Great video Saul. Clearly you care about helping people to learn to do this right. Thanks for the care you and your wife have put into sharing this valuable info with the rest of us. God bless.
HI Saul, I'm an amateur at classic skiing and I've had a number of people show me how but never really 'got it'. After listening to your analogy of a 'soccer kick' it made sense. The next time I went out my ski buddy commented on how much I'd improved. Thanks for your help.
This is such an amazing timeless video which covers so many of the misconceptions. It's enlightening to those who start off with waxless skis because many realize that they're just shuffling their feet and not actually "skiing".
thank you so much Mr Goldman for taking your time to produce this video. Im a Cuban beginner skier living in Canada and this sort of videos encourages me to go on. thanks again for sharing your knowledges with us! Andro.
Thank you so much for this video, which is in fact my favourite 'how to cross country ski' video: I have been watching it many, many times since I took up cross country skiing three years ago :) ... It is my favourite technique-refresher video at the start of the skiing season and has much helped me to improve my technique year on year. Simply excellent!!
Recently I finished nearly 20 years as a widower. New wife will not let me, a lifelong downhill skier, back out on the slopes. Says it's my age and medical condition. However, one day she came up with XC. Said I could do that. I am grateful to have someone again, so sometimes I listen. Have not done XC since the early 1950s. And only rudimentarily. So I am looking for video introductions. I am an old stick in the mud, and enjoy it. I was glad when you showed the snowplow, and called it that. Recently I learned that modern downhill children are taught the "pizza" and other sappy terminology. It makes me want to CHOKE!! Hey! When I learned to downhill ski as soon as I could walk, I was taught the Alrberg method. This will be a hig enough adjustment. I don't need sappy social adjustment pressures TOO!
This is fantastic. Thank you for such an informative and clear description of classic techniques. I also enjoy the humour, although I'm not sure how much of it is intended. I am learning to XC ski and find this really useful to watch a couple of times a week to make me think of what to practice and self analyse what I am doing.
Great video! I remember when I was first learning and never thought I'd get my trailing foot in the air. Then I went on groomed trails for the first time and my world was changed!
Thank you so much!!! I am an accomplished alpine skier who was completely terrified on a slight downhill slope on classic skis the other day. I'm going to get this!! :) Nicely done; thank you.
This is a great video that really gets a beginner started right. We watched this before we went out today here in Austria and it was very helpful - many thanks!
Thanks a lot for this very informative video, my girlfriend and I are going to go cross country skiing for the first time this weekend and your tips are very useful!
Thank you, I am researching the various techniques (biomechanics) found in cross country skiing for a university assignment. This really helped me with my understanding of the sport having never had any association with X country skiing before.
Thanks for the vidéo, very informative! I tried classic x-country skiing for the first time last weekend! I had a blast going downhill and it was very cardio going up :) I'm just not sure what to get in terms of equipment, nowax or wax... I read a lot about it and can't decide...
@isaacwright33 There are lots of opinions out there. I believe the final stage of the power phase in classic skiing involves shifting your centre of gravity forward and onto the ball of your feet and onto your toes for the final push down. In order to close the wax pocket on a properly fitted classic ski your wieght needs to be forward.--Saul
I've been xc skiing for over forty years though I live in an area with little and sometimes no snow in any one year. So when I do have the opportunity to ski it seems like I am always starting out for the first time again. With that said I now know that I've been doing wrong all these years in terms of kicking back with the trailing leg as part of the propulsion cycle. So it's transferring weight from the pressed down foot to the opposite gliding foot? And the "kick" is a sort of a follow through motion like in golf ('follow through' is a relaxed motion in direct opposition to the applied direction of the force)
I vote you Canada's most valuable import (unless I'm hearing your accent wrongly). I'm a total newb, only 25 miles under my belt, and have been scouring the internet for great instruction. You are that great coach for me now (only wished I could pay for some real world lessons here in Utah. What is the best approach for a 57 year old newb to train for double poling? I have great upper body strength, and strong legs as a product of heavy weight lifting.
Thanks to you I am finally making the step away from crown skies to waxing. Technique for striding AND all your awesome waxing help has finally broken the barrier for me after almost a decade of xc skiing.
I have a question regarding the gear, I will order a new equipment for classic nordic skiing, but I'm having doubts as if I will stick to classic boots, will be expensive in the future to upgrade to skating gear. My question is it's ok to buy a skating type boot for the moment and use it with the classic type skis and poles and in the future buy the appropriate skis and poles? Will affect the normal stride of the classic style?
***** Pure skating boots can be too stiff under foot. This can make proper classic technique difficult.High performance Combi Boots are a better choice if you need one boot for both techniques.
velotique I thought about that, I ordered the Atomic Sport Pro Skate, which are quite similar to Salomon Combi style boots. now hope for the best. Thanks for the answer.
Great video tuck was too briefly explained bending at the knees forward motion hands closer to the face poles in back on a low angle hugging the lower part of the body. Working on a better planting of my front leg at present. Trying to extend my lead foot a bit further. Gatineau Loppet 15 k.m race coming up soon. Thanks
When you stand on one ski, 100% of your weight is on this ski. How can you push down even more? Actually, I think I have just found this answer. If I stand on my scales and I raise on my toes very briskly, my scales tell me I am 90kg+ instead of 78. If this is right, it is really confusing when instructors tell us we have to push down, they should tell us we have to jump up.
You are correct. Shift pressure to your toe. "Push Down" means, on your weight transfer. Shift your weight aggressively and visualize that downward push, as opposed to pushing backward. Try it on your scale.
A few tips - Full weight transfer from leg to leg, with full commitment, push _down_ on the back leg to flatten the ski so the grippy part can bite in the snow, push front knee/hip forward (keep knee over ankle). Good luck - it feels a bit unnatural at first, but it will come to you quickly. Do start in groomed trails, it makes a huge difference for your comfort and ease of learning. Enjoy!
This is kind of a negative video about how we do it wrong....when the video could be pitched positively. The presenter seems to dwell on telling us how we're screwing up the classic technique; without a long dissertation, there is a way to present this positively. I don't have a lot of patience when I get the impression the presenter is an elitist who's talking down to me. There are better videos out there, and this one is from 2011, the relatively "neolithic" era.
