Did it once about ten years ago and loved it.
I now need to get as proficient as I can in the next two and a bit months. A couple of questions...
Where in Europe is good to learn/practice cross country skiing, preferably somewhere close to an airport with budget flights.
Secondly, do those gym cross trainer things train the specific muscles you need or is it best just to carry on with usual triathlon training type fitness?
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Fly to Lyon and go to the Grenoble area, you can fly with Ryanair for a small fee.
I am off to Lapland in March for a weeks XC so at the moment I am using the machine in our gym at work. These machines are quite good for specific muscular endurance but the thing to do is really concentrate on your fom whilst on the machine, they are not exactly like XC but will have to do in the absence of the white stuff.
We did a ski marathon once....I've never been so tired in my life, including IM. I was almost in tears by the end.
But XC ski is probably now by far my very best discipline, it's certainly the only one where I can keep up with or even beat Mr. IW!
Don`t know anything about triathalon training but you might want to look at specific exercises for upper arms and shoulders if it is going to be a long way. (over 20 miles)
But Norway is extremely expensive, so only come here if you can get a cheap package thingamy.
I'm off for a hut-to-hut tour near Finse at the end of March. And yes, everything else
than the flight is expensive...
[1] can be as low as £3 or so one-way for a weekday flight - and then of course they add about £25 taxes etc for a roundtrip. And £15 per leg of the journey for a skibag...
I´m contemplating doing a X-country ski race at the end of February.... it is good for the soul to come last.
Technique counts for a lot in X-country skiing. But it you´re fit and strong, you can use a triumph of strength over technique to pick up speed. A strong upper body really helps. And strong quads.
But... why...?
He also sells spinning bikes now too.
Nice stetson Will - we could have used them yesterday at Tough Guy.
Managed to get all the way down the mountain, with some spectaculare wipeouts - but they did not hurt as the whole mountain was powder
Got al the way to the botom and was cutting across a nursey slope and cought my front edge, which resulted in a swan dive onto ice/hard packed snow - landed chest first and smashed a couple of ribs under my chest
Later in the week - i also did in a knee tendon
and on the last day i had to get rescures (off a very nice French lady ski medic) after catching a back edge and tearing all my lower abs
I know hav cold and it hurts like hell when i coff
(
We had deep powder and sunny skies all weekend, but spent most of Saturday afternoon off piste, thigh deep in powder, trying to find a mate's lost ski! These skiiers, bloomin' liability.
Yeterday we jut videoed each othe jumping off cornices to assess technique. A sack of spuds has a better technique than me.
Mountain goat - our local ski shop will do you a package of new (old stock) and second hand cross country ski gear (skis, boots and poles) for about £100. But north Iceland isn't really an easy place to get to ...
Apart from agony, of course...
Er, trying to think how to explain it ... when your board is perpendicular to the slope, it is when the 'edge' (or the metal rim round the edge of your snowboard) digs into the slope below you when you don't want it to. The effect is like a tripwire. Thwack!
I'm sure someone can do a better explanation than this ... help...!
Alternatively, have a snowboard lesson and within half an hour of getting on a snowboard, it will happen to you....
I am doing a 3 week army style arctic warfare/survival/endurance type expedition in May. Not sure exactly what they've got in store for us, but I reckon there'll be plenty of xc skiing with heavy packs on. Oh, and getting dunked in icy water with your skis on, that kind of thing.
catching a front edge WW - nice one and can now see why you have 2 broken ridges. Jj - imagine falling flat on your face whilst facing down a slope - that way your chest has farther to fall before it connects - and assuming you don't break your wrists trying to stop that happening.
I see, thank you.
are 'broken ridges' a more macho version of broken ribs?
I found out on Friday that I have got through the selection process for the next series of SAS, Are You Tough Enough? which is subtitled SAS:Ice, and is being filmed in Norway in May. Selection included a timed backpack run last weekend over the highest peaks in the Brecon Beacons (all good Tough Guy training!).
Excited and scared in equal proportion, can't be colder than yesterday though can it Cougie?
Hey - my TG teeshirt is as good as new ! Can't believe it after everything I put it through. Top Quality Tees Mr M !