Rollerski safety

This is a repeat of something I emailed out to the mailing list last week, but I felt that it was important enough to serve as a reminder on the blog, too.

This time of year, we're all rollerskiing a lot, and getting quite excited for skiing on the actual white stuff. As we do this, I just want to remind you all about some important safety things. First off, it can't be said enough that we are a very small community, and so the actions of one rollerskier affects every rollerskier - we NEED to stay on the good side of the drivers out there, especially in the areas we like to ski (Littleton, Heath Bridge, Annursnac, etc). If we are inconveniencing drivers, they are more likely to complain, and once they complain enough, they might get motivated to actually do something about those annoying people taking up the whole road and slowing down folks who actually have to get somewhere (please read the sarcasm). So, our number one goal as rollerskiers should be: DON'T PISS OFF DRIVERS.

Understandably, sometimes we don't hear a car coming, or we have some other perfectly valid reason for not moving to the side of the road. This is fine, but, we should do everything in our power to be polite and share the road back. A couple guidelines:

-Ski single file as often as is practical.
-Ski single file if there is oncoming traffic or a car behind - when other skiers call out "car back", it is an action thing - so that you know to move into single file.
-When getting into single file, do it quickly, even if that means crowding the skier next to you.
-Obey the yellow line rule - do not EVER ski on the left side of the road.
-If there is a car coming towards you at the same time as a car behind, double pole.
-Be polite if a drive rolls down his window to curse at you.
-Be reflective and bright (CSU juniors all wear bright yellow reflective vests)
-Wear a helmet, and be cautious on big downhills.
-If you aren't skiing (for example, a coach is telling you something about technique), get off the road, and stand on the shoulder.

That's it for now, thanks for listening.