J3 Newsletter Updates from Gro
Fri Mar 6, 12:43 PM
by Kristen Westesen
February came and went in a whirlwind. We skied on the same old snow that fell in December and it just got faster and better, especially on classic klister days, with the exception of the last week when our skiing at Lindley unraveled quickly. Water-skiing in February and crossing raging rivers of melting snow is not exactly what is in the textbook but it all makes for some interesting days.
We kept working on lots of technique, especially classic we seem to be getting the hang of. Everyone is looking smashingly good in striding – those sloping hills at Lindley make diagonal-skiing really fun. Dragan helped us with V1 skating, double-poling and trying to ski more efficiently with your energy going into forward motion as and of course with our “smooth” skiing progress. Embla’s mom, Grethe the MSU Nordic Coach came out and helped us video one day of classic and one day of skate. The videos were analyzed at a pizza-eating seminar at Sam Miller’s house. Grethe gave us lots of insight and we went home with images of adjusting hips, timing our kick the right way and getting rid of crazy arms.
Two Saturdays we got to ski at Bohart: The “Ultimate World Championship Relays” were dominated by some surprisingly exotic nations. Nice work to all J4s and J5s who hung out with us. The second Bohart day turned out to be just the best powder day, the J3 back-country ski team emerged that day (think S-turns), fun, fun. We also one day got to work as YSL instructors, trying to teach YSL skiers how to act like J3s!!
Many of us travelled down to West Yellowstone for the last Intermountain race weekend of the season and we got to race a real sprint format. Doing an individual prelim 1 km in the morning and then running through heats in the afternoon is awesome deal for J3s. It is great to see our kids against kids from the other teams duking it out. Next up is the Youth Festival in Sun Valley where we have the sportsmanship award to defend and where we need to leave it all out on the obstacle course and flying downhill to hopefully this year conquer the strong home-team.
For the BSF J3 Team
GRO
January provided us with consistently good skiing. No days on dryland this month! There were some exceptionally good klister-days at Lindley and a Bridger Creek day that we unfortunately ended up skiing at in quite mushy conditions. All interesting and a tribute to the exciting sport we are pursuing – the snow-conditions are always changing so we never know what to expect from one day to the next. That is why it is do fascinating to kick-wax – it always changes!
Because of the blazing fast klistery conditions we got to work on some great cornering and downhill technique at Lindley. Those “flat” trails are not exactly flat and boring after you have screamed through some of those corners on fast corn snow! One Saturday at Bohart our goal was to get air on Psycho Pit . The jumpers on the team got lots (you know who you are!) AND the rest of us got a little. Fun, fun. We will keep working on fundamental technique throughout the rest of the ski-season so that everyone should finish the winter with a good grasp of basic skate and classic movements.
Some of us J3s travelled down to West for a Spam Cup, some went to the two first Junior Qualifiers races in Jackson Hole and Soldier Hollow, and we participated in the second Lindley World Cup, the crazy lycra one, a duathlon with one leg classic and one leg skate. February events include the last Junior Qualifier races in West on the 14th and 15th and of course the Youth Festival in Sun Valley at the end of the month where as many as possible of the J3s should plan to attend! We need many, many BSF’ers to have a chance at the team championship again!
Remember consistency pays off: the more you ski and fully participate at practice, the easier and more enjoyable it gets to ski.
Thanks to great helpers Danny the Man Gorder, Ben Ruffato and Heidi.
For the BSF J3 Team
GRO
17 kids aged 12and 13 or “J3”s are training this fall with the BSF J3 Team. We are many, many girls and a few good men. The team is an exciting mix of newer skiers and kids who have skied up through Youth Ski League, J5 and J4 and for us to continue to get to know each other and by developing as a team is a fun process. We have been meeting four times weekly since winter started November 1 and 8 of us travelled to West Yellowstone for our annual on-snow Thanksgiving camp while the in-town crew managed to ski a couple of times at Lindley on an extremely thin layer of snow on top of frozen grass! Good work to all BSF’ers in town and to the J3 campers who skied around 16 times!! down in West during camp.
We have been preparing for winter with a mix of running, ski-walking, hiking, strength-training, ski-imitations both with and without ski-poles as well as high-intensity relays and games mostly at Lindley and Triple Tree. We even had one ski-session up at Bridger Bowl where we hiked up to Pierre’s Knob and skied from there! We are getting in shape and eager to see if the ski-imitations we have done will work on snow as they are translated into gliding effortlessly over that white stuff we are all waiting for.
As you read this we hopefully will be flying on skis in town at Lindley working on classic and skate drills and playing games and training on snow. We will see if the snow-dances we did for training in early December worked!
For the BSF J3 Team,
Gro
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Aloha from Sunny Valley, ID
Fri Feb 29, 08:50 PM
by Timothy M. Weston
Just a quick update from our hotel’s lobby. The kids have a few minutes of free time right now as we just finished dinner (pizza) and the team meeting. Parents, don’t worry, kids will be in their own rooms at 2100 and lights out at 2130.
We’re here with 25 athletes J5 through J3 for the Western States Youth Ski Championships. The bus ride was uneventful and we even have a great driver. We made it here in around 7 hours, which seemed like the blink of an eye for some of the athletes that travelled to McCall two weeks ago (11+ hours). Our digs at the Americinn in Hailey are very nice.
The conditions were great today. It was warm, the sun was shining bright and there was plenty of old snow on the trails at Lake Creek. We previewed the “distance” (1km – 3km!) courses and then took a look at the flying downhill and part of the obstacle course. Suffice it to say, I wish I was young enough to take part in the activities this weekend. Everything looks awesome.
Earlier this evening the athletes received a quick lesson on ski maintenance and then waxed their own skis with some expensive wax (Toko Dibloc HF and Swix HF). Hopefully the weather will remain the same. If it does, we’ll have a fun day filled with klister and sticky fingers on Sunday.
Tomorrow they’ll have an individual-start freestyle race, followed by oppotunities to face the flying downhill and the obstacle course. In the evening they’ll prepare classic skis, and then head to the banquet. Sunday morning they’ll race the individual classic race, attend awards, and we all will high-tail it back to Bozeman in time for you parents to get a good-night kiss.
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2008 Western States in Sun Valley
Wed Jan 23, 10:00 AM
by Kristen Westesen
Western States will be held this year in beautiful Sunny Valley, Idaho – February 29 – March 2, 2008. Here is some trip information and photos from last year’s trip to Western States Nordic Ski Festival in McCall, Idaho.
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J3's can go to the qualifier in Soldier Hollow
Thu Jan 10, 08:33 AM
by Kristen Westesen
Attention, J3 skiers . . . the first Junior Nationals Qualifier will be held in Soldier Hollow, Utah January 18 and 19. The BSF team will travel via Karst Stage leaving on Wednesday, January 16th. The races will provide great experience, team building and fun. All J3’s are encouraged to go! Trip details will come in a future email from Dragan.
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Western States trip information
Wed Feb 21, 09:51 AM
by Kristen Westesen
Western States will be held this year in beautiful Sunny Valley, Idaho – February 29 – March 2, 2008. Here is some trip information and photos from last year’s trip to Western States Nordic Ski Festival in McCall, Idaho.
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2008 Western States Nordic Ski Festival - Sunny Valley!!
Mon Nov 13, 01:34 PM
by Kristen Westesen
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