Skating in citizen classic races

You are certainly more than welcome to diagonal skate on your classic
skis. If it increases your fun factor, go right ahead. But, don't
call it a "classic" technique, because it's not. You can use V1, V2
and V2A on your classic skis if you like too, but those aren't classic
techniques either!

While we're at it, herringbone skate is a term that should certainly
be banished from usage. Herringbone is a specific classic technique.
Diagonal skate is a specific skate technique. Note that ALL skate
techniques leave a pattern in the snow like the one herringbone is
named after (Ok, maybe marathon skate only leaves half the skeleton,
but I think you get the picture).

Brian

In article , levi wrote:
I will be adding herringbone skate (aka diagonal skate) to my "classic"
technique bag of tricks - except, of course, in races. Should have thought
of it years ago - shows you what blind adherence to meaningless rules will
do to your fun factor (see "snowboarding").

"Mitch Collinsworth" wrote in message
r.cornell.edu...

On Thu, 11 Mar 2004, Scott Elliot wrote:

The rule has recently been changed that step turn without push is
allowable
anywhere so you can step out of the track and do step turns any time you
want. Since you cannot push, this is not very effective skating
technique.

Huh? What is a turn without push? It doesn't make sense.

-Mitch

Agreed. According to the laws of physics you could not turn without
applying force so you cannot turn without push. Step turn without pus is
what FIS wrote, so the rules were obviously written by lawyers, not
scientists.

I believe the meaning is that you can't use push to accelerate in a step
turn where tracks are set. Where there are no set tracks, you can do a step
turn with push so you should be able to get some acceleration for really
fast downhill sections.

The intent is apparently to keep people from effectively skating around easy
curves in the trail, but still allow aggressive skiing on downhill sections
where tracks have been lifted.

Scott

Isn't some of this getting a bit silly, e.g. like none of the volunteers,
spectators, or coaches should skate along the side of the course during
a classic race??? Like maybe they're sort of de-flowering the virgin
snow and ruining some kind of (unappreciated by me for sure) aesthetic
experience. Obviously nobody should skate on top of the set track for
classic--that's got nothing to do with whether there's a race going on
or not, but come on, let's not get silly. If non-racers are allowed on
the course, like maybe somebody carrying a bunch of spare poles for
racers who might break one, it could just be a bit easier for that
person to skate to wherever he or she is going to take up position!

One thing that sometimes gets under my skin is people who herringbone
on top of the set track and wreck it (sometimes in a race, often not)
when there's plenty of room to move over. I guess they just assume
that nobody could possibly have the strength/technique/waxing to
stay in the track on that climb, simply because they couldn't. It
also seems that the school groups showing up at some of the places
where I ski are not given a short course in ski etiquette (or else
it goes in one ear and straight through the vacuum to the other ear).

But I was very interested to hear Brian's comment about possibly
using skate-style double-poling while doing herringbone. That's
something that's never occurred to me as a possibility before, so
I'll give it a try tomorrow. What circumstances (surely pretty rare,
since I've never once noticed anybody doing it) would make that
good idea for improving your speed or efficiency?

Best, Peter

On Fri, 12 Mar 2004, Scott Elliot wrote:

Agreed. According to the laws of physics you could not turn without
applying force so you cannot turn without push. Step turn without pus is
what FIS wrote, so the rules were obviously written by lawyers, not
scientists.

I believe the meaning is that you can't use push to accelerate in a step
turn where tracks are set. Where there are no set tracks, you can do a step
turn with push so you should be able to get some acceleration for really
fast downhill sections.

The intent is apparently to keep people from effectively skating around easy
curves in the trail, but still allow aggressive skiing on downhill sections
where tracks have been lifted.

Still not sure I understand the rule. Is it saying that where there
is a set track you must not push with the edge of a gliding ski?
Or is there still some in-between situation I'm not understanding?

-Mitch

On Fri, 12 Mar 2004 wrote:

But I was very interested to hear Brian's comment about possibly
using skate-style double-poling while doing herringbone. That's
something that's never occurred to me as a possibility before, so
I'll give it a try tomorrow. What circumstances (surely pretty rare,
since I've never once noticed anybody doing it) would make that
good idea for improving your speed or efficiency?

I didn't read Brian's comment to mean that he thought it was
advantageous to do it this way (i.e. a secret weapon the masses
haven't been told about). I think he was just making the point
that if for some reason you were to do it it would not be illegal.

I watched a little bit of this year's Vasaloppet video today (thanks,
Janne!) and somewhere in the first avi there's a clip from a race
from years ago in the wooden ski era. Everyone in the clip was
doing a kick-kick-double-pole. That wouldn't be illegal now, either,
but I don't think you'll find yourself moving up through the pack
by adopting it.

-Mitch

Scott Elliot wrote:




Agreed. According to the laws of physics you could not turn without
applying force so you cannot turn without push. Step turn without pus is
what FIS wrote, so the rules were obviously written by lawyers, not
scientists.

I believe the meaning is that you can't use push to accelerate in a step
turn where tracks are set.

Scott



I physicist would recognise a change of direction as an acceleration.
Turning the velocity vector imparts and angular acceleration whether the
normalised (root-mean-square) velocity changes or not. So, true, you
cannot turn without imparting an acceleration, even if you were riding
the rials, in the track on a pure glide. A step turn, of any kind will
impart an acceleration.

But we quibble, we know what is meant. You can push enough to keep
yourself from flying into the woods, but don't over do it and skate
uphill just because there is a slight curve uphill, a bending of the
rules I have observed. On the other hand, i think that frequent lane
changes are simply obeying the rules to a tee. The rules do or don't
allow for a lane to lane skate? If so, take advantage of it, even if
you look down on it as a loophole.

Jim

"Dell Todd" wrote in message
om...

We are racing - not touring. We are there, at least in part, for
results. If this was a Granola Tour, who would care ? If this is a
race where we watch the weather for a week in order to nail the glide
wax & kick wax, apply the expensive fluoros, train in a focused manner
year round for it, pay travel costs to the race, we have a lot
invested. The reason "Why we care" is we want to do as well as we can
on a given day, and have our level of prepearation reflect that as
much as possible. On a fair & level playing field. Or the race is
POINTLESS.

I agree with you. I was eating granola when typing. I didn't know that you
were talking about racing at the level where 10ths of seconds count, or at
least felt like they did. I guess I now take racing with a more relaxed
attitude than I once did, so I my views about this are not valid if applied
to the the best performers in a race.
Besides I was talking about my feelings about what others did to "get
through" a Worldloppet marathon, and those others where skiing near me and
weren't in contention for anything. They were racing against themselves.
Well, maybe some of them were in Euro-clubs and there were points involved,
but I never thought of that.

Gary Jacobson
Rosendale, NY

Jim Farrell made an interesting point, which leads to the conclusion
that defining classic as "all those techniques where a force is
never applied by a gliding ski" is not strictly correct. Everytime
you go round a bend at any speed just gliding in the track, you're
certainly applying a force, and producing an acceleration. Maybe
the phrase should be added: "..., if that force results in an
increase in speed or an attack on the evil forces of friction and
gravity." ! But maybe a strictly scientific one-sentence definition
of classic technique doesn't exist.

Best, Peter

It's just my $.02 that "classic" technique is an artificial distinction,
and skating, especially the herringbone skate, goes a lot farther back
than Bill Koch - probably to the first person trying to cross a snow
covered lake.

If it's an artificial distinction then you must be having an awfully
tough time on hills. Diagonal skate is not a herringbone with glide,
since the ability to glide depends on snow conditions and the quality of
your technique. As I pointed out in the exchange about skier #52 (photo
5), it's the body, head, leg and hand/arm positions and the motion of
all of them together that are different. Between a good herringbone and
good diagonal skate the differences are obvious, even in a photo. It's
where someone breaks down and is doing whatever that the distinction
gets murkier, especially when looking at a single moment. If you look
at those race photos mentioned earlier in the thread, the skiers doing a
good herringbone are unmistakeable.

Gene

levi wrote:

In article ,
AMcom wrote:

Maybe the essence of classic is that the ski stops to apply power.

Classic has a lot of glide. It just doesn't have glide WHILE powering
the ski.
That's what skating offers.

So diag skate LOOKS like herringbone but the kicking foot is GLIDING
not stopped
so it's skating not classic.

Easy?

I'm glad you caught my drift. Now, just add something that covers
double poling and "marathon skating". I'll be muddling through the
FIS rules eventually.

It's just my $.02 that "classic" technique is an artificial distinction,
and skating, especially the herringbone skate, goes a lot farther back
than Bill Koch - probably to the first person trying to cross a snow
covered lake.

levi wrote:

The darndest technique I ever saw was a guy crossing the lake near the
end of the Birkie one year. There were faint tracks, and mostly ice.
I hear this big "whack"..."whack"..."whack" coming up fast behind me.
The guy was basically doing some kind of marathon skate, the whacks came
from slamming his ski down and getting a *huge* push off onto his other
ski, gliding 20-30 yards down the faint icy track. I don't think his ski
"single skated", i.e. glided, one bit, in fact it kinda bounced off the
snow and ice (after, um, stopping?).

Interesting! If he just pushed with the ski and didn't glide while he pushed
then it's classic. It's like planting a kick that is angled to the outside, or
an angled KDP. Interesting!

I was freestyle, (and stuggling with the ice) so I suppose I might have
emulated him...but because the marathon skate is "illegal", I'd never spent
enough time figuring out how to do it, much less this variation. And 50K
into the Birkie is no time to be trying to learn a new technique!

I often find myself evolving new techniques within races as I try to keep the
ball rolling.

Marathon illegal? Only for classic. Did you type that right? You were doing
freestyle? If so, then marathon is totally fine. I do it quite often...only my
own invented varient is to do it in the regular skating lane, not in a track. I
invented this for myself in a race as a way to keep going fast with less
energy. : )

--

Jeff Potter
****
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