext. 3867
megan.parker@ecpc.com

Elk is now completely free of snow. Minimum 10" of hard green ice. 98% hard green ice with very few stripes of smooth hard white ice. No snow, no slush !! We have sailed a couple hundred miles in the last week,the warm weather completely melted the snow then the rain smoothed everything now after the freezing temps this is the best this ice has been this season by far.
We sailed all day today,the winds started out high but then fell off in the afternoon.Even when the winds were down to 4-6 mph I still sailed without effort. Skip STauber and I sailed Sunday until the winds fell to 4
Elk Lake is about 20 square miles and all frozen.

We have quite a number of photos of this past weekends Centrals Regatta on the www.gtiyc.com site.

Corey Hughes, Nite 341

Anybody care to speculate? It should still be best possible ice in the western region.

So back to Winnebago, or maybe Mendota, or some fresh ice up in greenbay.

I'm wondering about our local lakes like Pepin, Waconia or Millacs.

It's tough to find a good lake that doesn't have too many ice houses.

calling all local ice checkers... report in...

If the guys who sail out of that bar in pepin,wi, what is it called.. Pickled Parrot could go for a rip and post the conditions it would great.

think ice
us5214

We had a great day out on the ice today.

Six gold races and Six silver races,

33 in the Gold, 30 in the silver.

I don't have the results, but I believe JD, us4691 is standing 5 points behind Ron Sherry, us44.

The ice started out hard in the morning and the insert runners where fast. By the last race some used angles and others still stayed on the inserts.. Seemed like people had success with both speed and power sails. It was sunny and around 50 degrees. The ice changed to a dark color and was getting pretty soft, but not quite squishy.. I was happy to get off the ice..

Elk Lake has finally lost most of it's snow and was great today. See pictures under "action shots"

We are back on-line!

I've got the web cam setup at the launch site of the Central Regionals in Torch Lake.

http://iceboating.net/live/index.html

The ice looks really good and there are dozen boats out racing today.

Stop by and see what Twin Cities folks are doing

http://www.carbondragon.us/iceboat/ ... first ice on Cedar Lake

http://www.carbondragon.us/iceboat/footwear.htm
... great ice-grippers for your boots

http://www.carbondragon.us/iceboat/trailers.htm
... construction photos for building a DN trailer