Fingers crossed for snow here in American Birkie vicinity

We finally got snow here in the Seattle area.
Last winter was really bad. It has fallen more snow this winter already than all of last winter's total snow fall.

Here you have videos for all world cup races this year with English commentators. https://www.youtube.com/...assicSkiTrack/videos
Sundby won the 15k classic by just double poling. Time to make the courses harder.

And I picked this year for my first 51 k Gatineau Loppet. Gonna be a crash course of practice if and when the snow comes.

Two friends of mine, have signed up to make a return to the Canadian Ski Marathon - http://csm-mcs.com/

They were encouraging me to join them. I decided not to for other reasons - I am not sure my back would be able to handle 100 miles of Classic in two days - but now with the winter we are looking at, I am wondering if they will even be able to get in the training.

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

 
All trails are open and groomed in Charlo NB, fantastic facility that has hosted Biathlon nationals.

It isn't *that* far of a drive :-)

No snow in New England at all this year. Total disaster so far.

No snow in New England at all this year. Total disaster so far.

Pouring rain here just north of Toronto (could be snow) but it's 8C!!!

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

My daughter sent pictures X-skiing in Callaghan BC yesterday. Very jealous as it doesn't look like we'll be skiing any time soon in Ontario

Colorado

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Formerly DrD

What's up with the hidden videos in the 'how to classic' article?

you can expect a lot more great content on the nordic front. I'm super excited about this. It is my project, not Dan's.

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"Non est ad astra mollis e terris via." - Seneca | rappstar.com | FB - Rappstar Racing | IG - @jordanrapp

Can you post a screenshot? We've had a problem with Vimeo not working on SOME computers in terms of being visible. But we can't figure out why.

OS & Browser would be helpful too.

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"Non est ad astra mollis e terris via." - Seneca | rappstar.com | FB - Rappstar Racing | IG - @jordanrapp

Chrome on Windows 10.

Great job on this.

To support Fleck's post my best tri years have had the biggest winter of XC. I think most of us can handle a much higher workout over workout cardio workload (overall weekly TSS) than many of us can with SBR.

Last year I had my best IM of the year in the 3rd week of Mar in South Africa when all my biggest training days were speedskate + XC ski classic long+. Transition run (typically a 4.5-6 hrs day all of it weight bearing). My longest trainer ride all winter was 70 minutes until the weekend before which was 2 hrs on the trainer. I did have one 5 hour outdoor ride 8 weeks before the race when away in Taiwan and two other 2 hour rides when away for work in California. Other than that it was short trainer rides at 95 percent FTP, lots of run volume, low swim volume (hard to swim when your arms are doing 10 hrs+ per week of xc) and as much ski intensity and volume as I could pack in.

Some will say it is stupid to do an IM and not train specifically for it. I have tried this approach in the past for half IMs at St. Croix and. Wildflower and had some of my best races of the year and been on the podium in my age group. I wanted to try the experiment for a full IM and I felt the XC was excellent.

At the end of the day, I suppose higher general fitness and maybe a bit less specificity for those of us experienced in tri will trump (or at least match) lower general fitness but higher specificity.

PS...I did one 3 hour ride and another 4 hour ride at barely 55 percent FTP on race week when I got to South Africa to assist with getting used to being outdoors in the wind on rough pavement and get some sun exposure before race day (which also helps with time change)...one. of the hardest things racing down South after 5 months of zero direct sun is that day long sun exposure...XC can't help with that!

Finally someone calls Dan out on his winter snow jinx!

I wish I could x-country ski but it's gonna be +14 on X-mas day here in Ottawa.

Thanks a lot Dan!

Kidding of course. I loved the articles as well, and I cannot wait to get a good sweat on the trails.

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Only fools never change their minds and I'll never change my mind about that.

Let me know if you need anything from Norway

Keep your head up about the snow.

It's not even X-mas yet! In el nino years, the snow often comes late but heavy. I'm optimistic that it will actually be a big snow year.

In the banana belt of the US, it's actually not that common to have snow before x-mas. The best skiing of the year is almost always in march in my opinion anyways.

We are getting hammered with snow here in the Northwest.
One hour from you have 78 inches on the base of the ski area and 92 inches at the top.
It is going to snow all week.

Time to use Rode Super.

This is good since last winter was a disaster here in the Northwest.

It seems to be a change with how Vimeo handles things. I can't seem to replicate it with any consistency.

But i made some basic changes to the privacy settings on it. Can you let me know if you still see them as blocked?

thanks for your help on this!

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"Non est ad astra mollis e terris via." - Seneca | rappstar.com | FB - Rappstar Racing | IG - @jordanrapp

Still blocked for me, on a different PC this time. Windows 7 and Chrome. Switching to IE 11 will let the videos appear and play. I was able to watch via my ipad and safari last night as well.

Looking forward to the skate skiing part.

Yes, I've heard that IE allows the videos fine.

I'm on a Mac. Testing on both Chrome and Safari and the videos all show up fine. And I do make sure to be logged out of the ST Vimeo account when testing for visibility...

I will contact Vimeo. Sorry for the trouble...

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"Non est ad astra mollis e terris via." - Seneca | rappstar.com | FB - Rappstar Racing | IG - @jordanrapp

From Vimeo support: Hi there,

Thanks for reaching out.

Your videos are appearing embedded normally on our end. Can you please try clearing your browser cache and cookies for the browsers you’re having trouble with to see if that helps?

Let me know — thanks!

Sincerely,
Emily G

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"Non est ad astra mollis e terris via." - Seneca | rappstar.com | FB - Rappstar Racing | IG - @jordanrapp

Didn't clear everything, as I do benefit from some of that saved stuff.... Trying an incognito window is enough to make the videos appear and play in chrome (windows 7).

Thanks!

Staying NW of Duluth and hit the trails this week. Second winter learning classic. Love it. Need some snow in Chicago asap for Birkie training.