By Darren
Steinke
Gordie Howe Sports Complex
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| A young skier works her way up an incline. |
Meinert is
one of the coaches for the youth high performance program at the Saskatoon
Nordic Ski Club. During some practice sessions that take place on the trails
and hills that run through the Gordie Howe Sports Complex and neighbouring Holiday
Park Golf Course, there are times the club’s young skiers will share those
trials with competitive and recreational skiers from all ages.
While the
Saskatoon Nordic Ski Club coaches try to instill a love of the sport into their
athletes, Meinert said it great for the young skiers to see a variety of adult
skiers at various skill levels enjoy the sport, which is best known as
cross-country skiing.
“We hope that we’ve instilled in them that it is a sport for
life,” said Meinert. “A lot of the new long term athlete development, all those
models across sport have an active for life section.
“I think cross-country skiing is probably one of the best
sports for being active for life. We have kids from three-years-old and
probably in the same park at the same time we might have an 80-year-old out
skiing. It is for all ages, and that I think appeals to a lot of people and
families that you can ski your whole life.
“I hope that the kids see it that way too. There is a future for them whether they want to ski race, whether they just want to recreationally ski, whether they want to be an official at a race, or whether they want to be a coach. There is lots of options.”
Ivan English, who is vice-president of the Saskatoon Nordic Ski Club, said Nordic Skiing is just like the cross-country skiing you see on television when a Winter Olympics is on. On the trails, you can encounter all sorts of terrain.
“Cross-country skiing is basically up and down skiing,” said
English. “You climb hills.
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| A young skier takes on a downhill part of a trail. |
Within Nordic
skiing, there are two different types of skiing in classic skiing and skate
skiing.
Classic skiing is what most people think of for
cross-country skiing. A person’s skis are parallel in a track, and you do a
parallel or a diagonal stride so that the skis are in the track. It looks a bit
like running with your arms moving diagonally with your legs.
In skate
skiing, the track is wider and it is packed. You glide on your skies by pushing
off at an angle similar to the skating stride of a long track speed skater. A skier
pushed off at an angle and glides on their skies and uses poles.
English
said the coaches try to get the Saskatoon Nordic Ski Club members to try both
techniques.
“You will have a race for classic skiing, and you will also
have races for skate skiing,” said English. “For instance, some races you might
have on a Saturday you might do a classic race and then the Sunday you will do
a skate race.”
As for competitions themselves, Nordic skiing has a lot of
options. Young children will do races anywhere from one to four kilometres in
length.
Teenagers and young adults will take part in races 10 to
15-kilometres in length. Adults might take part in races anywhere from five-kilometres
in length all the way up to 50-kilometres in length.
While those race lengths are used for traditional Nordic skiing
competition, the sport also had sprint races, where racers go all out to finish
first in a one-or-two-kilometre loop and there is a lot of jockeying for position.
Sprint racers are very spectator friendly.
Besides the traditional and sprint races, Nordic skiing
offers loppet ski races. Loppet ski races are conducted in a similar style to
marathon or fun run races.
Those races can be anywhere from five to 10-kilometres in
length and can run as long to 50 to 60-kilometres in length.
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| A coach, right, instructs a Saskatoon Nordic Ski Club skier. |
“Skiing tries to offer something for everybody from the
recreation skier up to those who want to race and have a sport and train hard
at it,” said English.
The Saskatoon Nordic Ski Club has a pretty lengthy history in
“the Bridge City” too. Back in 1928, Nordic skiing was first offered when the
Saskatoon Ski Club was established.
In 1968, the Saskatoon Ski Club’s Nordic and Alpine disciplines
were split up which saw the creation of the Nordic Ski Club of Saskatoon, which
officially took on the Saskatoon Nordic Ski Club name in 2011.
In the youth high performance programs, Meinert said they have
a group of 30 skiers that come out and train multiple times a week.
“We’re pretty passionate about skiing and getting kids
active and enjoying and loving the outdoors,” said Meinert. “We get exercise
too, while we are out here.
“The kids have been really improving over the last couple of
years. We’ve really made an effort to try and train more times a week, work on
our technique. There is a provincial race series that we attend, and we’ve
gotten some great results there.
“We’re just at the age with some of our older kids, our 14,
15 and 16-year-olds to try to get them to race a bit out of province and see
what that competition is like in other places, because it is pretty steep. It
gives them an idea of how hard they need to train here in Saskatoon to be able
to compete out of province. They are great kids, and we always have lots of fun
out here.”
English said the Saskatoon Nordic Ski Club is looking forward
to growing the sport at the Gordie Howe Sports Complex, where the club will benefit
from a new Multi-sport Centre that is currently under construction along with a
timing hut and storage garage.
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| Nordic skiing is a sport that can be enjoyed for life. |
“We had to bring in hot chocolate for the kids on a little
sled just trying to make due. With the Gordie Howe Sports Complex, we are
really excited that we’ll actually have a facility to call home to share with
speed skating in the winter and other sports in the summer. We are actually
going to have a place for kids to come in and warm up and bathrooms and change
rooms and access to a canteen and be able to grow our sport.
“We’re going to have this great new home where we can really
have a lot more amenities for all of our skiers.”
For more information about the Saskatoon Nordic Ski Club, feel free to check out their website at www.saskatoonnordicski.ca.
