Coach Rosemary did a great job summing up some ideal waxes for MNC BKL skiers, so I thought I would mimic her post a bit and share some ideas for what MNC Masters might pick up to wax with this year!
All of these items can be purchased through our Toko Order Form (click here) by December 4th so look for some great deals and offers there.
Glide wax:
For those that want to keep it simple, Toko offers a great liquid Express Glide Wax. This is the kind of wax you can rub onto your ski right before training, or even just once a week, to keep your bases fresh.
For more advanced waxing (requiring iron, scraper, brushes, etc) Toko has a reliably simple system of glide waxes in Blue, Red, and Yellow!
Kick wax:
Another simple system. I recommend one each of Green/Base, Blue, Red, and Yellow. If conditions vary regularly, these tubes should last at least 2 years each although we always tend to go through more Red and Yellow with warm spells!
Don’t fear the klister! Another simple system, although I suggest a slightly different approach for Masters…
For a base klister, use the Green Spray Klister which provides an even layer without a mess. It can be applied without
a torch or heat, so you just spray it on and smooth it out with a thumb or cork, wait a few minutes for it to cool (ideally outside if it’s cold) and then apply your klister of choice.
When it comes to klisters for use on top of the spray binder, go with the “real deal” and not sprays. A tube each of Blue, Red, and Yellow will serve you well, likely for more than a single season.
Yesterday afternoon, a great group of MNC coaches met up for a clinic that covered a lot of bases! In addition to housekeeping business like safety protocol and phone numbers, Coach Rosemary led everyone in a great teambuilding/icebreaker activity involving blindfolds and mousetraps. Scary but great for working together! After I (Adam) got the group onto some yoga mats to talk hip activation and body awareness, we took a look at some current-season ski races from a few weekends prior. We talked technique trends, and how to share them with athletes of all ages. Then we moved out onto snow to practice ourselves.
It was a really fun clinic and I for one left motivated and excited at where we’re at as a club in providing skiers of all ages with appropriate, relevant, and important skills in a relevant way! Here are some photos and a link to my “visualization” videos:
Group lunch and caffeine session: crucial for any coach gathering!
Coach Liam, Coach Julie, and Coach Kristina getting ready to be led through some mousetraps by their fellow coaches!
A quick chat before Adam leads some core and hip mobility on the ground
Please see the information below from Catamount Trail Association director Amy Kelsey. If interested, be sure to get in touch!
The CTA is accepting applications from candidates with a strategic and creative mindset, superb communication & organizational skills, a collaborative leadership style, and the ability to directly manage and contribute to a number of operational areas. Candidates will also have an appreciation for the organization’s history, passion for stewarding its mission, and vision for furthering the CTA’s leadership in the future sustainability of the Catamount Trail and Vermont’s expanding network of winter backcountry trails and terrain.
If the above description speaks to you – AND you love working and playing in Vermont’s beautiful landscape in all weather – we’d love to hear from you!
Although every piece of equipment and article of clothing I own is covered in klister right now, I can easily say that this past week was the most productive and meaningful Thanksgiving training camp I’ve been a part of with the MNC Junior Team.
With a varied and fun 1k loop to work with, there was room for a lot of individual feedback and also group work. Moreso than ever before, people took initiative to show up to each session prepared and to make the most of the on-snow time.
The nature of the loop gave us several interesting workout ideas, including a “kickwax reduction project” where everyone started with plenty of kick and then skied 2 kilometers before making a pit stop at a trailside bench Sara and I manned with a torch, putty knives, and rags. Sara and I removed a bit of wax from every athlete’s skis each 2k/2 laps in order to find a balance of speed and kick. It was initially a session designed to get everyone comfortable on imperfect kick, but it also ended up having the benefit of both coaches and athletes knowing the individual pairs of skis more (everyone was on their race skis) and also work on communicating good feedback…for example, reporting that the kickwax was dragging under the front of the zone, or felt think under the heel, rather than “I don’t have kick” or “I have too much kick”.
Rose getting some striding on past the Center
We mixed in both skating and classic along with time in the gym where we continued our strength training from Dee PT. Thanks to the groomers and snowmakers everything held up great and we were on good skis the whole time!
Working on some speeds and the one-and-only Activation Drill!
On Saturday, everyone who had been on snow at least a few days got to race in the Craftsbury Opener. It was a tough event since the temp was about 55 and the snow was wet and slushy. Add to that the fact that nobody was racing on HF or fluoros and you can imagine that the skis were not running super fast for anyone. It was a great chance to get a taste of racing action in, and whether someone had a great race or one they’d rather forget everyone definitely learned a few things. Racers did either 5 (U16 and Open Women) or 7 (Open Men) laps, and Sara and Rick were able to track lap splits for every MNC athlete…very cool to see how everyone paced it and the fact that there weren’t really any drop-offs in time shows that the fitness is there.
Aidan won the 5k race, while Magda and Timmy both turned some heads in the Women’s/Men’s races by skiing with (and besting) a number of college racers from UNH, Williams, and Harvard. Everyone looked like they were ready for more and it’s going to be great to hit the Eastern Cup in only a short few weeks.
Magda heading out of the start. A nice day for some spring skiing in November
Dakota enjoying the slush on Chip Hill
Ava and Lily in sync on the gradual hill. Great forward body position with knees driving, hips forward, and back/spine neutral!
All told it was a phenomenal week of training and racing. Before everyone left, I discussed how I felt about a few aspects of camp…usually, our training camps tend to end up inadvertently bringing something new into the fold. The first time we had Mountain Camp, it was a serious study in team bonding and bringing a group together. By the next year, it was about challenging ourselves with workouts that were tougher than ever. This camp, I felt, really took us to the next level in terms of professionalism and focus. Instead of the snow loop being packed with Williams, Harvard, UNH, and then us (“those guys”), we were just another team getting their work done. I’ve coached at plenty of college training camps and this was the first time an MNC training camp has really felt like a college camp…it boils down to accountability and focus on the part of both the group and the individual, and I’m really glad that both were highly evident this past week. It’s going to be an AWESOME race season!
Well, despite the beautiful fluffy snow falling outside right now, there was significantly less to work with last week. Luckily, Craftsbury came through yet again with a great 1.1k snowmaking loop that basically had it all…steep climb, moderate climb, twisting curves, and flat straightaways. We headed up there on Saturday and had our first ski on real tracks with good snow: and of course klister!
It was a small group but we had a really productive first ski, getting in some drills and laps of both no-pole and one-pole skiing. Everyone initially agreed the wax wasn’t perfect for kicking…but I held my ground and said that we needed to practice being okay with imperfect kick and striving to make the best of it as a way to learn and gain confidence. Aidan probably had it the worst as I threw him on a hardwax cover to make things as fast as I could…I think it was a good experience though!
Season off to a good start!
Pastry goodies from Sweet Simone’s on the car ride home! Photo by Aidan
With the snow on the ground and the season about to get underway for real, it’s time to announce our final schedule and signups for Race Trips and Camps! This year we’re going to have 2 mid-winter travel events with group options: a Race Trip to the first Eastern Cup in Fort Kent (December 15-17), and a Team Camp in Lake Placid (Jan 5-7).
Registration is open for these camps at 7:00pm tonight (Monday, 11/20). More information and registration for each can be found at their respective Events pages on the website calendar:
Finally…if you did not check out some of the opening FIS races this past weekend, they can all be seen in their entirety on Youtube. Both Gallivare and Beitostolen races are up. For those interested in distance racing all of the longer races are absolutely worth a watch, but for a quick fix of intense action be sure to watch both the women’s and men’s classic sprint finals from Beito. Big attacks in both races making for some good motivation 🙂
