Sunday 19 January 2020

Checking out the black bears in a cottonwood tree



By Keith and Heather Nicol
Bears in the cottonwood tree
    On a recent ski trip from Mount Washington we saw several  people on the new bridge over the Tsolum River on Piercy Road. Some had long telephoto lenses so we decided to pull over and check it out.  Since they were looking up into a tall cottonwood tree we thought they must have spotted a rare bird but when we got closer we could see that there was a bear high up in the tree. In chatting with the people that were there they said that bears had been seen in the area for several weeks and they seems to be wintering there. Since we live close by we decided to go home and get our binoculars and our camera. Thirty minutes later we were back and some new people who happen to live close by were taking pictures and they told that they see the bears in that area all the time. We could make out the head of a young bear and it seemed to be resting on the mother’s head.  The large cottonwood tree is on the east side of the Tsolum River and best vantage point is from the bridge.  Traffic and parking can be an issue especially with all of the snow but we found the best place to park was on Dove Creek Road which is on the west side of the river and we parked near the large barn and walked up to the bridge from there.  Be aware that this is a busy highway so drive and park safely if you want to check the bears out.  
A small bear outlined against the sky
Another cub looking us over

Saturday 11 January 2020

Improving your classic skiing- Fixing the Lunge

by Keith and Heather Nicol

  The Lunge as I call it is an error that I commonly see when instructing classic skiing.  Note in photo 1 how  my
Photo 1 Lunging puts your weight back and in the middle of your skis
front foot lunges forward and I get stretched out. This makes balancing on a single ski impossible since my weight is directly between my feet and lunging also throws off my pole plant timing. To correct the lunge is not easy but I have found the following drill seems to work well. I simply run and swing my arms –see photo 2. This gets you forward and sets you up for good timing once poles are added.  I then begin to add my poles and then gradually lengthen out the glide as shown in photo 3. This sequence of running first gets skiers into a rhythmical arm swing with good weight transfer from ski to ski.  Then I ask skiers to simply add the pole plant and begin to lengthen the glide. Once this pattern becomes ingrained in the muscle memory then skiers can drop the running part of the drill and simply stride from ski to ski. The following video shows the sequence you should follow to correct the lunge.  So if you lunge while classic skiing or know someone that does have them try this drill and let me know how it works. Thanks to our sponsors: Infinity Ski Poles, Rudy Project Sunglasses and Auclair gloves.




Photo 2 - Try running on your skis get the correct arm swing and this also gets your weight forward
    

   
Photo 3- Once you get the timing try adding your poles and lengthening out the stride

 
Check out this video to help correct the Lunge