By Brian Gregg

After an abnormal week of rain, high winds and cool temperatures the sun finally showed its face here in Washington with a beautiful day just in time for an over distance run.  It is hard for me to believe talking to my teammates in Minnesota that is 90 degrees back in the Midwest right now. My brother Chad came back to the Methow for the weekend and we joined up with our friend Andrew for a 2.5 hour run.

Andrew and I enjoying the vista up valley from Black Bear Trail up at Sun Mountain

Over the last few years Andrew and his business Altius Physical Therapy has helped me a ton with my running bio-mechanics.  I used to never really think much about running technique but since working with Andrew I have dropped my 3000m running times by 10%.   It is pretty fun when you can make just a few small technical changes and improve by so much.  Although we certainly discussed running and ski technique  during our adventure it is nice to get out and just run as friends.

17 miles marked the longest run of the year for both Chad and I.  We both felt pretty good but the cool pond felt pretty good on our legs.

Today marked my first substantial run in the new Salomon: XR Mission shoe

The XR Mission shoe is designed to take you from the door to the trail and is basically  Salomon’s version of a road shoe.  The trails we ran on today were mostly well buffed out single track and dirt roads which is perfect for the XR Mission was great.It is a neutural shoe and is lighter than a regular trail shoe but still has the traditional Salomon toughness to it.  Over the last few years I have really enjoyed running in a light weight neutureal shoe such as the Speedcross or the Crossmax.  The XR Mission is quickly becoming my favorite shoe for loops with a mix of trail and road.

If your looking to test out the best Salomon shoe for you check out:

https://www.facebook.com/SalomonTrailTour

The Salomon trailer has been traveling from coast to coast  with demo shoes in all sizes.  I had a great time last fall during the Gear West Super Fit with Josh and all the latest shoes.

Nygren

Summer might not officially begin for another 2 weeks but in terms of skiing summer training is in full swing.    May was a time to build back into training and now that June has arrive training is really taking off.   Over Memorial Day weekend we had a short training camp at Telemark and laid out the plan for the coming year. With Igor as the new head coach camps and training this year will be structured a little differently.   As Igor said change and diversity is good for the body and what make you fast so I look forward to coming year.  I believe Igor’s immense experience will be hugely beneficial and a great compliment to the largely Norwegian training model we have followed in the past.  One large thing I am going to work on with Igor is skiing more relaxed.   Igor is all about fluidity, flexibility and balance which all areas in which I need improvement.

Anyone who knows me well will tell you I have a tendency to break a lot of equipment.   I guess it just comes with the territory when you use equipment hard day in and day out.  That being said I have come up with some good tricks.  Recent I discovered that a Zippo provides a strong, reliable enough flame to quickly change a rollerski tip on the fly.  You have to be a little careful not to over heat your pole but with a lighter and tip in my drink belt I was thriller to change a broken tip in under a minute last week in the middle of a ski.

The next CXC Elite camp starts June 14th up at Telemark.