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Turns out in addition to my blog post on Monday this week, Sara also wrote a recap of the first Eastern Cup in Waterville. Check it out below:

It’s race season! Last weekend the Juniors packed up a trailer, rented our first ever U-haul Chevy truck, and traveled to Waterville, Maine for our first Eastern Cup. Although the snow on the sides of the road slowly dwindled as we traveled south, our spirits were high when we reached Quarry Road.

The night before the first Eastern Cup I found myself running through the memories of training year 2023. I remember doing classic intervals on Road 101 last summer, where the juniors demonstrated classic striding so dialed I bragged about them to anyone who would listen. Then in September we entered the Keys to the Castle race in Lake Placid, where the juniors kept pace with the SMS T2 athletes on one of the most technical rollerski tracks in the country. Then just last weekend, I watched the athletes successfully plan and execute sprint tactics against college skiers in the Rodriguez Sprints.

So despite the tactical course, the tricky conditions, and the fast snow (or maybe because of these factors) we were “soups excited” as the juniors would put it. We’d been training for tough conditions, and we were ready for it.

The weekend did not disappoint. There was exciting head to head competition and tactical strategy. There were several spectacular crashes involving some broken equipment and a tattered race suit (although thankfully no serious injuries). We also faced setbacks in the form of cramped muscles, illness, and anxiety. Interestingly, many of the racers that experienced these challenges persevered to all-time best finishes, which just goes to show how results can be rewarded for perseverance in the face of adversity.

And results were had! There were definitely some turned heads and some raised eyebrows out there. We had podium finishes across the board, in U16, U18, and U20 divisions, in mens and women’s races, and in both classic sprint and skate distance events. Equally impressive were the improvements by athletes that had just completed their first season of summer and fall roller skiing, and took their ski racing to an entirely new level. But the ultimate victory was that MNC won the overall club competition for the first Eastern Cup!

I cannot imagine a more dedicated group of Junior athletes. Through setbacks in performance, injury, college applications, and hundreds of hours of training, they have made a commitment to the sport and community of Nordic skiing for the past few years of their lives. Together, they elevate the caliber of Nordic racing in New England. I feel so privileged to follow their progress and celebrate their successes.

If all this sounds like a scene you’d like to witness, the season is just heating up! Come over to Lake Placid or Craftsbury for the next Eastern Cups. You won’t be disappointed!

Kate Carlson (photo by Steve Fuller @flyingpoint)

Henry Sterner (photo by Steve Fuller @flyingpoint)

Looking to find out more info about the Eastern Cups this year?

Curious how things will look from the MNC side of things?

Trying to navigate which licenses and memberships to get?

Want to sign up for the food table and contribute tasty snacks on race day?

All of this and more can be found in the 2023/2024 MNC Eastern Cup Primer! It’s time to get excited for race season!

MNC Eastern Cup Primer 23/24

4pm is a tough time to exercise. A little reading into training literature will go so far as to recommend 3-4pm as the least ideal window for exercise within the realm of a normal day. This is especially true for teenage athletes in high school.

Take the great book “Roar” for example, which states:

“Most everyone has a lull around 3:00pm.; it has to do with our circadian rhythm, which causes a dip in core temperature.” 

Lunch is far enough in the past that the fuel you got in the cafeteria is no longer sufficient for training…and dinner is quickly approaching, sending signals that the body needs more food, and fast.

But there’s psychology at play too, which goes beyond the body’s needs from a fueling sense. Mentally and emotionally, by 4pm athletes have dealt with the busy schedules and anxiety of a long school day (plus travel to the training site), and having to switch to “go time” for ski practice is not always easy. What’s an ideal way to set training off on the right foot? Get some fuel in the tank!

Again, from Roar:

“You want that preworkout snack to accomplish three goals. One, provide fuel so you can go into your workout fully energized. Two, help minimize the muscle breakdown that occurs during your workout while maximizing the training adaptation (getting fitter and stronger) you want. Three, make you feel good mentally and physically.”

Armed with some scientific information on the best pre-workout snacks, what kind of snacks teenagers are likely to pick up and eat, and the cost of certain snacks, the food table was born earlier in the fall.

What is the food table? It’s not complicated…in fact, it’s just what it sounds like! A folding table placed prominently trailside, near a common gathering point. Sometimes when it is most important to consume different types of fuel over the course of a workout, such as carbs and a little protein before/sugars during/carbs and more protein after, the table will be divided into “BEFORE/DURING/AFTER” sections. But mostly it’s just a table of snacks, and people stopping to eat at any point in the workout is better than never stopping at all, or having the “perfect ratio” of nutrients.

Food table early in the fall

It probably took me too long to realize this, but to play around with an old adage, “sometimes you just have to provide someone the fish, rather than teaching them how to fish.”

I’ve tried the route of sending emails and posting recommendations to athletes and parents extolling the virtues of having a snack in your bag for the ride to practice, and a snack for the ride home as well (teaching how to fish). But life is busy and those seem to be easily-overlooked concepts.

As an alternative, when you put a box of Teddy Grahams, some Nutella and pretzels, and a box of fruit snacks on a table next to the trail (giving a fish), it’s amazing how many skiers will fuel up before, during, and after the session. When there’s a cooler with a bottle of chocolate milk ready for after the workout, nobody walks away without having some recovery nutrition in their system.

While this takes some ownership off the athlete, in my mind the trade-off is worth the extra effort and cost to provide snacking options. Food is fuel, and we all need it to survive and thrive. Having a table of snacks omnipresent at training sends a positive message: we SHOULD be eating before practice, during practice, and after practice. And this fuel doesn’t have to always be expensive, trendy, or perfectly balanced in nutrients…if you need fuel, something is better than nothing. Whether you bring fuel for training or not, something will be available to you. No workout needs to be done on an empty stomach.

But there’s more. The food table had an unintended benefit that started to become apparent after a few weeks of its presence. In short, the food table became the “water cooler” of the ski training office. It became a gathering point, a socializing area, and a catalyst for putting people in closer proximity to one another. For a team coming together from different schools, towns, and backgrounds, that ends up being extremely powerful.

When you are at the food table you are stopped: there’s no difference in skier speed or ability. Food brings people together, whether it’s a group of hunters trying to nab a buffalo to provide sustenance for a year, or a group of skiers passing around gummy bears between a set of intervals.

So when we had some team space at the Community Center last week, I got some paint and set out the food table: it was time to make it our own. Where will it go next? Wherever we are training!