Calling MNC skiers of all ages! Join in for a hike up Mt Mansfield next Sunday, November 1st, to celebrate NENSA’s Peak Weekend event! See our event link for more details.
Masters Training 10/25 thru 10/29
Sat. 10/24 – Catamount Run for Your Life 5K/10k. Up for a fun fall trail race? Costumes, Magic Hat.. for more info click here.
Sun. 10/25 NWVE TT (more info) This week the Masters group plans to meet up and participate in the NWVE 1 mile Uphill Roller Ski TT. Registration 8:00 to 8:45 & Race at 9:00 at Gutterson Field House UVM. For more info click here.
Tues. 10/27 Dee PT Strength (map) – Join Coach Dennis this Tuesday at 6-7PM for strength training session at Dee PT in South Burlington. If you haven’t signed up yet or want to find out more click here.
Thurs. 10/29 Dry Land Training (map) – Join Coach Rick for the first week of dry land training. This week we will meet from 5:30 – 7:00PM and will shift the training location to the Ethan Allen Range in Jericho where we will have access to lights and additional equipment. If you haven’t signed up yet or want to find out more click here.
Announcing the MNC Annual Meeting!
MNC welcomes all members (or all potential MNC members!) to join us at the Underhill Town Hall on November 7th for our first-ever Annual Meeting. Highlights include a group run, dinner, and silent auction, along with presentations from Mansfield Nordic leaders and coaches. The keynote speaker will be Pavel Cenkl, a Vermont teacher, coach and ultrarunner. Pavel will share stories and images from Climate Run: Iceland – an epic solo run.
To RSVP and to Sign-Up for the Potluck see our Calendar Entry.
Co-op Skate Sprint under the lights!
That was one heck of a fun training session! This evening we got together with skiers from GMVS, St Mikes and the UVM Club Team for a sprint showdown under the lights of the Range. The light was fading during qualification and by the time quarterfinals rolled around it was pure darkness aside from the trail of lights winding up and down the hill loop of the course.
Materials for the race: leaf blower, clipboard, cones, waterbelt full of chalk (not pictured: semi-functional cap gun)
With some creative heat structures many athletes were able to race against each other, and each racer got to do a qualifier and three full heats (a quarterfinal, semifinal and final). With four to a heat on the rollerski loop things got close at times, but that’s what makes races like these such good prep. Amazingly, no broken equipment or falls!
MNC represented well with Will Solow tying for a win in the qualifier alongside Torin LaLiberte from SMC. In the A-Final, Will took the victory ahead of another SMC skier, Matt Doyle. Will’s time in the final was the fastest individual lap of the day in any heat or qualifier, so to be able to ski that fast at the END of the race is certainly a great sign of fitness! Gotta also give a shoutout to Charlie Cobb who double-poled the whole thing…qualifier and every heat. Charlie is working around shin splints and has no choice but to get his DP on and the progress and strength gains have been huge.
At the end of the race we celebrated with some pizza in the Walker building! Very fun session and great to have some new faces out to hammer with…each of the coaches even got at least one lap of racing in (or in Katrina’s case, the whole event!). Gary Solow was taking some high quality photos and I will update this post with them (and a link to more, maybe) as they come online. For now here is a link to the results and some video Kai shot from the qualifier. It wasn’t quite dark yet but you can tell from the grainy footage that it was getting there. In the video description (click to visit it on Youtube) you’ll find a start list to see who is who!
VIDEO:
Sprint races give you a lot of results to sort through, that’s for sure!
Cooling down/Heating up
Multiple awesome weather phenomena in the same week: double rainbow at the Range on Thursday and the first snow of the year at Bolton on Saturday!
You could get pretty metaphorical here and explain that this rapid shift in weather is akin to the transitions skiers go through every season. I’m not sure if a scientist would agree, but I think snow has a distinct smell. You notice it the first time you walk out to your car when snow if falling and dusting the ground. Travel mug of coffee and duffel bag of ski gear in hand, brushing flakes aside and unlocking your car door in the snow for the first time each year is a true turning point that heightens all your senses: winter is on its way. Not just in the chilly air or the pumpkin lattes, but honestly here showing its face.
We ran our Bolton uphill test on Saturday. With a rampaging flood of sickness, schoolwork, travel and school breaks going on, we only had four hearty souls (plus one coach, one parent, one injured athlete and one pug) making the journey to the summit on a blustery, frigid day that featured slick rocks, snow on the ground and a wintry mix assaulting from above. Results and the historical archive can be found HERE (play around with the bottom tabs to see individual days and athlete-specific records).
Lisa Burt got photos of each runner in action! From L-R Coach Adam, Andre, Greg, Ben C, Ben L
Happy with the effort and the snow! Kai came along and got in some ski-waking..he even brought skis but there wasn’t quite enough snow…yet
MNC mascot Tyke showing how to dress for training in rough weather!
We capped of the week with a rollerski on the bike path in Burlington, followed by our annual Fischer Fit Night at Skirack. Thanks to everyone who came out to that cool event! Things are just getting started in our busy autumn schedule and more dates and events will come up fast. This Tuesday (tomorrow!) we will be hosting a Co-op TT at the Range: skate sprint under the lights! See this SK Sprint TT Flyer for details. Should be another great chance to hammer with our friends at GMVS, along with participation from St Mikes and some UVM Club skiers as well. The more the merrier!
