The first two time trials were held in conjunction with the Guelph team on January 8th and 9th. Guelph was having their winter camp at this point at Highlands, so the Waterloo team joined in for their trial trials, in order to give some more competition for both teams. Taking part from the Waterloo side were: Katie, Tim R and Colin, with Derek riding the IR and doubling as the videographer for the event.
The first of these time trials was a freestyle team sprint, to prepare for the team sprint that will happen at OU championships. The race was kept pretty short, about an 800 m loop, but it meant that everyone got some experience in this incredibly difficult style of event.
In order to allow for some good competition, the structure for the team sprint was to have a one lap qualification to seed the racers. From this the pairs for the team sprint were matched up to try and even out the speeds overall as 1st and last paired together, 2nd and 2nd last etc.
With this as the structure, it made for a lot of movement in the sprint its self as the faster skiers would attempt to build a lead and the team would try to hold this as they passed off to their potentially slower team mate.
Final results are unavailable as it was an informally time trial, but there is some solid video that can be seen below. Check out the second video, a solid crash caught on film.
The next day, the Waterloo skiers were back up to Highlands for a classic individual start time. It was 5km for the women and 10km for the men. Waterloo skiers involved included: Colin, Derek, Glenn, Jess and Katie.
It had snowed approximately 10 or 15 cm the night before at Highlands and so it meant that some of the trails were soft. Additionally, the time trial was started in the stadium and the Racer Out hill all the way up to the run-up to the glacier was ungroomed. Therefore, on the pre-ski, all involved tried to get the trail semi-groomed through self grooming. However, come race time, the climb up Racer Out involved taking it easy up the climb as it was herringbone in soft snow in order to not tire yourself out for the rest of the race.
Overall, it was a good racing experience for all involved to get some classic skiing experience in. Full results are unavailable, however the order of Waterloo skiers was: Derek, Colin, Glenn in the men’s race and Jess, Katie in the women’s race.
The final time trial was held on Sat Jan 15th and was held just with the Waterloo skiers. On the startlist were Colin, Glenn, Jess, Katie, Ryan. The format was left open, however all of the skiers decided to do the race classic. It was a mass start, with the men doing 10km and the women 5km. Overall the conditions were nice and the race was held on a 5km loop up at the glacier. The end results for the time trial were: Colin, Glenn, Ryan on the men’s side and Katie, Jess on the womens.
Colin leading the way up the first climb, followed by Glenn and Ryan.
Katie working her way up the climb.
Jess pushing her way through some striding.
Your memory is going soft with the old age! The self-grooming (aka 20 racers side stepping a 200m section) was for the team sprint :)
ReplyDeleteFor the classic race we self groomed for the first lap (not be side stepping but just herringbone) and then the second lap the groomer had been through.
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