I've yet to be back on my skate skis since that first ski vomit season and I was thinking now that the ski fitness is kinda sorta there it might be a good way to mix things up. Where my destination was for the evening in Copeland there happens to be some very nice relatively flat skate trails about a 30 minute classic ski in. Strapped my skates to a back pack, put on my skate boots which of course are not really designed for going in a straight ahead direction. Even walking in them is not exactly comfortable, the long poles and my headlamp and I was off. 10 minutes later I had the beater classic sliding in a forward motion.
I learned a little thing about mixing components together. Skate boots even partly undone doe not give you the mobility you need for a good classic stride and skate poles are huge for classic. I felt like a neanderthal dragging his arms on the ground while moving forward. My usual pace turned more into a shuffle slide drag instead of grip and glide.
My other concern were random low branches. Now low is a matter of clearance. For normal skiing they were well above head height but when you have 5 plus feet of sticks hanging off your back you realize how low things really arm. More because of those random forced limbo attempts. Some planned some not. 30 ish minutes later I was clicking out of the classics and hooking up the skates. At the time I was out there I really wasn't to concerned of someone stealing my other skis sitting on the edge of the trail. I did see some random wild animal tracks, you never know.
SO the skate ski, lets just say I was a little more controlled this time. Did a 2.5 laps of the 6 km loop. It's fairly flat but like in cycling those false flats seem to hurt more than any hill. I worked on a few different drills while being out there from just skating without poles to working on my offset. There is a lot more thinking when it comes to skating over classic. Like shifting gears on a bike learning when to one skate over two skate. Which side to push on depending on the camber of the hill or if there is a turn etc. Thinking sucks!!! I have to focus a lot because my body naturally goes to a two skate technique with my always wanting to push from the one side. Of course this makes me work harder.
Kept myself pretty much aerobic the whole time, Yes those false flats screw with things and of course a steep hill still makes that heart rate go up. Was happy with how things felt and made my way back to the classic skis. This was the reality check on how fast I was going on the skates to how slow I was going on my waxless classics as I now felt like a snail would come out of my draft and take the win. I will say that I should have taken the 2 minutes and changed the grip wax on my race classics but I was a little anxious to get out the door. Yes waxless skis are convent but they just never give that umph and traction.
Continued on my shuffle back to the truck dodging low trees and of course random stops on the trail by Molly. After all these years you would have thought she would have learned. Maybe she need to get a ski in the ass as a reminder why not to stop there. IT worked on the bike so many years back. She doesn't stop in front of bikes anymore.
Just over two hours of slipping and sliding. I'm feeling more confident now in putting in multiple hour training time on the skate skis now and of course everything is better than long boring hours on the rollers. Hmmm what could I do for this weekend.
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