Nathan Schultz is working with the US Ski Team as a wax tech and athlete coordinator during the Canadian World Cups Jan 19-27. He will file reports throughout the week documenting his experiences in what will hopefully be a very successful week for the USST. Schultz is the owner of Boulder Nordic Sport, www.bouldernordicsport.com. All photos courtesy of Phil Bowen, Competitive Image – http://www.competitiveimage.us unless otherwise noted
Tuesday Jan 22: Pursuit: 15km Women, 30km Men
Today started off early as we had to get in and finish up waxing since the power in the wax cabins was shut off before we were finished last night. The Nation’s Group crew of Chris Mallory (Sun Valley), Brian Fish (CXC), Erik Flora (APU) and Frode Lillefjell (APU) set to work waxing what seemed to be endless pairs of race skis. We had to finish putting on our glide powders on classic skis and skate skis, then binders and kick wax on the classic skis. Needless to say, it was chaotic.
Luckily, conditions were stable and the World Cup wax testing crew fed us good information. It was a little hard for all of us who are used to testing wax on our own to relinquish that responsibility and completely trust that someone else would get it right. We all helped each other when needed and somehow managed to get all athletes on their race skis with very little panic.
![](http://images.fasterskier.com/oldsitearchive/upload/080124-101911-NGWaxRoom_2.jpg width=450 height=300 border=1><br />
<font size=1 face=verdana>The Nation’s Group Wax Room before the Pursuit. From Left to Right, Matt Muir, Nathan Schultz, Chris Mallory, Brian Fish.</font></center></p>
<p>I was working on 3 skiers skis and assisting with 2 others, so I was so busy waxing that I didn’t even know that the women were racing until they raced by the wax cabin at the end of their first lap. We were a bit panicked when Morgan Arritola’s skis looked slow coming down the long hill into the stadium, but she had great kick and an impressive skate leg to ski to a solid 23rd place. I sent all of the guys out to test their skate skis as I finished up kick waxing everything. The guys chose their best skate skis, then headed out on the classics while I powdered up the skate skis they had just picked.</p>
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