TART TRAILS 2009-10 Grooming Wrap up

Recently, Tart Trails Inc. sent the following report to everyone who purchased a grooming badge.

TART Trails 3-25-2010

It looks like the skiing is over for this season. The forecast calls for unseasonable warm weather and no snow between now and the end of March. Even if we do receive a significant snowfall we would need to start from scratch and pack a base before we could start skiing again. We have scheduled an appointment for today to take one of our snowmobiles in to correct a safety recall problem and to get it ready for next season. The Vasa groomers will be meeting at the barn soon to take care of other maintenance to prepare the other snowmobile and the LMC for next winter so we will be ready on December 1st (weather permitting) to start grooming again.

All of the groomers would like to thank you for your support this season. Thank you for purchasing a 2009-10 Grooming Badge or K Sponsor, which is a major portion of the funding for the TART Grooming Program. We hope that we can count on your continued support in the future. For those of you that attended the Groomer Appreciation Party on Monday, thank you for the beer and the words of appreciation that makes it a little easier to get up early in the morning during the winter to get the trails ready for skiing.

For those of you into numbers, here are some statistics for the 2009-10 season. The Vasa Trail was groomed a total of 56 times. A total of 400 hours were spent grooming 1490 miles. The number of days between the first groom and the last groom was 91. The skiing was good to excellent for most of those days and skiers were out after the last groom enjoying the trail.

The Leelanau Trail was groomed a total of 10 times. The lower numbers were due in part to a mid January delivery of the new Ginzu Groomer. Two new groomers have been trained for the Leelanau Trail, Bill Heitman and Gary Joslin along with Dave Monstrey and Mark Plune. They will be ready to go when the snow falls next year and plan on grooming more often now that they have their own equipment.

I have compiled a video of grooming during this season and posted it on YouTube. For those who would like to view it here is a link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vydpQX8FzJA
Have a great summer.

Jim Dombrowski


The VASA Board of Directors would like to thank the groomers for all the time they put into maintaining the trail and providing World Class skiing conditions throughout the winter.

We also would like to thank everyone who provided financial support towards this past winters grooming. Without your support Tart Trails Inc would not have been able to regularly groom the Vasa Trail System. Without regular grooming, throughout the ski season, we would not be able to put on a high quality North American Vasa race each year.

For those of you who purchased a Grooming Badge from Tart Trails, we believe you received a great value for your money, as evidenced by the excellent skiing conditions throughout the winter and regular grooming reports from TART Trails. We encourage you to continue to support the grooming program and purchase a Grooming Badge for the 2010-2011 ski season.