News…

Equipment for sale: I will publish a list of the stuff I have for sale on the website. It will be there by the time you read this. Check them out. Let me know your interest and we can make the deal from my van in the parking lot on Tuesday’s. Money talks FCFS.

Equipment day: About 5 or 6 people showed up at the "Mad House" that was Joe’s Race Night. The prices were great with 30% off equipment and 50% off poles. Boot selection was quite limited in that there appears to be a shortage (IE none) of Atomic boots this year and Atomic was a major line at Joes. Helped a few people buy some mid-level skate skis and lots of Fastwax at last year’s prices plus 30% off.

The next equipment day will be at Finn Sisu on Dec 2nd at 10am. They’ve got plenty of stuff and we’ll have the shop to ourselves as they are opening early just for us, so you’ll get plenty of attention. One other possibility, especially for clothes will be Midwest Mountaineering Winterfest this Fri-Sun. It’s a great event and worth going to to get the juices flowing even if you aren’t looking to buy. Lot’s of stuff to look at and info to pick up, Sled Dogs to pet and lectures. I’m going to be there on Friday night about 6pm. No promises, but I’ll hang around the equipment area from 6-6:30 if you have any questions look for me there.

Thanksgiving Trip: Things are looking up for the trip to ABR. They are getting snow. We’ve got a few more spots available. Let me know ASAP if you’re interested. Leaving Thursday night or Friday morning. About $30 per night per person lodging. Carpools of course.

Typical class night: Unlike the last two weeks we’ll try to have a typical class night next week. That means meet upstairs anywhere from 6:15 to 6:45. Put on boots, stretch, and yak. Then we’ll poll the group to see who there for beginner/intermediate/advanced classic and skate. Point out the evening’s coaches and head outside by 6:45. We will also assign meeting places for the various groups. Basically meet under the various light poles in the parking lot. That way you’ll know where to go if you’re a bit late.

Wax party coming in December stay tuned...

Ask A Coach: A new section where your questions of general interest are answered. Several of our coaches have areas of expertise. Ed is a Kniesiologist (sp). Ask him questions about the physics and muscles involved in the body motions and positions involved in skiing. He’s also an expert in the area of Exercised Induced Asthma. Ben specializes in Training Programs and Technique. I like to think that I know a lot about equipment and dryland. Or just fire off a question to the coaches in general at coaches@rideandglide.bizland.com We also have a member who’s a Nutritionist. She will have a column soon. Send your nutrition questions to me for now and I’ll forward them. I’ll have a link on the web page for questions eventually.

Ski Fit: A number of people brought old, wide classic skis in for me to evaluate last Tuesday. I’m sure a lot of you have a pair of these. A pair of skis you’ve had for ages, probably waxless. You got them at a ski swap or from a friend or at a "What Not" sports store. They are great for tooling around in the woods, listening to birds and enjoying the winter. That’s why most serious skiers have a pair of these, just for those days when you want to be outside. But if you’re out with your friends who have “Light Touring” or racing equipment on prepared trails at a touring center you can’t keep up. Your skis are heavy and slow and can even be detrimental to proper technique. They are too soft for prepared tracks (IE firm tracks) and as a result the wax pocket (fishscale pattern) drags on the snow even when you’re coasting. The wax pocket of your friends skis only touch the snow when they push off, so they glide a lot further for each stroke than you do. If you’re really serious about skiing, especially as an aerobic sport, pick up a pair of modern skis. If you’re not sure yet. Use your old ones for a while and see how it goes. There will be big sales come Spring and you can buy then. Otherwise come to the Finn Sisu event on Dec 2nd and pick up a "New Ride".

You also may have skis that are too stiff for you. You can’t get any grip to move you forward. You’re always slipping. You need a properly fit pair of skis. That’s where a good shop comes into play. Notice I have been talking about classic skis. Fit is more important in classic. A bad fit means you aren’t going anywhere or it may be too much work. A poor fit on skate skis is not a big a problem. You can still move along, just not as fast as you might like.

Roller Skiing: Many people have asked me about buying rollerskis. If you are a beginner I don’t recommend that you buy them. Rollerskis are quite difficult to balance on. They are also scary due to the potential of falling. So you’ve got two things working against you. If you are not reasonably accomplished at skiing on snow, IE you’re in the middle instead of out over your skis, it will be worse on rollerskis. Committing to that gliding ski requires balance, which requires lots of practice. On rollerskis the balance is more difficult and most people don’t commit to the rollerski aggressively enough to balance on it due to the fear of falling. As a result all roller skis all you do is reinforce the bad habits and skills that you have on snow. If you have rollerskis and can’t get "out of the middle" you should spend all your time just free skating instead of doing a poor V1. Concentrate on relaxed glides as long as you can on each side. Once you can "Free Skate" comfortably and are able to move from ski to ski because you want to as apposed to having to because you are falling back to the middle then you can start to work on V1. Rollerski can also serve as a good arm workout by doing "Double Poling". This is also safer as there is less chance of falling due to balance problems. However there always the ever-present stones waiting to trip you up. People also ask "What about In-Line Skates?" In-Line Skates (like Rollerblades) have several problems that don’t make them a good substitute. They are too fast, which encourages "Slow Turnover" which is not good for your ski form. They are also too stable so as a result you really don’t learn the fine muscle control needed to balance on skis. Finally In-Line Skaters tend to push off with their toes. Skiers should be pushing off more with their entire foot. So In-Line Skates can develop bad habits. By all means keep In-Line Skating for your fitness, but don’t expect your skiing to improve because of it.

After closing up my "fencing operation" I grabbed a few wanderers and led them out to the lights up the hill by the Pavilion. There we met the rest of the Intermediate group. I took half and Jon and Todd took the other and we went our separate ways. We worked on the V1 progression drills that mimic the positions used in V1. Your most important technique at this level. Other techniques may be faster and more important when you become advanced. But for now V1 is your Bread and Butter. It’s how you climb hills, it’s stable in icy conditions and it’s your go to technique when you’re tired. Which for a lot of us is quite often. We slowly went through the drills. Bounding or high energy movements are more for endurance and strength. Do the movements slowly to learn them properly and engrain them in your mind. You can’t cheat when you move slowly. We’ll do a lot of this on snow as well. It’s hard to ski slowly with proper technique. But if you can it proves that you understand what you are doing.

Also introduced a universal timing movement common to all skate techniques and even classic. That timing movement is the "Action Time" The moment when your hands reach your waist and your feet have come together. You are preparing to skate or stride to the other foot. In all techniques, skate and classic, You build power and compression right up until your hands reach your waist then you propel yourself to the other side. This one movement is a key item you have to learn. It’s the beginning of the "weight shift" that we always talk about. This "weight shift" is pretty evident in skate skiing and far more subtle in classic. Think about and practice this movement. You classic people try it too. Think about the kick as propelling you to the other ski(from track to track).

For those of you who question the importance of dry land, or for those who just want to get psyched up for dry land training watch this youtube video.

I just watched it and am heading out to do some hill bounding!

We had a very good session on Tuesday night. Coaches Tom and Hank led the group with a pole hike to the top of the Lexington Hill. Once there we did a group stretching session which gave us an opportunity to learn each other's names. We then did ~30 minutes of review of last weeks activities. We focused on obtaining the neutral position/stance, the skate kick being a push to the side - not to the back, and V1 timing. For V1 timing the poles and to-be-glided-upon ski hit the ground at the same time. The poles complete a full poling motion, you kick to the other side, and then once gliding on the other ski recover the arms and start the motion all over again. We did some side bounding as well as a strength building exercise.

We then did ~30 minutes of introducing new stuff. Here we focused on classical skiing dry land drills. Why would you teach classical drills to a skate group?? Because practicing classical skiing technique can actually improve your skate skiing prowess. We focused on arm and leg coordination, proper balance, proper stride position, and proper hand position when poling. The poling drill focuses on visuallizing a cup of water in your hand. When your arm comes forward you want to try to throw the water on a person standing in front of you. This forces you to angle your hand/pole properly for maximum power. We also did the "finger crusher" drill where one person puts their hand under the "gliding" food of their partner. The "gliding" partner then tries to bound forward with maximum force being put into their heel in an attempt to crush their partners finger. This drill is done to focus on pushing of with the full foot vs. the toe alone. This drill does not result in injury, rather it results in the "crushed" partner being able to provide feedback on what variations provide the most force in the heel. Once we had timing and kicking down we did some hill bounding. Classic technique hill bounding is about as close as you can get to ski simulation without snow, skis, or roller skis. Everyone had a good time bounding up the hill.

We ended the session with a pole hike through the back bowl and another group stretching session. We also did the snow dance. I don't know if anyone has noticed but last week we had flurries on Wed. This week we had flurries on Wed. Both weeks we snow danced. Everyone just needs to do a nightly snow dance in their front yards and we will have a White Thanksgiving!

Enjoy the U-Tube Video and see you next week!

A fantastic night of training under almost summer like conditions. We had a group of nearly 20 and then broke up into 2 groups after a short pole hike warmup. Kurt? took one group, and I took the second and headed for the nearest hill. My group was more interested in keeping moving, so I decided we would work on body position and early explosion on the poles with body position for the night – I like to call it, "creating potential energy". We spent the next hour hopping, jumping, stretching and running uphill, working on quick kick and knee drive to create a powerful kick and good beginning body position. We met back up with our ½ and finished out with a 10 minute cool down pole hike…good fun had by all.

Until next week -ben