City of Lakes: The City of Lakes Loppet is our club championship. Men's and women's divisions, both skate and classic. If you do the race or the tour or volunteer you get a $5 rebate on your R&G dues. If you're the club champion you win one of the monogrammed wax scrappers (whooooo!) and the accolades of your fellow members. Here's the information for volunteers. In past years we've had 25-30 skiers and volunteers. Does anyone want to do the 10K Tour as a group. We can get someone to lead and you can all ski together. Let me know and we'll organize something. This year the snow might finally be good enough to do something like this. Let's start a trend of group skiing in the COL Tour.

Here's the information for volunteers.
Go to the COL website www.cityoflakesloppet.com. After you’ve selected the volunteer positions you are interested in, please print out or save a copy for your records. Additionally, they will send out a reminder e-mail prior to race week-end. Also check with Jyneen as she usually organizes some volunteer activities.

Lake Elmo Ski Clinic: Several of our Coaches will be giving a free clinic at Lake Elmo on Jan 19th. If you've got friends or family members who you want to get into skiing this would be a good chance to get them a free lesson. We'll have free rental equipment for classic. If they want a skate lesson you'll need your own equipment. REI in Bloomington is the only place I know of that rents skate equipment. They need to pre-register. Here's the info. Skifest Registraion

Clothing: I hope to have the clothing by the end of the month. You can pay for you item when you pick it up. I've got extra pieces if you didn't get in your order and I've got lots of hats.

Forum: Don't forget the R&G forum. Now that race season is upon us, I'm sure some of you have questions about racing. Post them on the forum. We'll also have a race night at class before the COL. We'll talk racing and do some race training. Ride & Glide Forum

Coaches Corner:

If you feel you just aren't getting this "Skiing Thing" don't be afraid to ask to go to a different group. In fact we'll probably do that to you automatically one of these nights. Along that line here's something from Coach Gene

Sometimes it’s the Instruction, More often it’s the Practice
Gene Goldenfeld

Reading between the lines of the last newsletter, I sense some frustration after a few lessons on snow. That brings up a common misperception about the process of learning cross-country skiing. Understandably, students assume that what's worked on in class will translate readily to skiing on their own. When things don’t quite turn out that way – or worse – then frustration and discouragement start outweighing the fun. In questioning oneself, it’s only natural to wonder about the teaching, be it the quality or the particular teacher-student interaction. And sometimes there is a problem with those and adjustments are appropriate. However, as both an experienced student and instructor, I can guarantee that the vast majority of learners everywhere go through the same type of process irrespective of instructor. That’s where the misperception comes in.

The truth is that while the concepts behind technically efficient skiing are actually quite simple and straight forward, it takes quite a bit of practice time for these new skills to become ingrained as habit. How much time? It depends on the student’s current skill level, the technique involved and what level of proficiency they are looking for. If just a little improvement at a basic level is desired, then a few hours may suffice. To get beyond a basic level, my working estimate is that for every several minutes of specific instruction it takes as many as 5 to 50 hours on and off snow to make that technique part of one’s repertoire. Much more to become really good or if it involves changes in style, such as breaking particularly entrenched habits. All of which implies that the process of learning involves more than just training muscles and gaining comfort on snow. Let’s leave that discussion aside for now and focus on how to practice and improve.

Successful practice at all levels means focusing on specific skills, both by doing drills such as those learned in class and by concentrating on a technique element or two while out skiing. Just going out and hoping everything from class will fall into place won’t cut it. Here are some ideas:

1) For Beginners and Intermediates especially: Do a couple of drill-like sequences at the beginning, either as part of warming up or after it. This is a great a way to remember what you did in class and get in the groove for the day. For example, start with legs only and then move to double poling (striders can add some single poling). Then put it all together and head out. Advanced skiers may start with drills and/or salt them into the workout, even dedicating half or whole sessions to each element (skiing without poles, double poling, single poling, kick-double pole, etc.).

2) While out skiing, pick one, at most two, skill elements to focus on. This is something even the best typically do. Try to ski with an easy, steady rhythm, getting the element(s) down without hurrying. As you feel comfortable, pick it up every so often for 5-30 seconds, to see how well you can maintain form at higher speed. Vary the technique when doing it, depending on the terrain, so all aspects are worked on.

3) Ski Posture: It’s often easier to learn off snow than on. A good example from my own experience is the coaches’ mantra: hips forward, ankles flexed. If this is a problem for you, try this: Move from your core (center-of-gravity) in all aspects of your life. Yes, I mean everywhere: home, work, mall, market, hiking... How? Instead of pushing off with your legs, flex those ankles a little and consciously initiate movement forward from the core, taking relatively small steps. It should feel like you’re floating (like a dancer). Exaggerate it a little and notice how your legs/feet prevent you from falling, just like your instructor say to do on snow (“zombie walk” in my class). After some time of this, not only will you walk with less energy but more importantly for your skiing, moving from your core with hips forward and ankles flexed will feel natural. Contact me if you have any questions.

It's tough to ski well when it's so icy, and the beginners group had their hands (and feet full), as the tracks were very icy. Klister and Rex Grip Tape were giving adeauate kick, though, so we did some basic striding and double poling drills, and stayed off the hills.

When things are icy, there's a tendency to be tentative on the skis, and of course this is a big mistake. It's especially important when your skis are moving fast and edges don't bite very well to be aggressive. It takes longer to turn and stop, but the usual principles apply. Concentrate on keeping your skis flat when you glide. Riding your edges will lower your control, and won't really slow you down on icy snow. When want to stop, keep your weight forward on your skis and avoid the tendency to sit back on them. Plant the edges agressively to get some bite from them.

I find that when I first start out on icy snow, it takes a while to adjust and to relax with the reality that you can't stop on a dime. I often fall a few times until I adjust, but I generally find that within a few minutes, it gets easier, and I can enjoy zipping around with little effort.

Como was pretty bullet proof, but we found some reasonable areas to ski on. Again as usual we broke into two groups. This night we started working on some of the more subtle aspects of skate technique. Initially one group worked on skiing corners with a modified version of the Marathon Skate and the other group worked on V2 by doing "Forced V2" up the Lexington Hill. Given how fast the icy trail was V2'ing up that hill was possible and most people were able to do it and were surprised that they could. V2'ing up a hill at our level is mostly for show, but it does force you to do the timing EXACTLY right or it won't work. So it is good practice to try it once in a while. And that exact timing is "Don't skate off to the other side until your hands reach your waist" It also help's to turn over as fast as you can such that you break it into smaller easier bites. Though some people were able to power up the hill with big strokes, most found it easier to take smaller quicker steps. Most also found that the second time up was tougher as they wasted there arms on the first pass. To finish out the evening we went over to the Zoo Sidehill and practiced using the Marathon Skate on the sidehill. MS is a great way to ski sidehills, especially when it's icy. Everyone agreed that it was better then the conventional wisdom which was to V1 with the "strong side" to the high side of the trail. MS's around corners and on sidehills needs to be demonstrated. IF you missed it we'll do it again. Be sure to ask.

We doubled poled. A lot. And there were good signs of improvement across the group. The key to effective double poling is falling foward on one’s poles from flexed (bent) ankles, everything above the ankles coming forward as a unit. Those three elements – ankles, falling, unit – do not come readily and require considerable practice. It took me a couple of seasons, including rollerskiing, to get it down.

Four common tendencies of intermediate-level skiers in double poling that need careful attention are:

1. Going up and down and instead of up and forward (like an airplane taking off);
2. Going forward by using one shoulders instead of actively moving the core to bring whole torso foward as one piece;
3. Speeding up so much that there’s no time to come up and fall forward, which is needed to mobilize muscles for the next double pole; and
4. Poling with one’s arms extended, instead of elbows being bent at 90 degrees; the latter allows the skier to mobilize the upper body into a position of maximum strength for the next poling.

Lots of practice at double poling slowly, giving oneself time to fall forward, pays off well in the long run.

A final note: the degree to which one poles “into the legs,” i.e., flexes ankles and knees during the poling phase, is function of terrain and speed (individual and snow). Generally, going uphill will mean more ankle/knee flex than flats and downhills, while going fast means less need or time for it.