“What did you use for wax?” I heard that question a lot following the classical sprint event at US Nationals. The Nanooks performed extremely well on the final day of racing in Anchorage. We had three men in the A-Final and one in the B-Final. Our men finished 1st, 2nd, 5th and 11th. We also had solid performances by our U23 and junior competitors.

Let me just say from the start, it was NOT the wax. It was the student-athletes. They did it. They trained, they prepared, they performed. They come from excellent clubs and have support from their families. Their previous coaches guided them, counseled them, and set the foundation. The University of Alaska Fairbanks Ski Team’s mission is to continue this long process. We support our team members, but ultimately they are the ones who do it or don’t. And yesterday we took advantage when opportunities presented themselves. The wax was a very small part of the entire equation. We tested a lot all week and here’s what we used.

For kick, we ironed in one layer of Swix Blue Extra, then added one layer of Rode Fast Wax (fluorinated) Violet Special, then finished with a layer of Rode Fast Wax Super Blue. For glide we prepped with a combination of Swix LF8 and Swix Moly (MB77). We covered with Swix HF7BW. Then we ironed in Swix FC8. After the qualifying we ironed in another layer of FC 8 and added the Swix Rocket Spray. We added the Swix Rocket Spray after every round and just corked the kick. No more kick was added.

We had made a strategic decision to err on the side of being a little too slick on the kick side. We knew that DP, kick DP, and tucking would be more important that striding. We also knew that herring-boning the top section of the course would be necessary.

Assistant coach Matt Dunlap, as well as the student-athletes, handled the entire waxing process in a professional way. The student-athletes made it easy for the coaches to help select and apply the wax.

It was a fun day and a fun week, but the season is young and we have many more goals on the bulletin board. It’ back to work. -SJ

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 9th, 2010 at 6:44 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.