Hi BKL Parents and Kids! It’s fall and time to start thinking about this winter!
Here is a mini to-do list for the near future 🙂
1) Reserve your Room for the BKL Festival! This year’s Festival is on Feb. 17 & 18 in Weston, Ma. The host hotel is the Embassey Suites in Waltham. Be sure to use the group code to get the special rate of $119/nt.
2) Coming soon: BKL Fall Hiking Series! Keep your eye on the e-blast and MNC website for dates and times to be posted soon! Hikes will be on weekends in November and October. Can’t wait to see you all at the hikes!
Hope you are all having a fun, active fall!
PS…check out this awesome video of Brady practicing his backflips on skis. Wow!
MNC has received recognition as a Bronze Level program by the U.S. Ski and Snowboard’s Podium Club Certification Program. MNC is the ONLY Nordic-specific club in New England to achieve this status. Along with Loppet Nordic Racing in Minnesota, Mansfield Nordic is one of only TWO Nordic-specific clubs in the country to be awarded status from the U.S. Ski and Snowboard certification system.
Below follows a press release from U.S. Ski and Snowboard:
TheMansfield Nordic Clubhas recently been awarded Podium Certification at the Bronze level by U.S. Ski and Snowboard. U.S. Ski & Snowboard’s Podium Club Certification Program requires a rigorous, mission driven self-assessment and review of best principles and practices in eight areas of organizational performance. TheMansfield Nordic Clubhas demonstrated appropriate levels of performance in all areas and is recognized as an important partner of U.S. Ski and Snowboard and a leader among ski and snowboard clubs in the nation.
Statements:
Ellen Adams, USSA Club Development Manager
The Certification process not only recognizes club excellence, but also gives a clear roadmap for all clubs to become stronger organizations. This is a strategic part of U.S. Ski and Snowboard’s plans to support clubs, be a more club-based organization and better understand the challenges and opportunities that exist for clubs in every corner of the country. The process to achieve Podium Level Certification requires a commitment to excellence on behalf of a club and its constituents, and clubs have reported finding great value in doing the work necessary to complete the certification. Many clubs have found that the most positive impact was not necessarily the certification designation, but, rather, in uncovering the true opportunities they have to improve and continue to deliver sustained excellence. These clubs all set great examples, and are leading the charge for club improvement nationally.
Luke Bodensteiner, USSA Executive Vice President of Athletics
Working in closer partnership with our member clubs to recognize excellence and create a platform for continued improvement is the new frontier for our organization. Our clubs are our sport’s biggest asset to athlete recruitment and development, and working hand-in-hand with them will enhance their levels of achievement and will transform the performance of our athletes and teams at all levels.
Jon Casson, USSA Sport Education Director
The USSA Club Certification program is a valuable resource for all our clubs. Our clubs all are working hard to be the best they can be and give all of their athletes a great experience in skiing and snowboarding. The Certification programs give our clubs the resources they need to assess and improve their structure and programs to meet their organizational goals and the goals of the thousands of U.S. Ski and Snowboard athletes across the US.
The leaves remain pretty green at the moment, but if you’ve been outside on the roads and trails lately you can definitely feel fall starting to settle in. Each cold rollerski makes it harder for your pole tips to stick to the pavement, and every chilly interval session leaves your lungs with a distinct metallic taste.
It’s time for some harder workouts and tests that challenge fitness, strength, and speed. The Junior team had a miniature “fall break” from training this past week, with only 2 days of structured sessions. That was intentionally done to coincide with the general onset of zombie-fication that comes with the first week of school. But now things are gearing up again, and we’ll be on a pretty solid routine of busy workouts with a race about every second week. There are a lot of great events out there:
The NENSA Fall Rollerski Classic is an event we are putting on with EABC up at the Range. You should DEFINITELY mark your calendars and plan to either race, volunteer, or cheer! We’re looking to make this the biggest rollerski event in the East, and hoping it can continue to grow from there.
Fall Rollerski Classic poster by Coach Liam
Between now and October 7th, we’ll be putting in plenty of work to make sure we can race fast and push hard during that event, and the others we have booked up this fall as well! We’re fortunate to continue our partnership with the St Mikes Nordic team: members of their team will be joining us on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays this fall to work together, and we’ve already gotten started with some skate rollerskiing on Thursday and great bounding intervals at Cochrans.
Getting the Knight and Pug squads together at Cochrans
Lots of new and awesome trails around Cochrans
If you haven’t signed up for our Fall programming, now is the time to head over to that page and check it off the list. Once there, you’ll also find registration open for our Climb to the Castle trip to Lake Placid, and Thanksgiving Camp 2017! This year’s Thanksgiving Camp will remain at Craftsbury, and although the duration and amenities remain the same we’ve been able to substantially lower the cost to $399 for the entire camp (over $100 less than past years!). Now is a great time to plan your Thanksgiving skiing…after two minimal-snow camps in a row, we are due for a big blizzard this time!
For some it has already happened, but in general this coming week will mark the start of the 17/18 school year. There’s a lot of excitement and trepidation in the air, as you might expect. The school calendar is also a blunt reminder of the change from summer to fall, and of course invites reflection on the training done over the past few months.
In the car this morning I got to talk about that a bit with Kai and Aidan. We were en route to a long mountain bike ride in Pittsfield, Vermont at the awesome Green Mountain Trails…after Saturday’s session, we realized it would only be the three of us around for training the next day and so we made plans for a big, unique ride to cap off the summer.
Back to the conversation at hand and the summer reflection: the basic agreement, backed up by training plan and training log intel, was that we’d trained more than last year (total hours and number of sessions), trained harder than last year (more time at L4, staying in touch with racing), and also done a better job of coming into most sessions prepared and recovering well. The team is fit, and excited for fall races and challenges rather than dreading them.
Ben C doing some “scenic bounding” drills at the Round Church
Ben L getting some lactate tested by Coach Laurel
On Saturday we had a pretty intimidating workout planned: a hard effort “duathlon” workout involving skate skiing up the Bolton access road, switching to shoes and running to the top via the route of our uphill running test. Although we had a relatively small group for this one, I was surprised many times in this one workout…surprised in a good way!
It was great to see the guys working together at the start, and keeping the pace manageable so as not to blow up late in the ski portion. At the sugarhouse Kai made a breakaway and skied incredibly well: the best I’d seen him in 2 years and, for the first time in those 2 years, uninhibited by injury and pain. As I drove up and down to check on the progress of various skiers, I kept thinking I’d see Kai around the next uphill corner. Often though, he would be out of sight, already several switchbacks or turns ahead of where I thought he would be.
Ali worked her way up the mountain behind the guys, also skiing great…in fact, Ali skied up and then ran to the top on Saturday, when last year she did not even complete the ski portion! Huge steps up this year from so many of the crew.
Ali getting after that V1
Coming up to the top of the run was my next big surprise. As Ali and I started the run together, I was worried the guys (Kai, Ben, Aidan, Dakota) might already be on their way down. Instead, they had all stayed at the top to cheer on Ali so that we could all be at the summit together. Props!
What’s more, I learned that Kai, Aidan, and Dakota had all done the entire workout (ski, transition, and run) in under an hour. At the start, I had said it might be incredibly difficult to do that. Guess that wasn’t the case. Aidan even did the run in 15:45, only 30 seconds off his PR that he had set when he wasn’t skiing up a mountain beforehand!
Tyke was also at the top to support us, of course!
Back on the singletrack today in Pittsfield with Kai and Aidan, all of that excitement was hard to keep pent up. I had been thinking about it in my head during a long climb, and as we rounded an uphill switchback into another ascent I just blurted out “gonna be a big year for the Pugs!”
Huntington Boiz atop the Green Mountain Trails
2 hours and 45 minutes of riding later, we popped out of the woods and into a farm field, and headed in the direction of home, fall, school, and even faster skiing.
With summer winding down, our schedule has been a bit focused on making sure we get in all of our favorite workouts before school starts up and fall sports kick in. Running has already started and family vacations are in their last hurrahs as well, so unfortunately we only had a limited group on Saturday for what is now a favorite workout.
I discovered Road 101 last year in the same way I discover many interesting training spots: taking a random turn and driving down to explore on my own in the middle of some other drive. This beautiful mountain road switchbacks up near Smuggs and is usually pretty free of traffic compared to the bustling, tourist-heavy Notch Road. Perfect for striding, which is something we try to only work on in focused sessions (not just casually striding around on rollerskis).
I put together some edits of individual skiers to watch technique, but of course also made a separate short clip that encapsulates what a cool day we had!
Ski trails in the distance, fresh pavement and skiers in the foreground
We have one more busy week of summer training before things shift to the autumn schedule…if you haven’t checked out registration yet, we are LIVE for our Fall 2017 programming! Visit that page HERE. We’re excited to train hard and get in some fall faces, and get back to our partnership with the St Mikes team!
