Conditioning

Quick, short, focused exercises and drills can strengthen neural connections in your brain and your body, resulting in better economy, better efficiency and better technique. Speed is much more neurological than it is physical. You don't need major doses of speed practice to get better. Instead, quick, focused bursts sprinkled throughout a ski or a run or any activity will expand and improve your neural wiring. That is precisely the focus of this quick video tip. The video explains that you should practice two extreme tactics for skate skiing uphill. Quick, hopping steps uphill with very short glides. And... Long, slow, ultra glidey steps uphill.

The publication produced by the American Cross Country Skiers (AXCS) entitled "XC World Digest" collects great training and technique articles from Europe and elsewhere, providing digestible, descriptive, translated pieces of cross country skiing content to sink your Nordic teeth into. Membership comes with numerous benefits, including a print publication that's well worth the price of joining. Below represents my highlights from this issue, curated and interpreted by me, including all of my baises and idiosyncrasies. Hope you find some value!

I’ve trained and run two regular road marathons in the past. Each one, I got sick before running, wasted my body during the run, and got more sick after the race. Find out how a ran my first ultra and why I feel good.

For optimal performance on and off the snow, you MUST incorporate some dynamic stretching, aka mobility stretching, into your pre-exercise routine. You should move your whole body through a round or two of movements that fire all the muscles, rotate the joints and warm-up the tendons.