From – Mon May 15 23:27:23 2000
XC race lessons learned at the Vasa
Well, I just did my first ski of the year at the NA Vasa.
I did the 27k classic. It was very fun for the first half.
Despite having to rewax several times. But then I managed
to run out of gas with 10 to go, not having wax didn’t help.
Lots of walking and waddling up lousy herringbone hills.
Oh well! But despite that the leaders only put 15 minutes on
me by the finish.
I was happy coz every time I had wax I’d just blow by the
4 guys I was with. It was a bit embarrassing also because
I’m sure I was the rattiest looking skier at the whole race.
Tattered gauzy sweater and knickers without kneesocks.
I gotta get my act together. It’s beyond even my lax limits.
But at least it was fun being the fast bum…when I had wax.
And at least my pants stayed up this time…suspenders.
I’m also semi-proud to say I was the only skier with a GUT
in that group.
I had no idea how many skiers were out there or where they were,
but it turns out that if I’d stayed ahead of the train I was staying
ahead of most of the time I’d’ve got 3rd overall.
About the wax…. Whenever you do a classic race with icy hard tracks
and churned up base snow, USE BINDER and a KLISTER SKI.
Or use klister as your binder. Otherwise, you’ll have the pleasure
of rewaxing a lot. Even if there’s a touch of fresh snow over the
ice. We were supposed to get a little more new snow, but we didn’t
so I lost out.
I really enjoyed finding the right technique a few times, tho.
We skied the next day also and despite being very tired and sore
(could hardly get out of a car or cross legs), it was very informative
to do quite a bit of technique testing.
I have a young protege who I’ve been trying to explain Anikin Tech
to and we’ve raised him up 15 places in classic events already, but
after our post-race tech session, I think he’ll go up another 5 places.
He’s looking good! It’s great fun drumming the ‘toilet seat’ out of
people and getting them to open up and glide A LOT up hills.
I realized that you can ski uphill and get good glide and go hard
and think you’re doing OK, but then if you really dial in and really
get that body ‘tip over’ action going and push the hip/foot forward,
you can get yet another couple feet per stride AND feel yourself
using deeper muscles better AND feel your heart/breath rate go
down!
I find that when I get tired (all the way down to zero gas) I have
to have exactly right technique or I’m lost. With dead arms and legs
(like I had) you need to kick off heel and use central body mass
to get push and kick or you’re dead. Sometimes people say that
elite technique takes more energy. I think it saves it.
In the race, the guys I was re-catching quite often on the long
steeps all had bad technique. There. I saw that a couple could
get long glide on the slight uphills, but they all start TROTTING
when the hill got even modestly steep. And they were breathing hard.
I don’t know if they knew they were just trotting.
One guy looked like he might be using Anikin Tech, but I hope
I didn’t look that ugly. Really, I don’t know what good tech is
supposed to look like, but I think it is at least going to look
cool and beautiful. It seemed like maybe he was using skate poles.
He was bent way over with his hands planting way up in the air
and almost no kick. He would move along OK on the flats. Musta
been a paddler.
But this ain’t my whole story! I had the great fortune to have
the 50k SuperDudes all ski past me. (We started earlier.)
I’d never really seen such guys skiing up close and all in
comparison. What fun! We were about 17 k in when they caught.
The Factory Team (Fischer/Rossi) guys just looked great.
3 of them in total synch. They were leaning foward in their boots.
They had slow tempo. They fully used arms and legs. They looked
big and strong (even the littler guy).
Then a couple minutes later came our top guy, Milan Biac. Higher tempo,
quite a bit looser form. Then another minute and along came a kid,
Ben Lund, looking too skinny to go that fast (he bonked bad).
But as soon as the factory guys went by no one really looked FAST
anymore, in general. Then about 5 minutes later along came our
first regional skier train of 10 guys. High tempo, no commitment,
skinny! (First factory girl in their midst.) Another 5 minutes and
another train of 10 guys, same thing. Then no one and our trails split.
Now, our guys were surely going fast and they are surely fit and strong.
They are national class athletes in other sports like canoe racing. They are
basically as fit at the National guys, really. But they weren’t skiing in the
same sport that the lead National guys were. Their fitness wasn’t being put to best use.
My big surprise here was that all the guys who rule the regional racing
and kicked my butt back in the day look skinny compared
to the Factory Guys. There is no way on earth that they could’ve
skied with those guys for very far based on what I saw. Unless they just doubletimed
the National guys, which actually could happen on rare occasion.
It was simply different KINDS of skiiing. But I think this situation could be remedied.
It seems like folks need more weights and power training in the summer.
Then, we gotta get better form. Lean forward, commit to arms and legs,
slow that tempo down, maybe tip the head down a bit more, use upper
body to ‘tip over’ and drive poles with torso weight. The local heroes are
just flicking their poles and swimming their skis around under their body.
Their heads are up, their weight is back. Their knees are bent. They simply
ain’t riding A SKI, singular. They’re riding both skis. I don’t think that reforming
in this way would take some elite amount of power.
I used to doubt what Anikin said about classic being almost the same as
skating, but now I wonder. It seems like our local heroes were making
the same skating mistakes that Anikin yells at you about in classic. And it
seems like the same cool things that I’m starting to figure out in classic
will help me if I ever do some skating again. If so, watch out dudes!
It was also humorous to chat with folks after the race and hear from
guys who went and watched Thunder Bay. They said our Natl Guys looked
like High School skiers compared to real World Cup skiers.
Also, that they looked nervous and shy. And skinny. Amazing. It’s no slam on
anyone. It just goes to show the various levels and the big jumps between them.
Sometimes I think the gaps aren’t so big. They are. It’s mainly due to technique, I’d say.
[Since this race, I organized an Anikin Clinic to try to learn more about technique myself and
to give Michigan skiers a chance to improve their skiing so it could catch up to their fitness.
I’m more sure than ever that my diagnosis is correct about our overall bad technique. Since then I
have also bought my first ski training videos—two from the Norwegian coaches. They proved to be
yet another quantum step up for me beyond the Anikin Clinic. Man, what tapes! Check em out at
Nordic Sports Equipment or other race supply catalog if you like.
They show World Cup skiers doing classic and skating up a hill in a WC event. They show regular speed, then slow motion. Front, back and side. They critique the style. The US skiers are used to show bad form. But the good form is just stunning. You can really see it. It just looks so different from any skiing we’re used to see. The nice easy listening soundtrack helps, too. It’s just beautiful tape. And the fundamental rules they present are like I’ve never heard. And I study technique more than most citizen skiers. I’ve taken a couple clinics. I’d say that most racers haven’t taken any. Even those who’ve been racing for over a decade. They know enough, they think. They don’t! It can’t be self taught. And it really freaked me to see that the same principles apply to classic, skate and HERRINGBONE! —Stable trunk, steady torso angle, deep knee and ankle bend, power through heel, good ‘fall’ on poles, complete followthru with poling, total weight transfer with hip. All the same for every technique. They sure look nice. I plan to do what I can from here on out. Too bad I didn’t know this stuff back when I raced!)
