Great skate ski / skijor clinic today at Larose. First half was about skate skiing technique, sans dogs. I had no idea there were so many technical aspects to skiing; it was a real eye-opener. Failed miserably at pretty much everything and I like to think it's due to my pathetic, beat up classic skis (which I hadn't waxed at all) and short classic poles. Needless to say I'm coming closer and closer to deciding once and for all to get skate skis. But I've been saying that for a year now. :-) Hmmm... maybe I'm procrastinating so that I can keep on whining and blaming the equipment instead of my lack of skiing abilities. Heh.
At lunch time a friend and I went out for a short skijor. First I took Lucy out solo, and she was good except when she wanted to stop and sniff. And when we got to the trail leading to the car, she totally forgot how to pull. Then I put her back and took Walter solo. He was a good boy and did his lefts and rights wonderfully at all of the intersections we came to.
The second half of the day was with the dogs. Started with passing distractions (on foot), which at first were a stuffed animal and dog food, then progressing to a bunch of dogs on leash at the side of the trail. Brought Lucy out for the first bit but then decided Walter would get more out of this exercise as Lucy was ignoring the other dogs anyway. He did really great, what a good boy. Also did some left and rights through a snowshoe-created labyrinth, again on foot. Compared to our skijor earlier in the day he was pathetic at the directionals, I'm guessing because it was a very distracting environment with about a dozen teams wandering through the small area at the same time. Then we did a short head-on passing exercise which went fine. Oh yeah and also a line out exercise. Finally we went out for a short group skijor and Walter was fine with being passed (same direction) and we passed one dog as well.
The conditions were excellent, so skijoring was a LOT more enjoyable than our last, icy, outing.
Anyway the dogs have the right idea as I write this: Time for a snooze!
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5 comments:
I'm on the same fence about getting skate skis. The problem for me is that there are so few places to do it and I have a really nice pair of classic skis, hard to justify the $$ for just a few days of skiing per year. Still, it looks like such fun, so much faster than classic. ORS sent me an email on some deals, the link is here: http://www.orscrosscountryskisdirect.com/
Scroll way down to find the skate skis. $400 didn't seem to bad for the 'recreational' package but at that price I'm skeptical about how good they are. Not sure what that transfers to in Canadian or what the shipping charges would add and the sale ends in a few days.
Thanks for that link. But, I finally hopped off the fence last weekend and bought skate skis/boots/bindings/poles. Although the actual skis were on sale for only $100 (we ski on some rough conditions so no sense getting nice skis), after all was said and done with the bindings, boots, poles, and waxing paraphernalia, the total amount was "slightly" higher. Let's just say, thank goodness January is a 3-pay month for me!
Haven't had a chance to try them out yet but hopefully this weekend.
Hi Lisa,
I'm SO happy I finally explored your main blog page a bit :) I didn't think you were updating the blogs and look at how much I've missed!
So excited for you that you got your skate skis...it's SO much fun to be able to go both ways (classic or skate). We just got back from a 3 day weekend of skijoring with the sixpack at Devil's Thumb Ranch about 2 hours away...it was a blast. I posted a video on youtube (it's on the Yahoo's blog http://smrp.typepad.com ) that I think you'll laugh at. We aren't super serious about it obviously, but they sure love it! Give the dynamic duo a big squish and howl!
Sue
Hi Sue,
Yeah I'm really looking forward to trying the skate skis this weekend! If I'm still a totally pathetic skier, I really can't blame it on the equipment anymore.
Just checked out that video - it is awesome. The music is perfect. In fact I think I'm gonna go watch it again.
I'm about to redo my blog links and will be adding yours for sure. I noticed you had added mine to your page; thanks :-)
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