Barry

You may have noticed a silver dog-bone-shaped sticker on the back of your season pass this year.  It is an RFID tag in support of a pilot project we are running at Telemark this year.  It allows us to automatically detect when a season pass moves past the lodge, permitting us to gather anonymous visit statistics.  We don’t know specifically who the tag belongs to — we will NEVER track people at Telemark without your permission!  But we can tell when “someone” arrives and how long they stay on the property each time that “someone” visits.  From this data we can compile, for example:

• Usage by hour/day/week/month/season
• How many super-keeners come nearly every day
• How many people come at least once per week, and which days they come

This is just a pilot project, to see what we can learn that will help us manage and improve the club.  Some thoughts about how the club might benefit:

• lodge staffing
• grooming schedule
• grants and corporate sponsors, because we will have exact numbers rather than dubious generic “industry standards”
• marketing
• affiliations with other local partners such as the Westbank Chamber of Commerce

 

But we really have no idea what we might discover.  To our knowledge, this is the first time this technology has been deployed in a Nordic club in North America.  (If you know of others, please drop us a note because we would love to chat with them!)

Thanks to the 2 Engineering / Computer Science UBC recent grads who donated their time to design and write the software for this project.  The equipment was provided on loan from Canmore-based Zone 4.  The RFID expertise was provided by Dallas-based Codesource LLC.

 

Kirsten’s dog Heidi: “I love it when the pack goes skiing on the K9 trail because I get to come!  I get to cast aside my leash and explore and run hard and stick my nose way down in the deep fluffy snow beside the trail.  But today was extra special.  Today was the best day ever.  The sun was out, the wildlife was out, the snow was perfect, and the air was SOOO clean.  Can we go again tomorrow?”

The Telemark K9 trails are across the road from the main parking lot.  There is a 3.5 km classic & skate ski trail and 2 stunning 3 km snowshoe trails (turn sharp right at the trail head).  Everything on that side of the road is off-leash dog territory.  The humans require a season pass or trail day pass ($5.00 at the lodge or use the drop box at the trail head).

The trails are well marked for both clockwise and counter clockwise travel.  No need to bag your pet’s business but please flick it off the trail.

Note that you don’t need a canine companion to use these trails and they are really fantastic trails.  The snowshoe trails are amongst the best on our property.

If like me you have had enough of the deep freeze, it is not as bad as it seems.  Looks like our winter has actually only been one month?  One looooonnnnnggg month…

Today (Sunday Feb 3) midnight is the early registration deadline for our TECK Okanagan Cup race next Saturday.  This is a low-key fun race geared to young first-timers or adults who are not still trying to make the National team!  It is your last chance this year to try out racing and to pick up one of those big beautiful TECK medals to show your classmates at school.  Click here to register.  (Missed early registration?  You can still register at regular prices until noon Wednesday Feb. 6!)

This race happens Saturday afternoon after Westerns racing has wrapped up for the day.  Come up and watch some of the top Canadian cross country ski athletes compete in Westerns in the morning and then go do it yourself in the afternoon Okanagan Cup. Here is the OK Cup race schedule:

Teck Okanagan Cup

1:30 PM Atoms Boys & Girls (age 6-8) 1 km

1:45 PM Pee Wee Boys (age 9-10) 1.5 km

1:50 PM Pee Wee Girls (age 9-10) 1.5 km

2:00 PM Bantam Boys (age 11-12) 2.5 km

2:05 PM Bantam Girls (age 11-12) 2.5 km

2:15 PM Masters Men (age 20+) 15 km

2:20 PM Masters Women (age 20+) 10 km

Telemark is hosting the Western Canadian Championships race next weekend.  We anticipate welcoming over 500 of the most competitive cross-country skiers along with their coaches and support teams from across Canada and western United States.  A small race committee of club members has been working on this event for several months.  Now it is time for the big show and we need a whole lot of more people to help us make this a memorable event.  Setting up, tearing down, setting up again, stripping bibs… all sorts of fun. If you are able, please sign up for a few jobs and we will put you to work. There will be some perks! No experience necessary — we will train you!  Even if you can only offer a couple hours, it all helps.

Click here to sign up.

Near perfect conditions and a record 248 racers from 3 years old to 80 years old took on the Telemark trails today.  And we had a sweep with both the fastest male and fastest female.

Fastest Female, Telemark’s Julia Ransom completed the 30 KM skathlon in 1:29:37.  Julia also won the hill climb in 3 minutes 31 seconds and ALSO the downhill challenge in 5 minutes 58 seconds.

Fastest Male, also from the Telemark club, Ian Williams was fastest male with a finish time of 1:16:45.  Ian also won the hill climb in 2 minutes 48 seconds and ALSO won the downhill challenge in 5 minutes 21 seconds.

Congratulations Julia and Ian.  Complete results are available on Zone 4.

Photo credit Olaf Dijkstra.

Volunteers Needed

Our beloved Apple Loppet XC ski race is on again this year next Sunday, Jan. 13.  If you are not racing, please come out and help us make this a memorable event for the more than 100 kids as young as 3 years old and of course all of the older athletes who come to race.  We need people for course setup, aid/nutrition stations, timing, course marshallers, food and snack stations, and parking lot.   Chose your preference — keep warm inside or be right in the middle of the action with the racers.  No experience necessary.  Click here for signup form or directly contact our volunteer coordinator Alison by email at volunteer@telemarknordic.com.

Request for Baking Donations

We are accepting donations of baked items and fresh fruit for the Apple Loppet next Sunday.  Cookies, squares, muffins, what have you.  Items can be dropped off at the lodge Saturday all day or Sunday morning.  Please email Alison at volunteer@telemarknordic.com if you have questions or if you want someone to pick up your goodies.

Thank you for volunteering.

Great Food, Rocking Tunes, age-appropriate prizes
30 km relay or skiathalon
Recreational, Youth and Special Olympic Categories
“Monarch of the Mountain” timed hill climb
“Kamikaz-(s)he Run” timed downhill challenge
Claim bragging rights for your hill climbing stamina and tuck technique
Youth and Recreational categories are classic technique:
3 & 4 year old Bunnies – 200 metres
7 & under age 1km
8-11 age 3km
12-15 age 6km (2 x 3km)
16-17 age 7.5km
Recreational is all ages and 7.5km
Special Olympics 3km

Special Olympics Snowshoe – this will be run separate to the loppet in the afternoon. There are 2 distances – 50 and 100 metres.

Skiathlon is 30km (classic & free technique) and offers 10 year age categories starting at 18 years of age.

Click here to register.