Telemark Talk / Telemark Tips Forum

well I got in my 5 days of Tele skiing this year and they were all epic. I learned a few things:

1. my daily max is 5-6hrs of lift served skiing, about 18-20k vert per day
2. I am able to ski well for 4hrs per day by skiing parallel turns about 50% of the time
3. the last 2-3 runs of the day / last hour are more of what I call survival skiing, rather than technically correct and fun skiing
4. I almost always ski with alpine skiers who are much faster than me. this forces me to ski faster than I like. I prefer to ski one pitch at a time, pick a line, make great turns, rinse and repeat. that rhythm is basically impossible when skiing with alpine cruisers like my son
5. I have the tech skills hardcoded from years of skiing, but my conditioning fails me and my legs stop executing what my brain tells them to.

Some goals for off season training in 2020

1. get to a place where I can run 6 miles 2-3 times per week. last year I tried running 1 mile everyday and started having knee problems. I need to work up to the 6 mile goal very slowly. hopefully my mid-summer I am at a place where I can run a few 5k and maybe 10k races.
2. continue with my StairMaster interval workouts including my heavily crouched "TeleMaster" position which hammers your quads
3. Introduce Plyometric box jump intervals. 2 leg and 1 leg. the power to lift my entire body weight on 1 leg is insufficient
4. Strengthen my back, upper and lower. long days over many years of sitting at a desk as weakened my back muscles
5. the good news is that my body weight is where it should be. the stair master last year added leg mass, more running in 2020 should balance that out a bit

6. buy some new( used) Tele skis bindings from somewhere. I like the Outlaws I skied last week. prob a 98 width ski in 170ish length.

Are you in a place where you can mountain bike?
It's way more fun than running and easier on your knees. It also strengthens your lower back.

If you are experiencing knee pain at shorter distances, you may do more harm than good running; especially if you are determined to up the distance. It would be a shame if you put in all that effort and damaged your knees. Knees love the motion of cycling.

The stats you're describing aren't bad - especially given that you can only get in a small number of days. One thing you can do, if you are on Scarpas, is adjust the forward lean one notch in the more vertical. It will put slightly more of your weight down through your skeleton Vs. your quads. It may be enough to make a difference in endurance, inbounds.

Running short distances hurt my knees too so I gave it up, and that was almost 30 years ago. I think my knees are better now, but like MSU alum said, there are more fun ways to get it done.

I think you'd get the most benefit from strength training, squats, dead lifts, lunges and if you're touring go heavy on calf raises.

gonna skip those calf raises. my calves got huge from years of road and mtn bike racing. I almost couldn't get the top buckle on my Crispis buckled, the scarpas are better for big calves...

just found these notes posted from Feb. my goals at the time seemed ambitious given all the knee problems I was having. so here we are on Sept 1. this is what I've been up to:

1. been holed up in Big Sky for the month. elevation 7500ft based lodge ( was in Jackson Hole at similar elevation 2 months ago)
2. 60-120 mins of workout everyday
3. mix of power hiking up, running down, power hiking down super steeps
4. treadmill in gym

when I got here, I could hike to top of the Swift Current lift in about 65 mins. its 1500ft of vert over 2 miles, taking frequent stops, and in some cases feeling light headed. 2 days ago I did the same hike with no breaks in 46 mins. ran down.

I also hike ram charge access road. 6 mile round trip. I like the access road because its not so steep, and I can comfortably run down the whole thing.

over the weekend I power hiked to the Dopplehanger lift at about 9850 elevation. I wanted to hit 10k feet but that would have required scrambling over steep cobble, and the sun was already behind lone peak. then I ran down. was about 8.5 miles and 3500 ft vert.

the power hikes are def easier now, but as someone once said "its not that its easier, you just go faster". I can't help but always want to beat my times up the mountain.

running 3 miles down gives your quads a pounding, trail shoes are critical. I fell in my first week here and road rash has finally healed. I also partially turned an ankle, which is better now. running down I find that if you do not concentrate fully, bad things do happen( but not as bad as when your dad accidentally shoots you in the face with bear spray...)

I still find running up hill nearly impossible here. so I grind out the gentler vert in a 16min/mile power hike pace. steep vert is more like 25 mins/mile. key is steady pace and I check my HR on my watch. its easy to blow up, but I also find I can recover in under 1 min. faster ascents I find come from steady pace without stopping.

when I get home to sea level in a few weeks, I expect that running the flats around my house should be easy, and my goal of 6 miles 3x week should be no prob.

now that I have a solid base and no pain in knees etc, it will be time to start plyo's and other dynamic exercises, possibly some weight training.

This is sounding like your plan is really coming together, I love it! I am jealous of the mountain/altitude mix you are getting right now. Keep crushing!

Start easy with the leg work, I always overdo it and have to sit a week or two out waiting for some weird knee thing to disappear.

yup. 1 year ago when I decided to start running, I figured I'd run 1 mile a day. I ended up messing both knees up so badly I had to stop running until the spring. fortunately my knees joints have got with the program and I haven't had any knee pain since March.

Dude that's awesome! Sounds like you're gonna be in great shape for ski season

last day here. heading for Laramie tomorrow. I decided to today to do all my of my daily workouts back-back with no breaks. avg pace is because going up the steeps is slow, but running down is faster. I still missed 10k feet, but its too sketchy to get the last 170ft when you are by yourself.

well one of my goals for 2020 was to be able to run 6 miles. I just ran 7.5 in Omaha. I completely understand how blood doping feels now. after dropping down from a month at 7500-9000 ft, running 7.5 miles was the easiest thing I've done in 6 weeks. I was barely breathing.

I'm seriously tempted to turn around the car and go back to Montana.