The Susitna 100 is a 100 mile race through the frozen wilderness of Alaska. The race course follows remote snow machine trails that are extremely variable in both terrain and snow conditions. Racers can choose their mode of transportation: ski, bike, or run. The race starts at 9 am, and the fastest usually finish by midnight. A biker often wins, but not this year. This year Tim Kelley smoked the field on skis. He completed...
Last time, I introduced you to the plotline: While training for the upcoming ski season, I took a bad fall and shattered my collarbone. So now, instead of documenting my training routine, I am documenting my attempted recovery. For more details, as well as photos and X-rays, click on the link in the right-hand column. Now, back to our story… I tried to mentally prepare myself for the next few weeks. This would give me...
For those of you who don’t already know me, my name is Jess Kiesel. I am a cross country skier racing for the University of Utah. I have been skiing since I could stand and racing for as long as I can remember. I come from an incredible family with an incredible athletic history that includes World Cup wins, Olympic gold medals, U.S. National Championships wins, NCAA Championship wins, Junior Olympic wins and medals, former...
The Swedish 90 Kilometer long Vasaloppet has been a nightmare for Norwegian skiers for more than four decades. One Norwegian World Cup star after another has failed in their quest to become the first Norwegian since Ole “From the forest” Ellefsaeter won it more than 40 years ago! Oddvar Bra, Vegard Ulvang, Bjorn Daehlie, Erling Jevne and dozens of other great 50- kilometer skiers have all come up short to win the “Vasa” Super marathon....
Mass-start cross country ski races is increasing in popularity. Many skiers find themselves in unknown territory when they end up skiing with a small or large group of skiers – a “pack” – during part of, or for the entire race. Here are some suggestions for how to approach pack racing, enjoy the experience and avoid some common mistakes. Drafting It’s less energy demanding to ski behind someone in a race – especially on the...
We’ve all heard it said that in sports you should believe in yourself. Perhaps this is an unattainable ideal. After all, from my own experience the biggest obstacle to success has been controlling the “mental game†which dictates my physical ability to accomplish something. We as athletes, are always trying to be “mentally toughâ€, or to “get in the Gameâ€.  I recently proved to myself the absolute necessity for an athlete to believe in him/her...
This is not the article I had planned to write. No, I had much different things in mind. I had a great idea for a season-long series of articles: the 6-month ski plan. Here is the background. I stopped racing competively at a National level in spring 2002. Since then I had remained active, exercising 5-6 times a week for an hour or two, but no serious training. At the beginning of last September I...
The last report in this “training and racing†series featuring my friend Gordon Lange and I was posted in November, following a great 50 kilometer ski tour into the West Yellowstone Park with Olympic Champion Thomas Alsgaard. Here is a little report on mostly my training and preparation from that November workout up until the recent Masters Nationals in Marquette, Michigan. The skiing in Utah has been stable and pretty good from November, however relatively...
Right now there are abundant opportunities to get out and enjoy winter, especially if you are a woman. In the next few weeks, there are many “Women's Only” events going on around the country. Not coincidentally, many of these are being held this weekend (AKA Super Bowl Weekend). Here we have provided links to some of the most popular events. A Huge List of Many Cross Country Events for women can be found here:
These suggestions assume that you’re able to train four time per week, but at the same time attempt to vary (or periodisize) the sessions from week to week. To vary the volume is not very relevant, since the number of total hours is relatively low every week. I also assume that most of you can ski close to home, or have access to ski-trails relatively nearby. In case you do not have snow, the interval...
All of us have heard that we’re supposed to warm up before strenuous exercises and races. But, do we know why, how and how much? Since you’re reading this article, you’re probably an endurance athlete and/or a Cross-Country ski racer. Your endurance distance training, intermixed with quality sessions such as intervals and pace/time-trial workouts, may have prepared you well for your regular or occasional races. However, how well do you perform your final race preparation,...
Norwegian National Team coach Svein Tore Samdal denies that there is anyone on the women’s national team with diet problems, but points out the challenge of good nutrition. – Supplying good nutrition is a constant challenge for us in the support system. We are constantly focused on making sure that the athletes are getting enough and a balanced nutrition that makes it possible to avoid getting sick and achieve optimal results. I’m not saying that...
Norwegian National Team skier Vibeke Skofterud had lost lots of weight through dieting when she made lots of progress two years ago. It didn’t work in the long run.
Norwegian junior skier Martin Sundby has taken a giant step in the right direction this season and has until now clearly been the best male junior racer in the country. There are (despite this) experts that are claiming that this giant talent is training wrong. Sundby’s training is by some (experts) viewed as a bit unique. – I’m doing lots of hard training – interval training around 90-95% of max heart rate. I’m also the...
Norwegian National Team skier Hilde Gjermundshaug Pedersen doesn’t like the word dieting, but notes that some skier has it on their plan. She warns very strongly against young skiers trying this in order to become a better ski racer. -This is a warning to all young skiers since this is not the way to go. Dieting is not a short cut in order to become a better ski racer. The only thing that will make...
“You’re always in the danger zone”, says Sweden’s Cross-Country ski-ace, Mathias Fredriksson about the possible reason for the recently observed cases of over-training among the World Cup elite skiers. Two of the Swedish National Team skiers and last year’s World Championship medallists, Per Elofsson and Jorgen Brink, have both been absent from racing this year, due to over-training and fatigue.
The toughest part about nordic skiing in Antarctica comes the moment you turn around to ski back. It's when you realize that, after 40 minutes of effortless V2-ing, you've been skiing with a gale force tail wind the entire time. And now you have to ski back INTO it in order to get home. Duh. McMurdo Station, Antarctica (summer pop. 1200) is located on Ross Island and is the US Antarctic Program's base of operations....
Fasterskier.com did a profile on 17-year-old Glenn Randall on December 10th. Glenn lives in Collbran, Colorado. He is the only (serious) racer in the area and made last year’s Junior World Championship team as a 16-year old. A week ago he participated in three of the Super Tour races at Soldier Hollow, Utah. Only a handful of junior racers showed up and Glenn came out as the top junior in all three races. He placed...
Depending on snow conditions, December can be a tricky month for Cross-Country skiers. Many of us have trained faithfully from early summer with anticipation of being able to get on snow at Thanksgiving time and be able to ski consistently thereafter. If you’ve planned the training season correctly, you would have built up your training and yourself to be ready for the race season in early to mid-December. However, as most of us have experienced,...
Fasterskier.com has featured Norwegian skate specialist Tore Rud Hofstad a number of times. He was second in the 15 kilometer skate World Cup at Beitostolen, Norway and 14th in the 30 kilometer skate mass-start in Toblach. He got sick after that race (in Toblach) and did not train for six days. He is now training again and hopes to fight for a podium finish in Ramsau this weekend. Hofstad skipped the races in Davos last...