CSU Junitor training Nov 11 Smuggler's Notch

Lot's of snow, but even more footprints up to the Notch.  Good skiing on the north side for classic skiing.  Stuart,. Henry, Alex, Chris and Jim.  Note Chris circa 1990 short alpine boards.  Rehab skate.
Mansfield Nordic had a rather large practice group doing repeats on the pass.  Snow is here.

30th Annual CSU Fall Classic Rollerski Race

Wow, its hard to believe I've been putting on this race for 30 years!  Well, I might believe it based on my inexorable slide to the back of the pack from one year to the next.  That said, we had a beautiful, if somewhat windy, day for a rollerski race sandwiched in between an awful lot of rain.  I'll take it!  With the rain I had to paint the arrows and sweep corners the morning of the race, but it was worth it as a good group of Harvard skiers, CSU Jrs. and CSU masters showed up to duke it out and figure out what kind of shape they are really in on the cusp of ski season.  And after hearing about the lousy conditions up at the Trapps race on Saturday I was especially happy with the weather.  

As I said, I was pretty much in the back the whole race so I didn't see much as everyone drifted away from me up Johnson St. on lap 1.  Alas, my 3 year duel with Robert Faltus and Clara Cousens ended and it was lonely.  But up front, Everett Sapp from Harvard took the victory in the men's race with CSU alum James Kitch in 2nd and CSUers Alex Burt, Linden Niedeck, Henry Johnstone and Ben Bucheit following in quick succession.  On the women's side Harvard's Ursula Volz grabbed the win with CSU alums Clara Cousens and Izzy Cole in 2nd and 3rd.  Andy Milne, even with a crash caused by a stone, was the first masters skier.  Laura Appleby and Sofia Scirica did the one-lapper taking 1st and 2nd, while Barry Kitch took the one-lapper on the men's side followed in 2nd by Noah Baumann and his dad Heiner in 3rd.  And, we were all cheered on by the Harvard skiers who had raced on Saturday at Trapps as they skied around the course!

All those who were at the awards took home a prize (pies, cider donuts, gift cards or blinkies from Chris Li).  I'd like to thank the volunteers who stepped up to watch the corners and do the timing and the Town of N. Andover for allowing me, once again, to hold the race despite the gas explosion crisis and digging up roads to replace gas lines.  Fortunately, the race course was outside the affected area.  Thanks again to everyone for coming up and making it a fun morning.

Men’s Results
Name	Club	1st Lap	Finish Time
Everett Sapp	Harvard	19:11	36:55
James Kitch	Harvard	19:11	38:21
Alex Burt	CSU	19:11	38:54
Linden Niedeck	CSU	20:08	40:17
Henry Johnstone	CSU	20:08	40:18
Ben Buchheim	CSU	21:04	43:02
Andy Milne	CSU	22:20	43:48
Greg Bodkins	CSU	22:56	45:18
Bob Burnham	CSU	22:56	46:37
Robert Faltus	CSU	23:43	48:36
Jamie Doucett	CSU	24:49	49:47
Dag Holmboe		25:30	51:16
Women’s Results
Ursula Volz	Harvard	21:48	43:43
Clara Cousens	Harvard	22:56	45:51
Izzy Cole	Harvard	23:43	47:49
Jody Newton	CSU	Started race late
Junior Women - 1 lap
Laura Appleby	CSU	22:55
Sofia Scirica	CSU	0:26:07
Men - 1 lap
Barry Kitch	CSU	22:54
Noah Baumann	CSU	23:40
Heiner Baumann	CSU	23:42
Ben Scirica	CSU

Rolling

CSU getting into the swing of fall training.

30th Annual CSU Rollerski Race

The 2018 CSU Rollerski Race will take place for the 30th year in N. Andover on Sunday, November 4, 2018.  I will email entry forms to the CSU list.

The race starts at 9:30 am and is CLASSIC.  The race is 2 laps for seniors and masters, 1 lap  for juniors (you can do 2 if you'd like though, decide at registration).   Race entry fee is a whopping $12.  Pies and cider donuts for prizes.

The 2018 CSU Fall Classic Roller-Ski Race

Hosted by the Cambridge Sports Union

Proceeds to Support FOLJMS (The Friends of Leo J Martin Skiing)

Date: Sunday, November 4, 2018

Start: 9:30am start

Entry Fee: $12

Course: 2 lap course, approx. 15km (7.5 for Juniors) over rolling suburban streets

Technique: Classic

Location: Playground on Milk St. and Johnson St, North Andover, Mass.

Mail Entries: Jamie Doucett Info:    Call at 978-475-6323

26 Lincoln Street Email: jdoucett@comcast.net

Andover, MA.  01810

App Gap challenge + some adventuring

Kate Weinberg, now at Bates, has updated this blog post for us, even though she wasn't necessarily there. I've tried to fix the typos, but I may have missed some. Enjoy! 

This past August Alex Jospe lead a legendary trip to Vermont for the final summer camp of the summer! This weekend was, as always, jam packed with adventures including a hard rollerski race up the Appalachian Gap, waterfall exploring, a sunset hike, chinese food and of course, a long hike.

FRIDAY

Laura and Kate arrived to the campsite on Friday night. Upon locating the campsite, they checked in with the one and only, Martha. She bestowed plenty of valuable information about the campsite to Laura and Kate. The two were happy to learn about the campsite, but got a little worried when Martha explained to them that she consumes the non potable water every day. After this, let's just say…. interesting interaction, Kate and Laura found the campsite.

The two worked hard together to set up a nice four person tent for the two of them. Laura and Kate are only slight acquaintances, so they were glad to have a four person tent that was just big enough for the two of them. Kate mainly watched and screwed up the attachments, while Laura fixed Kate’s mistakes and set up the tent, roasting her along the way.

That night Laura and Kate headed into the poppin' town of Bristol to discover an amazing night life vibe. They settled on a pizza place to carb up before the big race. Then they headed back for a nice hot goss sesh and of course, some much needed rest before the big race.

SATURDAY

Race day arrived, and Laura and Kate headed out to the race sight to meet up with Alex Jospe, Clara Lake, Alex Burt and Ayden Nicole (both at the GMVS camp) and Clara’s dad Steve. Everyone was excited to see all of their competitors they normally only see in the winter. Rumor has it that the owners of the infamous csu_memes instagram account were present at this very race! Incredible! Everyone was jealous of those who met the memers, while others who did not have as much luck settled on the other, less desirable celebs like Sophie Caldwell and Caitlin Patterson. Everyone collected some dope t-shirts and headed into vans to get to their race start.

Alex decided to skip out on this race and instead took on the noble task of timing in the transition zone. Not racing was a somewhat out-of-character decision for the ski coach, but she still managed to snag herself a t-shirt, so I guess she still benefited from the event, even if it wasn’t in the form of endorphins.

App Gap transition zone

The girls started slightly ahead of the boys, but all faced a tremendous challenge. The course consisted of a skate leg and then a transition into a classic leg. The Appalachian Gap has an average 8% percent grade, but everyone absolutely crushed it, showing pure and utter excellence in their potato dropping skillz and DP form. All that no pole double pole really paid off!

Everyone then headed over to GMVS for a nice bbq. Then Clara, Steve, Laura, Alex and Kate headed back towards the campsite. Alex, since she didn’t race, went on a long run, while the others went on an adventure to seek out a swimming hole.

First they encountered a swimming area, but, upon exploration, came across an incredible waterfall crevasse. They explored further, climbing over rocks, standing under the waterfall and enjoying the experience of adventure in a new place.

The four headed home to the campsite to meet up with Alex before they headed out to chinese food in Bristol. After a delectable meal, they all grabbed some incredible ice cream before heading out to the sunset hike.

Alex continuously re-assured the crew that this would indeed, be a chill hike. Members were skeptical, especially Kate who was still recovering from Alex’s last “chill walk” that ended up being an hour long, steep hike.

Everyone was happy to be on the trails and the sunset view was beautiful. Everyone was grateful to be away from the hustle and bustle of home and to sit back and enjoy the view. The group watched the sunset before heading down to head back to the campsite.

Sunset hike

Kind of an underwhelming sunset, but a pretty cool little hike up to the ledge

Some form of a game at the campsite

The following morning Kate had to leave to go home to catch her flight to Switzerland. Check out her dope gopro edit of her trip by clicking the link below!!

https://youtu.be/Bm2guuFoPFc

SUNDAY

Alex, Clara and Laura geared up for a long hike through the misty, foggy and wet vermont mountains. The hike began with a lot of uphill. Alex made sure to stop at every photo opp to take selfies for her blog, instagram and facebook where she will use the same exact photos and caption on each platform. [editor's note: I can't help it, I'm old, and that's how old people use social media]

While Alex pondered the definition of extra, Laura and Clara had themselves a nice hot goss sesh about who they thought ran @csu_memes. They journeyed over several summits, and made sure to stop and enjoy the gorgeous views.

Great views for our run.

At one point Alex decided that this 5 hour hike wasn’t enough of a workout, so she ordered the two girls to drop and give her 30 pushups. She may claim that they were, as depicted in this photo, getting low to the grass to hydrate, when in reality the truth of the situation was different.

Misty grass makes tasty mid-run fuel


Edible or not? Do we think Laura ate these berries?


Long trail is pretty awesome.


Camping location. Next year. Stark's nest.


Hard to tell, but Clara just jumped a pretty big gap to catch that tree.


Sweet spider webs.


More views.


I found bears in a cave

After the hike everyone loaded their things into cars and headed home. Everyone was a little sad to leave, but mainly happy they had the chance to come.

Huge thanks to the one and only Alex Jospe for hosting!

Louisa May Alcott 5k race

We kicked off our CSU-X fall race season with the Louisa May Alcott 5k, in Concord. It's a flat road course, which doesn't exactly suit skier strengths, but it was fun to dust off the racing legs! Strong showings by CSUers, and I think every single junior hit a PR. Good cool weather and a good summer of training will do that for you. Us more experienced coaches and parents may not have hit PRs, but we enjoyed the race anyway.

Linden led the way, in 4th place overall! Huge PR, and a good run. In the 5k, we had:

Linden
Henry
Ben
Tod
Alex B
Heiner
Clara
Milo
Eva
Jane Anna
Rob
Will
Evie
Cat
Hannah
Owen

In the 10k, Cameron led the way in 2nd overall, and Pat was in 6th with a strong run.
Cameron
Pat
Alex J
Jody

Full results:
http://www.itsyourrace.com/results.aspx?id=11316

I didn't get many photos of the CSU kids winning every medal there is to win, but just trust me when I say we cleaned up.

Henry, Ben, and Linden with their medals


Jody winning her class in the 10k; receiving a medal from Uta Pippig!

July adventure weekend

As usual, I'm late when it comes to posting photos from the weekend, because this is three weeks late. Regardless, it was a good weekend. started at a Walmart parking lot, which was a total cultural experience for some of us. About 99 boxes of clif bars were purchased here.

Then on to the parking area for our rollerski, which doubled as the parking lot for some swimming. Good thing, because somebody locked keys in his car, and we all spent a little longer at the swimming hole than initially planned. All good, we had food and water and swimming and it didn't start thunderstorming until we were all safely indoors eating burritos. Win for the day. 

Salvation on a hot day takes the form of the Rumney general store.



Sofia and I enjoying cold drinks on the Rumney store front porch



Gorgeous pavement, gorgeous views.







A different form of salvation - a cold stream for our heads and helmets at the top of a loooong climb.



Francesca leading the pack through Rumney



Starting out

So after our burritos, we set up camp at the Campton site, and attempting to make a fire for s'mores, but the previously mentioned thunderstorms had things pretty wet, and that, combined with a lack of real kindling, had us eating cold s'mores, for no lack of trying.

The next morning we headed up to the Kancamangus, to drop some cars along the way, and then we all skied back up to the first trailhead. From there we started on a fairly long, fairly hilly, 12-19 mile loop (depending on where you ended up cutting back toward the cars). It was a gorgeous day for a hike, clear and almost cool when we started, though it got pretty hot. The group moved along at a good clip, and we ended up separating at Downe's Brook trail, with about half heading down that way and the other half hitting Whiteface and Passaconaway before heading down.

There were a couple slips, we may have run out of water, and at one point we may have gotten lost, but we all ended up in one piece, in one place, and with smiles all around. Well-deserved pizza and ice cream after a long day!

post-hike coach selfie



















Looking down the slide toward Lake Winnipesaukee.

Summer camp

Great week at summer camp back in early July. Here are some photos.


The whole crew on top of Watatic

Getting a bounding demo


Rob has two feet off the ground!


Some of the girls heading off on a ski


Some of the boys rolling


Drink break!


Rolling


Still rolling


Rolling faster


oops, spotted raspberries. not rolling anymore


Monadnock from the school


Annual mini golf tournament. Rob won.


Tweedos mini golf is only the best.


Kathy drove the awesome van. It has seatbelts, a working radio, and suspension. You can guess which features excited the coaches and which excited the skiers.


View from the Dublin trail ascending Monadnock


Kathy and Grace on the ridge


Skiers up top. Kind of crowded on top, gorgeous mountain day


Drink break




View of the top from Pumpelly trail


Heading down. not going full send today, just chill.




Dip in Dublin lake after


Monadnock looks so small from here!






Then Kimballs for ice cream. Necessary after the tiny snack the dining hall packed in lieu of lunch. Teenagers doing lots of physical activity generally like to eat more for lunch than an apple, half a turkey sandwich, a bag of chips, and three packs of mustard. fyi.

Also, Clara slayed the ice cream eating. She crushed that sundae mostly alone, and in less than 5 minutes.


The boys got a sundae and it took them longer and two extra people.


Skit night


Results from the skate intervals on the last day. Seems some folks could use a lesson in pacing. Always interesting to see how people do given a hard effort after a heavy week. Some rise to the occasion, some crumble. Also very dependent on how much they're sleeping...