FasterSkier

Category: XCFeeds

A collection of live feeds from cross-country ski blogs around the web.

  • Cyclova XC’s Team Apparel Giveaway!

    Tommy Krenz is thrilled to be sporting a Cyclova XC kit – and this is your chance to get some, FOR FREE!

    Cyclova XC has always been focused on having fun with our sports and building community around them.  We believe being a part of a team is part of what can make XC Skiing, Cycling, and Trail Running so much fun!  If you haven’t been part of a team before, and are curious – by all means contact us to get in on the fun!
    Now through the end of December is your chance to WIN FREE CYCLOVA XC TEAM GEAR!  Thanks to a generous donor who believes in the magic of our sports and the great time that being a part of our team is, we are offering  FREE CYCLOVA XC TEAM GEAR to one lucky winner.  

    Every customer who makes a purchase in our store between December 14 and December 31 is eligible to fill out a ticket to be entered in a random drawing.  On January 2, 2012, we will draw the lucky winner who will have their choice of the following pieces of Cyclova XC Team Gear:

    Each of these prize packages has a value of $130+, and each will ensure the lucky winner will be skiing/biking/running in comfort and style!  Come on in to the store to learn more, and to enter!

  • Craftsbury Snowmaking: a classic day on the race loop

    Hans described it best when he said it was like skiing at a world cup venue: dirt and moss in the woods, but a foot of snow on the trail. We can’t say enough about the job that the Craftsbury snowmakers are doing: the 1.5 km race loop is ready to go and they are still working.

    We had good tracks all the way around today, and skied on race skis without doing any damage.

    Alum David Sinclair is on break from Dartmouth, and will be joining us this week. It’s always fun to have David around!

    The workout today was loop specific: we did a progression beginning with no pole (4 loops), then 1 pole (2 loops each pole), then exclusively double pole (2 loops). We finished the structured workout with three timed loops—one at levels 1,2, and 3—to work on pacing. Here Hans strides it out up the big climb in L2.

    Fitzy finishes up her L2 lap in the field.

    Eventually the sun came out and the track started warming up, but we had great kick for the whole morning. MK strides up the final climb into the field.

    Heidi finishes her L3 loop while David tries desperately to get in the photo.

    Dev’s tongue has become almost as blog-popular as Dev himself.

    Fitzy was all smiles in the sun: we’re lucky to be on manmade snow, but we’re still hoping for the real deal!

  • Fall Camp Recap

    The J2/J3 group arrived safely back in Vermont this evening, and the J1/OJ + Brooke group arrives home tomorrow evening. We’ve had a great time in Colorado and have gotten a lot of quality training in. As Sverre mentioned, the older kids headed over to Steamboat for a time trial on Saturday. It was nice to get a hard effort in, come down almost 2,000 feet from where we were living & training for the previous week, and mix it up with the Steamboat kids – who were fast! Results are over on their blog. No photos from the TT, but plenty of other photos from the week. Check them out below:
    We watched Kikkan win gold in Davos on Sunday morning. We headed out for our morning jog and ran back inside and crowded around the kitchen table in the boys house to watch the final!
    That same afternoon we headed out for a long OD. This crew made it to the top of Blue Ridge – 10,670 feet! Sweet! Katharine and Brooke also made it to the top, but missed the picture, and several others got to 9,800 feet before turning around.
    On Sunday night we had our Yankee Swap – $5 limit that produced everything from body spray to Red Bull to various thrift shop finds to stuffed animals to $5 in cold hard cash. Charlie was the first to pick up the night’s coveted item – an American flag button up shirt (Koby’s find)…
    …and Murph briefly got the shirt, but Sophie (lucky #1 for the swap) wrangled a deal to get back the shirt and swap it with Charlie for a cowboy hat from Steamboat, purchased by Gino.
    Pippin opens her gift – canned hot sauce! Hmmm…. “BFD” – breakfast for dinner at the J2/J3 house!

    Prepared by head chef for the night – Alex Cobb!
    Lots of photos from a practice earlier this week – we skied a short loop in groups of 2-4 and the goal was to have everyone take turns leading and getting up to top speed from the start of downhill and then carrying that speed to the low point of the loop. We waxed at the lodge at the nordic center every few days. Great to have benches available for us to use, which allowed us to travel light!
    Team photo on Sunday morning before heading out for our classic OD.
    Waking up to this every morning – what a great way to spend a week!

  • Fall Camp Update

    Sorry about the lack of news, the internet is very spotty here. We will try to get a recap with pictures up over the next few days.

    Camp is winding down here at Snow Mtn Ranch. The younger kids left this morning and the older kids are leaving tomorrow.
    We had a great weekend, clear blue skies and nice temps. On Saturday a bunch of us went down to Steamboat for a TT with their group. It was fun see the crew from Steamboat and good to get in a practice race. We were definitely a bit tired from all of the skiing we have been doing, but everyone gave a good effort and skied well. The Rocky kids beat us fair and square so the TT should be a good wake up call.
    Yesterday we had a classic OD. Most of us skied up the Blue Ridge Trail to the top of the pass and had spectacular views in all directions. The climb up gained 2000′ in elevation and we topped out at about 10,700!
    Today we have 2 easier skis with some speed and technique, then we pack up and get ready for our 6:15 am departure.

  • Sovereign Lakes NorAm

    I just got home from some sprint racing at the Sovereign Lakes Nordic Center, one of my favorite race venues. This weekend was a classic sprint and 15km classic distance race. Following last weekend’s lackluster finishes in Bozeman I was anxious to improve my standings. I had gotten in a good amount of rest and a few solid intensity sessions while home, and was feeling ready to sprint.

    We arrived at Silver Star on Thursday night – me, Scott, Alison and Nikki. It’s always fun to have a group to travel with, even though it often just means more people twiddling quietly on their laptops at the same time in the condo…

    Previewing the course on Friday I saw it had changed dramatically since the last time I raced at Sovereign. What had previously been a relatively flat, fast 1200m sprint course had become a 1600m course with two legitimate climbs interspersed. I was excited because it meant you wouldn’t be able to sneak by just double-poling on skate skis in the classic sprint. While I feel pretty strong at double pole I’ve always thought if you’re going to hold a classic sprint, there should be striding involved. As it turned out come race morning, the snow was fast enough that much of the course was a double pole anyway, but it definitely necessitated some striding over the tops of hills. I conducted a much better warm-up this week and qualified 9th. It was another step forward in the race progression this fall and I was excited to see what the heats held, as they were to be the first of the season.

    I got slotted into the fifth quarterfinal alongside Mike Sinnott and four Canadians. Mike’s a strong sprinter and qualified well so I decided to tag onto him through the heat. Out of the start I felt great and quickly moved into second alongside Mike; once or twice a Canadian would pull up alongside or even in front of me but I quickly regained position to secure my spot. The final climb of the course led into a 90 degree turn then into a short 20m straight shot over a bridge before dropping into a steep left-hand 270 degree downhill corner which led into the finish stretch. Coming across the bridge we were three-abreast and I pushed hard to take the corner in second, blocking out the third man. Mike and I came out of the corner in the lead and double-poled away for a small gap and moved on to the semis.

    Rounding the final corner into the finish stretch during the quarterfinal. Photo courtesy Jesse Winter.

    I knew I had spent most of my chips in the quarterfinal. We’re still in the building process of my anaerobic endurance and while I would’ve liked to think I could repeat that effort for the semis and final, it didn’t seem likely. My semi started much the same as the previous heat and I scrambled to keep position in the center of the pack. I held on well through most of the long climb in the middle of the course but then started to feel the tie-up in my legs. I dropped about 5m off the pack up the final climb to the bridge and slowed up, knowing I wouldn’t catch the lead three and wanting to save my energy for the B final.

    The B went much the same way as the semi; I had a little kick until the end of the long climb, then I was exhausted. I trailed the group across the finish line in 6th, 12th overall. I wasn’t too proud of falling off the pack in the last two heats but my effort was better than my previous sprints this season and I could tell the fitness is still improving. Next weekend’s skate sprint in Rossland should be another step forward, and I’ll look forward to taking that speed all the way through the finals.

    For now, there’s good, fast skiing in the Methow and I’m going out to train. Happy Monday!

  • Offday special: Coach Beckwith old school shwag

    Coach Beckwith taking it home in a high school time trial.

  • Davos Recap

    North Americans

    Each weekend seems to be an interesting mix of results for the North Americans. Starting with the women (Davos result circled in blue):

    Compared to this season, that was an off day for Kikkan, but compared to last season that was pretty typical. Part of me wonders if she dialed it back a bit late in the race when she knew she wasn’t feeling strong to save some energy for the sprint. But as you can see from her graph, if that’s going to be her “bad” race this season, she’s going have a strong set of results this year.

    I’m very cautious about jumping on bandwagons when someone pops a good race or two, but Holly Brooks is beginning to convince me. That’s three good (and one OK) distance results in a row now. More importantly, I like the direction her trend is heading. It’s still early, so it’ll only take a few mediocre races to flatten that trend out, but so far it looks promising.

    You can’t deny that Liz Stephen has had some strong results so far this season. My only concern is that they have all been roughly where we’ve seen her topping out before. Can her good days inch up towards the top ten?

    As for the men:

    Kris Freeman still hasn’t sorted out whatever’s going on with him, obviously. It’s always painful to read his blog posts and quotes after bad races; he’s so unfailingly harsh on himself.

    Ivan Babikov turned in a stellar race, of course, but as you can see it was well within his normal range. The youngsters Elliott and Hoffman both had solid days, certainly compared to their results so far this season. I’d really like to see Hoffman’s results creep a bit further down into the pink, though.

    Sprint Recap

    Oh, and there was a sprint race, too! You may have heard who won the women’s race…

    Randall was just plain skiing faster than everyone, start to finish. (Apologies for cutting off Heidi Weng’s prelim result; I cutoff the y axis to remove some outlying times and just realized hers got cut too.) It’s interesting how slow the qualification times were. Most people managed to go faster in the quarters, but as you can see, the women who made it to the final were just on a different level, speed-wise.

    The men’s final wasn’t quite as clear cut:

    These times are all a bit closer together, compared to the women. (Again, except for 1-2 large outlying times that I’ve omitted.)

    One thing I saw some commentary on was the fact that Bjørgen missed the finals in part due to the higher speed of Kikkan’s semi:

    And yeah, Kikkan did stretch out that semi a bit. But compare that to the dramatic separation between the men’s semifinals:

    Interestingly, being in the slower semi may not have helped all that much in this case.

    Related posts:

    1. <Davos Recap: Distance – North Americans
    2. <Recap: Davos Sprint
    3. <Recap: Davos Sprint Con’t


  • Park City Continental Cup

    After some solid racing in Norway and Finland, I came back to Park city for the first continental cups of the year. I was very confident coming into these races, as Last year I went 3/3 on podiums on the COC level. This year with the x-c form and the altitude, I knew I had a very good chance of continuing my streak of COC podiums.

    Going into the first competition jumps, I was happy with my level during training. Unfortunately I didn’t have my best jump, as I was a little late and too aggressive over the knoll. With some very strong jumping from Marjan Jelenko, I was put in a hard situation to reach the podium. After the first 2 laps, I had reached the group containing second and third place. I then took to the front and really pushed the pace. Fortunately nobody was able to match my pace allowing to break away with a couple second on hand before the finishing stretch. Thus being four podiums in my last four races.

    Team event:
    After a strong performance by Nick Hendrickson in the first competition, the coaches elected Nick and I to be USA #1. The format was a team sprint. Each skier would alternate turns on 1.8 kilometer course. I knew team had a chance to score another podium. After not the best jumps, Nick and I had to ski a strong race to reach the podium. After two strong legs by both Nick and I we had reached the podium group and now it was a dog fight for whole would be in which position. The german team had a strong team skiing away from both France and Nick and I (USA #1). The French team, then put a little of time into nick which resulted in 3rd place, and Nick’s first podium, and my 6th!

  • Lillehammer World Cups

    Coming off Kuusamo, I was very excited to try and score some points in Norway. I have spent a lot of time in Norway since skiing internationally, in a way its a home to me, and I feel very comfortable there.

    Once again the weather was challenging in Lillehammer. Luckily the crews at the “Lysgardbakken arena” worked very hard and had the k90 ready when we arrived to jump on Monday. After some better jumps on the k90, I was very confident going into the competitions that weekend.

    With some strong tailwind during the comp, I was especially excited about my jump in competition, as it put me closer to points than before. As the weather developed, the snow started to fall hard, which made for some very tough conditions on the cross country course. After some trouble picking skis and some help from my teammates, I decided to go with a pair of skis I have raced on more than any others.

    From the start of the race, I felt very good. Catching the pack in front of me and quickly moving away from them, I knew I was having a good race. It wasn’t till the last lap, when head coach Dave Jarrett, told me I was almost in the top 20.  This event was my personal best on world cup, as I finished 21st with the 2nd fastest time on WC. I was super excited, and ready for more.

    Unfortunately Sunday wasn’t my day. After a very solid trial round jump, I had a mental mistake and had a terrible comp round making me not qualify for the penalty race.

  • Kuusamo/Ruka

    Kuusamo:
    Our first competitions were in Kuusamo/Ruka, Finland. Coming from last years comps there, I was super excited knowing I have been jumping better with time. Also knowing I was in good form on the cross country side, I thought I had a solid chance for some top 30.

    Due to the weather, the competitions were a challenge to get off. I was there for a whole week and only got three jumps. Unfortunately they weren’t great jumps and had some tough wind.

    The positives that came from kuusamo, was my form in racing. I skied very well in the first race, ranking 6th in time rank and just missing points. In the second race, I had a solid race in very slow conditions, unfortunately I was in the “bus start” and didn’t put enough time on the skiers I passed to stay in points!

    With better condition on the horizon I was very excited to travel to Lillehammer!

  • Silverstar

     Today I am sitting out the 15km classic. It was tough decision, but after last weekends 10km classic in Canmore, I was pretty run down. I woke up Monday morning with a tickle in my throat, (every skiers worst nightmare upon waking up!) but after some easy days and lots of sleep, I was able to catch it before it turned into anything major. I brought my energy levels back up enough to do an intensity workout on Thursday. I felt decent, and decided it was safe to start the classic sprint yesterday. It was test number two, and it didn’t go so well. I felt fine skiing easy, but during the qualifier it didn’t take long to realize things weren’t quite back to normal.

    I decided to play it safe and rest up for next weekend. I didn’t want to have two mediocre NorAm weekends in a row. I will rest up, and hope to get things back on track for next weekends skate sprint and 15km mass start skate race. 

    Disappointing for sure, and as hard as it is to watch my teammates hit the start line without me, I want to be 100% ready to go in Rossland.

    Before heading to Silverstar, I went to Lake Louise to watch Tess Davies race in her first World Cup Downhill. Annika, Kendra and I made up her personal cheering squad. It was an great day and super fun to watch Tess race!

    The cheering squad, Kendra and Annika.
    All smiles after finishing

    Leah was there in spirit. 
    Signing autographs
    Sunrise in Silverstar.

  • Noram

    I raced today at Sovereign Lakes, first Noram for a couple of years. My top result in the past was 32nd place. Today I qualified 7th and was able to ski up into 3rd, for my first Noram podium. Pretty excited!!! Check out this link for a full race report- fasterskier.

    Photo credit: Lauren Fritz

  • Duhvos Sprint

    I pretty much couldn’t have made worse predictions for the distance races at Davos. Regardless, here are more foolish guesses, this time for the freestyle sprints. Despite having been soundly proven wrong about Northug in the 30k individual, I just can’t see him placing well in the sprint after racing so hard today. I’m ready to be proven wrong again. And though I think Bjørgen would be a solid

  • Craftsbury TT Results (UPDATED: with pictures)

    Huge Props to the work being done by the Craftsbury Community!

    Amid hard working snow-makers we were able to get off a time trial on some cold snow this morning.  We’re in good hands looking forward to the Eastern Cups next weekend! (Pictures of many of the racers are below the results)
     
    Craftsbury TT. 
    (3×2.5km women)

    1. Amy Glen                       24:49

    2. Megan Killigrew            25:21

    3. Tara Geraghty-Moats      25:45

    4. Heidi Halvorsen              25:49

    5. Hannah Dreissigacker     26:07

    6. Anja Gruber                    26:29

    7. Caitlin Patterson             26:39

    8. MK Cirelli                      27:07

    9. Caitlin Curran                 27:10

    10. Gage Fichter                 27:14

    11. Alicia-Rose Pastore      27:22

    12. Janey McClelland         27:37

    13. Hannah Miller              28:30

    14. Alexandra Zakrzewska 29:05



    15. Danika Frisbee             31:09



    16. Silke Hines                   34:10

    (4×2.5 men)

    1. Sean Dougherty              30:10

    2. Bryan Cook                    30:44

    3. Alex Howe                     30:51

    4. Pat O’Brien                     30:54

    5. Cole Talbot                     30:55

    6. Dylan McGuffin             31:25

    7. Rogan Brown                 31:35

    8. Scott Patterson               31:47

    9. Mike Gibson                  31:49

    10. Devlin Shea                 31:50

    11. Nils Koons                   31:52

    12. Pete Hegman               32:00

    13. Tim Reynolds              32:29

    14. Antoine St-Louis         34:44

    15. Ethan Dreissigacker    34:44.2

    16. Alex Schulz                 34:58

    Many of the top skiers from the region showed up to do a hard effort this morning. Most were on training skis and a few people were just working out, but it certainly felt like a race.
     Fitzy did approximately 5 km, twice around the loop.
    Here she charges down the hill in Murphy’s field, getting in a solid forward position.
     MK is still feeling the effects of three consecutive races at the end of an altitude camp, but she still finished well in a pack of strong collegiate and post-collegiate skiers.
    Heidi and Toine found each other at some point out there and skied much of the race together.
    Heidi was a strong fourth place, only four seconds off the podium.
    Ryley’s hip has been bothering him, and he only skied one lap. We’ll get him going for the first Eastern Cup, here next weekend.
     Hans skied a two-lap workout, working on engaging his core and getting in good positions while going fast.
     It’s always great to have Antoine around. He came down from Canada to race and to wish Dev a happy birthday. Not too long a drive and it was fun getting to hang out in the van with the team after the race.
     Dev turned 17 today. Nice! Here he churns it up in front of the barn in Murphy’s field.
    Dev took bib 1 and skied an awesome race, finishing in the middle of a pack of great skiers.
    Heidi and Toine celebrate working together on the course after a hard effort. 
    We were joined on the course by several different teams of skiers:

     Nils Koons, Dartmouth
     Alex Howe, UVM
    Pete Hegman, UVM

    Nils Koons hammering through the snow gun section.

    Amy Glen, UVM
    Alex Howe, chased by Heidi.

    Scott Patterson skis in front of Franz Bernstein, who wasn’t racing, and MK.

    Hannah Dreissigacker, Green Racing Project.

    Tim Reynolds, GMVS alum and GRP skier, heads into the wall of snow.

    Amy Glen follows him down into the lower section of the course.

    Caitlin Curran, UVM

    Alex Howe

    Tara Geraghty-Moats, skiing in Craftsbury Nordic colors.

    Alex Schultz skis on his home course.

    Tim getting after it.

    Amy Glen, UVM

    Patrick O’Brien, GRP and Caitlin Curran, UVM

    Nils Koons rounds the corner in the sun.

    It was a gorgeous day in VT!

    Tim leads a small pack of skiers through Murphy’s Field.

    Dylan Grald, GMVS alum, gets in some intensity.

    Nils Koons

    Pete Hegman

    Gage Fichter, UVM

    Schultzy, pre-race.

    Tim is cheered on by Mad River Nordic skiers Gracie and Noah

    Ethan Dreissigacker climbs the hill towards the snow guns. Thank you Craftsbury for such a stellar early season option!

  • A Stone in the Road + Images of Davos

    The internet is finally working this morning – I’ll post this quickly as it’s t-1hr before leaving for the race this morning! Check out the pics of Davos…. it’s literally transformed since we’ve been here.  Below all the pictures is a short story that my mom sent me last week. It has nothing to do with skiing but harbors a great message – read it if you have time. As always, thanks for all the words of encouragement! 
    Holly 😉 
    This is one of the tiny man-made loops that we skied on for the first couple of days here. 
    Another man made loop we traveled too….. Pontresina, Switzerland. Fun to think that Rob, my husband competed in World Juniors here in 1998! 
    Pontresina again… 
    Huge groups of Nordic walkers all around Davos. 
    Snow guns were pumping at full tilt for days on end to provide an excellent base! 
    Finally – it SNOWED! 
    This is Jesper Modin – a 6’6″ Swedish Sprinter rocking a tiny unicylce with a flat tire in the closet-sized gym in downtown Davos! 
    Outside our hotel

    The Swiss gas stations have a well-stocked, gormet selection of Swiss chocolate – always!

    The first natural snow we skied on since arriving in Europe almost a month ago…. a couple of us got in the habit of getting up really early to get first tracks 🙂

    APU girls, Davos, Stadium

    I love the Swiss wood work…. 
    A cup of love at the famous “Clatch” coffee house
    Took a tram up the side of the mountain one day for a gorgeous view

    Tad reading a poem on his love for the state of Alaska!

    A couple nights ago we had the second annual secret santa gift exchange. Everyone gets a gift and writes a poem about someone on the team. As you can imagine, it was hilarious! 
    More later – off to the 15k this morning!  Have a great weekend everyone and congrats to the Alaska high school skiers who had their first day of Lynx Loppet!  
    Holly 😉 
    The stone in the road
    There is a story told of a king who lived long ago in a country across the sea. He was a
    very wise king, and spared no effort to teach his people good habits. Often he did things
    which seemed to them strange and useless; but all that he did, he did to teach his people to
    be industrious and careful.
    “Nothing good can come to a nation,” he said, “whose people complain and expect
    others to fix their problems for them. The good things of life are given to those who take
    matters into their own hands.”
    One night, while everyone else slept, he placed a large stone in the road that led past
    his palace. Then he hid behind a hedge, and waited to see what would happen.
    First came a farmer with his wagon heavily loaded with grain, which he was taking to
    the mill to be ground.
    “Well, whoever saw such carelessness?” he said crossly, as he turned his team and
    drove around the stone. “Why don’t these lazy people have that rock taken from the road?”
    And so he went on complaining of the uselessness of others, but not touching the stone
    himself.Soon afterward, a young soldier came singing along the road. The long plume of his
    cap waved in the breeze, and a bright sword hung at his side. He was thinking of the
    wonderful bravery he would show in the war.
    The soldier did not see the stone, but struck his foot against it and went sprawling in
    the dust. He rose to his feet, shook the dust from his clothes, picked up his sword, and
    stormed angrily about the lazy people who had no more sense than to leave such a huge
    rock in the road. Then he, too, walked away, not once thinking that he might move it
    himself.
    So the day passed. Everyone who came by complained and whined because the stone
    lay in the road, but no one touched it.
    At last, just at nightfall, the miller’s daughter came past. She was a hard-working girl,
    and was very tired, because she had been busy since early morning at the mill.
    But she said to herself, “It is almost dark. Somebody may fall over this stone in the
    night, and perhaps he could be badly hurt. I will move it out of the way.”
    So she tugged at the heavy stone. It was hard to move, but she pulled and pulled, and
    pushed, and lifted until at last she moved it from its place. To her surprise, she found a box
    underneath.
    She lifted the box. It was heavy, for it was filled with something. Upon it was written:
    “This box belongs to the one who moves the stone.”
    She opened the lid, and found it was full of gold!
    The miller’s daughter went home with a happy heart. When the farmer and the
    soldier and all the others heard what had happened, they gathered around the spot in the
    road where the stone had been. They scratched at the dust with their feet, hoping to turn up
    a piece of gold.
    “My friends,” said the king, “we often find obstacles and burdens in our way. We may
    complain out loud while we walk around them if we choose, or we can lift them and find
    out what they mean. Disappointment is usually the price of laziness.”
    Then the wise king mounted his horse and, with a polite “Good evening,” rode away.
    W. J. B.

    ….

  • Canmore Alberta Cup

    Black Jack Kicks Off!

    Black Jack ski team is off a great start. Last weekend we kicked off with a skate sprint and distance classic at the Alberta Cup in Canmore. Although this was just a provincial race, the competition was strong, with skiers from across the country including Quebec and Yukon. This weekend we are pumped to race at the Vernon NorAm Cup. The competition will include a sprint and a distance race, both in the classic technique.

    <Peter Locke
    <327655_10150415628107256_550017255_9041432_125993972_o
    <331330_10150415602947256_550017255_9041293_1955616561_o
    <341228_10150415252902256_550017255_9040473_1596350879_o
    <338026_10150415252632256_550017255_9040472_583772506_o
    <332308_10150415252092256_550017255_9040468_816912660_o
    <338188_10150415251752256_550017255_9040466_2114634553_o

    Results

    Classic Interval Start

    Junior Men – 9km
    5th – David
    8th – Peter
    11th – Nick

    Junior Boys – 6km
    2nd – Shawn

    Junior Girls – 6km
    4th – Susanne
    6th – Jillian
    8th – Sierra

    Juvenile Boys – 4km
    11th – Daniel

    Juvenile Girls – 4km
    14 – Robyn

    Midget Girls – 2km
    19 – Anika

    Skate Sprint
    Junior Men
    5th – Peter
    7th – David
    9th Nick

    Junior Boys
    5th – Shawn

    Junior Girls
    4th – Jill
    11th – Susanne
    12 – Sierra

    Juvenile Girls
    15 – Robyn

    Juvenile Boys
    20th – Daniel

  • Canmore Alberta Cup

    Black Jack Kicks Off! Black Jack ski team is off a great start. Last weekend we kicked off with a skate sprint and distance classic at the Alberta Cup in Canmore. Although this was just a provincial race, the competition was strong, with skiers from across the country including Quebec and Yukon. This weekend we […]

  • Davos Oddness

    After some off-again on-again decisionmaking due to a lack and then a surfeit of snow in Davos, we’re going to see some unusual events this weekend: long(ish) individual-start skate races. A 15k for women and 30k for men are being run over a big 7.5k loop that, as usual at Davos, is basically a long uphill to the halfway point and then a long downhill back to the line. It’s not the mythical 30k/

  • Bozeman/Silver Star

    Hello readers, I’m now in Silver Star, Canada and it is AMAZING here. The trails are always corduroy and the sun is always shinning. This is the best skiing in North America, well besides the Methow of course. We arrived monday night, so this was our fourth day skiing. Today we did race prep which involves an easy ski warm up with a couple times around the sprint course at near race pace, then a little cool down. I felt pretty strong, still a little sore from strength a couple days ago but I have gotten use to that being on the APU team. Erik Flora, our coach pretty much believes if your not sore your not pushing yourself hard enough.

    Last weekend we raced in Bozeman, Montana for the second Super Tour series this season. The first day we had a skate sprint and a skate 10 kilometer race. I started a little slow in the sprint and finished just outside the top ten. I was not super stoked about this result but I still had one more chance that day to put something together. I went out in the skate distance race really hard and ended up finishing 8th, 3 seconds from 6th which happens to be the last position that receives prize money. A pretty good race for myself but that is also some expensive 3 seconds. It’s amazing when you are out on a course for close to a half hour and it comes down to just seconds, I guess every second really does count. The second day was a classic 15 kilometer race this ended up being my race of the weekend. It was an interval start race, meaning that each racer starts on their own, in this case the gap between each skier was 30 seconds. I started right around the middle of the pack with Sylvan Ellefson, a podium finisher from the previous weekend starting 30 seconds behind me. Sylvan ended up catching me right around half way through the race and followed me for 3 or 4 kilometers before taking the lead. I then gave it everything to hold on to him for the last 4 kilometers.  We definitely had a good pace going the last half of the course because we ended up finishing the race in first and second position. Sylvan winning by thirty seconds and me beating the third place person by ten seconds.

    Yesterday we had a long ski easy and had to stop a couple of times to shoot some pictures of us sailing over the bumps on the fast downhills. Fun stuff!

  • Craftsbury Skiing: Speeds on Snow in Vermont

    It wasn’t glamorous, but it was snow, and pretty good snow at that. The crew at Craftsbury has been working hard to prepare the trails for early season training and racing. They fired up the snow guns and got a little help from this week’s snowfall: we were able to cruise around on at least 5 kilometers of groomed trail. We shared the tracks with the Dartmouth Ski Team and the Craftsbury Green Team, including our friend Tim Reynolds.
    We’re in a low-volume week coming back from altitude, but we want to keep our edge, so we’ve been working on speed. Today’s workout was 15 seconds on 15 seconds off for five minutes, repeated four times. Everyone is looking pretty snappy: good to see after a two-week block at 7000 feet.
    Kaitlin hammers over the top of a little hill and back down.
     It was fun to have our friend Gracie along: she’s from New Jersey but will ski with us on weekends when she comes up. Here she’s working on some balance on skis. First time on snow this year!
    Dev and Hans skied the whole workout together, alternating leads the whole time.

    Another friend, Terry Kellogg, also joined us today and even jumped in a few of the intervals. Terry skied for Middlebury back in the day and he’s still got it.

    Heidi cools down post workout: we skied the speeds on a 1 km loop, but there were plenty of trails to ski on before and afterwards.

     Time trial tomorrow, then we’ll see where the snow goes. Craftsbury looks pretty set to hold the Eastern Cups next weekend, and we’ll be familiar with the course by then unless it decides to snow hard somewhere else!