The recent thaw has not deterred many of our Masters from continuing to train and search for snow.
Last Tuesday Masters made the best of the warm temps with some dry land training at Sleepy Hollow. In addition to the usual fare of running and bounding drills, was a tour of Sleepy Hollow’s Sugar Shack by Eli Enman. Athletes were also rewarded with a taste of some warm maple syrup!
Photo Courtesy of Steve’s Strava.
Dave Johnston, Steve Messier and Ellie Bouffard went in search of snow and were rewarded with some great conditions and great results at the Rangley Loppet.
Image courtesy of Nick Persampieri
For those not willing to travel so far, conditions at Crafstbury were still quite nice. So let’s hope the next thaw doesn’t hit us too badly.
Finally, Jim Fredericks and Joanna Hanowski have taken the travel to the extreme and can now be found in Switzerland at the World Masters.
Tuesday- No practice. It’s supposed to be warm & raining. Many parents may also be at Town Meeting most of the day.
Thursday- tentative plans are we should be able to ski at the range. Skate technique. Practice on as of Wed. night. Please check blog tomorrow- I will make a new post if we cannot ski, otherwise we are on!
Sunday: Shooting Stars Biathlon Festival at the Range. If you have been wanting to try biathlon this winter, now is your chance! See last week’s post or event calendar for links to info & registration. We are supposed to get snow on Saturday, so skiing should be good! Continue Reading →
Many MNC skiers took part in the recent VT High School State Championship races this past week. Slush, rain, and a threat of thunder pervaded Friday’s classic events, while Monday’s skate race was sunny and bright albeit similarly slushy. Congrats to all the athletes! Dave Priganc was taking photos at the events, and I will post a few here from the skate portion as well as linking to the albums at the bottom. Enjoy!
Sammy Leo skiing to a great finish and getting the nod to anchor the afternoon relay team
Eli was not feeling great in the classic race but really turned it on in the skate with a 6th place D1 finish!
Ali was out with a fever for the classic race, came back for a fantastic scramble leg that day, but was still not 100% for the freestyle events. Still plenty of Championship races left for her though with U16 and EHS right around the corner!
Phil skied smooth and helped a surging Burlington team that is turning heads in ways not seen since the “Lustgarten Era”!
Sammie also fought through sickness on the classic day, but the freestyle races were the Nolan Show with Kira 5th and Sammie 9th! Way to go! Cougar ladies were State Champs!
Alex was out for a rip and, if our math is right, he earned a nod for the EHS team!
After another season spent managing some injuries, it was great to see Kai have fast races both days and get the call to represent VT at Easterns!
Much like Kai, Marika came into the season with a few injuries to cope with but has gotten stronger with every race, States included! Can’t wait to see what EHS holds
Isaac was unstoppable, winning by almost 30 seconds. Given his fast and snappy tempo (ok, maybe also his flowing blonde hair) I’ve decided his World Cup technique match is Ida Sargent
Baxter was not messing around, with back-to-back 2nd place D1 finishes in classic and skate, helping CVU to the men’s title
Some Pugs on-site for cheering, and trying to do odd things for the camera
Relay start! Kai, Baxter, and Eli all on the scramble leg
Women’s relay start, Ali and Marika leading off in this one
Final shot, another from the relay. Rose Clayton had a heroic 3rd leg and gave Sammie a lead she would hold for the win!
For more photos, including podium/awards, check out Dave’s album below. Thanks Dave!
Thursday Practice (3/02)- Cancelled. The trails at the Range are currently closed. All those going to the Festival will need to wax and pack, so I am cancelling practice rather than having to drive somewhere to snow.
BKL Festival- Bethel has tons of snow and will definitely survive this week’s warm weather. Check out the photos:
Shooting Stars Biathlon Festival: March 12 at the Range. Register your kids now for this one, it’s going to be a lot of fun! Air rifle, paintball, & standard biathlon plus s’mores at the campfire, food & sugar on snow! For more info & sign-up: Shooting Stars Biathlon
The organizers are looking for help with serving the food. If your kids are going, consider volunteering! To help, e-mail Rick Constanza: rtcostanza@gmail.com
BKL End of Program Party: March 14. Stay-tuned for details!
That’s about all we were in for this past week, with T-shirt weather and snow that was quickly becoming water before our eyes (and under our skis).
With prep for Championship Season on the mind, the MNC Juniors worked on some speeds and fast skiing. On Tuesday, we we mixed together our second klister pot of the season in order to get things kicking for some classic intervals. Depending on each athlete’s race schedule the intervals varied in length and pace, but everyone was looking great!
Jumping is definitely something you’ve gotta incorporate when the opportunity presents itself. One of the big benefits of wet snow is just how maleable and packable it is. That meant that on Thursday I was able to skip my usual pre-practice activity of building fires in the Walker Building woodstoves, and instead use that time to put together a few fun kickers on downhill sections of trail (with the shoveling help of Carl Priganc). Why build jumps even for serious racers? If you’ve been watching any of the World Championships this week, you’ll have noticed a few key attributes:
The courses are very twisty and full of corners and curves
The downhills are really really FAST
The pack skis incredibly close together and AGGRESSIVELY
So, we train for this kind of skiing both intentionally and unintentionally. Most training sessions, summer, fall, and winter, we almost always begin by just skiing easy loops around “Sprint” loop, the lap that goes around the building and up by the parking lot. Slowly but surely, as team members arrive the group of skiers grows. We ski at an easy pace for the most part, but we almost always end up racing the downhill section into the hard corner at the bottom. Again and again, up to 10 or 15 times every session. Poles get pushed, elbows get thrown, and aggressive moves get made.
Whether it’s on rollerskis or snow skis, this is a great way to intrinsically build comfort in tight situations and fast corners.
So when you add in some jumps, it makes it even more fun and you get a true skier-cross vibe. I didn’t get any footage of the whole group going down the backside of Sprint loop but in the clip below you can see Will and Aidan doing a test run!
As the clips also show, we do lots of drills practicing skiing very quickly on all sorts of terrain. On Thursday after warming up on the jump-enhanced Sprint loop we practiced group speeds around a tight corner in the stadium, and then worked on getting up a steep hill in the slush. As the video shows, the best way to get up a hill in the thick mush is to spend as little time on each ski as possible. A week ago in some thick but cold and fluffy powder, my term to people was to “surf” over the snow. In the slush I like the term “float” even better given the even further-reduced time the skis spend on the snow on the climbs.
Fast feet always moving, gaze always focused on the next move
Something we learned from Andy Newell’s agility clips: the arms don’t stop generating momentum!
This past Friday was the first day of High School State Championships, and Saturday was an epic Bogburn race, both involving plenty of slush, so the practice was well-warranted. Congrats to everyone at States and best of luck tomorrow! Check back for full State Meet recap after the conclusion of the freestyle races!
