Below is a link to the Athlete Reflection Form, with questions we’ve visited over the past few seasons. Take a moment to fill this out, and if you’d like to schedule a meeting to discuss the past season, the season ahead, goals, plans, and targets, April is a great month for it!
Meetings ideally take place at the library or any shop where coffee can be consumed. Shoot Adam an email and we can work out a time/place. If you’d like your own goal pyramid template to print out before a meeting, you can find that link here.
As shared in some other posts and resources (like the Junior Training Doc), there is a lot of info out there about what to be working toward this time of year. Those posts and pages are also linked below for your convenience:
The last of the last races for 2021/2022! MNC was represented on different sides of the continent for the final two National Championship events of the season, with Ava in Whistler and a large group of racers from the BKL age all the way up to Juniors and Masters (our EABC friends) in Lake Placid.
The Canadian National Championships also doubled as Supertour Finals and the long-distance US Nationals, so a mix of the top skiers from both Canada and the US were present, including a large contingent of recently returned Olympians like Jessie Diggins, Cendrine Browne, Julia Kern, Scott Patterson, and many more. Whistler is an awesome place, and it’s easy to picture an MNC training camp happening there in the future…just saying.
Ava raced an impressive array of events, coming right of a sweep of JNs with a short week of a break before a 5km skate, 10km classic, classic sprint, and 22.5km freestyle mass start! Things got off to a fast start with a quick-but-hilly 5km freestyle where Ava took 19th overall. That got the engines firing after the travel for an amazing 10km classic where Ava finished 10th overall, arguably one of the strongest-ever races of her entire career when you take into account the competition, the course, and the conditions. Rain and slush and fog were the name of the game in Whistler.
Meanwhile, the group back in the East trickled into Lake Placid where just enough snow was sticking around to host some biathlon races. It sounds like slush was the theme for both coasts, and everyone donned their raincoats and rain pants for the final push. Ava and I had a few days off from racing, and it actually cleared up JUST enough to see some big big mountains on an easy recovery ski. A good time to capture a little video!
The classic sprint in Whistler saw Ava qualifying in 10th overall, hitting a narrow 3rd in her heat to snag another top-15 finish. The big finish was on Sunday though, with a 22.5km mass start…no small feat in dense slush and 45 degree temps! Ava played it perfectly though, despite getting a pole ripped-off in the first couple kilometers. Through a few strategic pulls at the front to whittle-down the field, as well as a dynamic push to break away in the final 2.5km, victory belonged to Ava which means she took home the win in her final race with MNC and as a high school athlete. Watch out next year, EISA!
Back home, the MNC and EABC groups were skiing fast and showing impressive ski speed against biathletes from other regions. One highlight was the relay event, in which a Youth, and Junior, and a Senior athlete were paired together on teams. Several of our athletes got to not only race with biathletes a few years older than them, many of them got to compete on a team with World Cup medalists and professionals!
Brady and Taylor with pro biathlete Raleigh from the Green Racing Project
Looking ready for a break at the end of the season?
Now things have really finished up, with many transitioning to gradual running progressions, rest time away from competition, and cleanup of skis and gear. And getting the bike tuned up, the band warmups in, the mental systems reset…right? Hope so, because the next season is bound to be long, stressful, and busy, so if we don’t take time now to relax it’ll all build up just a little too much. Here are some helpful articles and writing about what skiers can be focusing on right now.
April is a rest month for skiers, and for MNC’s official programming as well. In May, we start up with spring training, where athletes can choose 1-, 2-, or 3-day/week options. Those playing spring sports may opt for once per week in order to get in some longer distance days, or rollerski work. Those not playing a spring sport are encouraged to train 3x per week with the club, and mix in other activities on different days of the week.
It’s important to have a gradual return to training (especially running and rollerskiing) rather than jumping into everything all at once. But as May rolls into June, we will be increasing the duration and intensity of certain sessions.
You can check out the MNC spring training page, including registration links, below. Training begins on May 3.
Last April, the team got together for an informal run on Saturdays or Sunday in Jericho. Look for some of those options to pop up on the Junior Training Doc in the coming weeks. For info on adding running back into your schedule on your own, here is a document with a weekly progression and suggestions.
For many, the racing season has ended with the exception of the FIS race this coming weekend at Craftsbury. Now what? Is it time to lace up the running shoes and start accumulating mileage? Time to circle the track in pursuit of a PR this spring season? Time to hit the gym and pump iron?
During the dryland season we have rollerskiing, biking, hiking, and running to contend with. If we immediately jump into those other activities full-force our bodies are just not going to handle them well.When it comes to physiologically ending one season (skiing on snow) and preparing for the next (dryland) we need to be careful and thoughtful. We’ve been training on snow for months now, meaning we’re only used to one medium for activity: skiing (and strength training for some).
Ending one season also means transitioning out of competition and into a building phase. For those competing in spring endurance sports, this season is the hardest because there really is no building or rest phase: you go right from pushing yourself in one sport to pushing in another. This works ok with fall sports like cross country because additional rollerskiing and volume can be added, and racing in the fall is a great way to tune-up for ski season. But in the spring we are looking for a different stimulus. When the skis are first hung up, it’s time to be careful about when and how you go hard.
We work through our training logs in weeks and months, so it helps to use the calendar as a baseline. April is considered to be the skiing “rest” month. In this rest month we are still training, although it’s all about slowly getting used to those dryland activities (more on that below). What happens when the ski season ends and we’re only 2/3 through March?
We still have snow to ski on up at high elevations. If we have the means and the motivation, we want to extend the on-snow skiing as long as we can! If this means taking fischscales out into the backcountry, or exploring the mountains with skins and AT gear, that’s awesome. Don’t forget about some backcountry exploring or even “nor-pine” skiing.
Once we’re in nor-pine season, it usually means incorporating running 2-3 times per week on non-ski days. Like last year, we’ll probably start a weekend running group in Jericho/Williston, with a simple distance run and warmups increasing every week. Last year, we started with 3-4 miles and increased a little bit each weekend. When running, whether solo or with our group, it’ll be important to:
Start slow (even paces that might feel arduous…your legs have NOT done this in a while!)
Incorporate warmup drills and running technique progressions
Bring out bands for hip strengthening in order to prevent injury and strengthen our strides
In April though, there’s no shame in sitting inside on a rainy, gross day rather than forcing yourself to motivate for a run or bike ride.
Later into April and closer to May, it’s time to build back. Running, biking, rollerskiing, and strength are the main summer modes of training. Here’s a very generalized idea of how to incorporate them slowly:
Running
Start with 2 or 3 miles at a very easy pace, every other day. Gradually increase the distance of your runs first (no more than 10-15% increase in total mileage each week, which will feel small but adds up!). Incorporate band work whenever possible. Every run if you can!
Biking
Mountain bike trails are often too wet and muddy in the spring to ride. You can still get your MTB legs ready with some gravel riding, even if you don’t have a “gravel bike”. Pick some dirt roads, remember hi-viz clothing, and explore. Biking is the best way to do some longer spring workouts because it is not weight-bearing and has less injury risk.
Strength
In later April and May we really want to be getting into some functional, traditional strength training. However in the spring we can still get ready with a little bodyweight action. Focus mainly on the core, the upper back, and the hips. The MNC band warmup above serves as a good addition to any strength routine. And although it may bring back some Spring 2020 quarantine PTSD…you can find a basic solo strength workout video below.
Rollerskiing
This is saved for last because in April it is the least-important! We often start rollerskiing in the very end of April, but not much before that. Many of our strength exercises keep the ski muscles engaged, and taking a break from the repetitive motion of skiing can actually be good. It allows us to work on technique areas by coming into the movements fresh, and the break also serves us well to get motivation up for a LONG stretch of rollerskiing. Breaking out the rollerskis isn’t recommended more than once per week in April.
Some tough MNC racers took on 3 races in 3 days last weekend up in Ripton, as the Rikert Grand Prix brought in Olympians, college skiers, BKL racers, and more! There was a 3km skate prologue on Friday, a classic mass start on Saturday, and a hillclimb up the Middlebury Snowbowl on Sunday.
With MNC athletes ranging from recent BKL Fest competitors all the way to Masters racers, the club was showing our full representation!
With the events all concluded for the season, it seems hard to imagine anyone caught up to MNC in the NENSA Club Cup, which is great to see! Our skiers have truly raced hard and taken it to the start line all season long, across all age groups, and around the whole of New England and beyond!
