Meet our coaches for the 2023 season of our Skill Development Program. All lessons are happening at the Elk Valley Nordic Centre on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.
Coaches Corner
kids activities
Events planned for 2022-2023 season
The 6th Annual Great Fernie Pumpkin Hunt
The Fernie Nordic Society is excited to be hosting one of our community’s favourite events of the year! This popular event is open to the general public and is aimed at children up to 9 year old and their family.
When: Saturday, October 22, 2022
Where: Elk Valley Nordic Centre next to Mt Fernie Provincial park
Cost: $20 per pumpkin. Tickets can be purchased at The Guides Hut in Fernie. (Exact cash only please)
Choose a Time Slot: 11am-12pm, 12:30pm-1:30pm or 2:00pm-3:00pm
What to expect?
- Fun searching for your favourite pumpkin!
- Fernie Roasting Co. Coffee, hot chocolate and food by donation
- Emily Park Photography & more!
More events
Several of our group events should return this season:
- Full Moon Skis at the golf course or at the Nordic Centre
- Griz Days event
- Community Fun Race
- Fernie Flying Viking Challenge
- Illuminated ski loop on Saturday evenings from 6 to 8 pm at the Nordic Centre
Make sure that you are on our email list so you do not miss anything.
P.S. the club is still looking for an energetic person to take the lead on some of these events. Give us a shout! It will be much rewarding.
9th Annual Community Fun Event
The Community Fun Event is returning on Sunday February 12, 2023 on the trails of the Fernie Golf Course. The event is open to everyone, club members and non-members alike.
3rd Annual Fernie Flying Viking Challenge
How about a fun challenge for yourself and your friends? Ski on the 25 km circuit of trails from the warming hut of the Elk Valley Nordic Centre and the trails of the Fernie Alpine Resort. There is a prize for best costume! A short ride on the chairlift is included in the fun. Do the loop twice to complete the event. Or a partner and you may ski the circuit together once, adding up to 50 km.
Where: Elk Valley Nordic Centre
When: Sunday, March 26, 2023
More details to come
The Racers at Winter Training Camp
The Fernie Nordic Racers recently participated in a training camp coached by Graham Maclean and the Fernie Nordic Racers coaches. Graham Maclean is a professional national coach and technical waxing consultant from Golden. He came to Fernie to help us improve our skills.
On Friday January 29th, we worked on our classic technique for 1 hour and a half. Graham taught us some drills we can use to improve our double poling and diagonal stride technique. We practiced changing from different gears and going up and down a flat hill. We also had fun playing Dodgeball at the end of practice!
On Saturday morning, we separated into groups by level, the first group went with Graham, Helen, and Rob to do some time trials around the 1.2 km Cedar Loop. Graham filmed our classic technique to give us some feedback after the time trial. Coach Johnny took the second group to ski and do some drills to improve their classic technique. The third group went with Megan Lohmann to practice downhill skills. Then we switched, so everyone could do all the activities. The time trial was adapted depending on skill levels.
After the morning session, we went home to rest, eat, and hydrate. During the afternoon, we went to the cross-country ski trails at Fernie Alpine Resort, and we separated into two groups. The younger athletes went with coach Johnny to work on their one skate on a flat section while the older athletes worked on their offset with Graham. After an hour we switched to practice all the techniques. When we went down, we did a human slalom and went down a big hill which was super fun. Then we went home to rest for Sunday’s big day.
On Sunday morning, we went for a long easy ski and we stopped to do some sprints on the way. They were around 10 seconds sprints with 2,3 or more people. Then we skied up to Boomerang chair and went back to the hut to eat some good soup, chili and bread. We watched our videos from Saturday’s time trial with Graham. He gave us some advice and tips on our techniques and then we played a big game of manhunter during the afternoon.
In conclusion, we thank Graham for all the coaching he did, the tips and advice he gave us and mostly all the fun we had! We are very grateful for this experience, and we hope to get more opportunities like this one.
article by Aurélie Smithson and Louison Dubief
Fernie Racers at the last Kootenay Cup race
A few photos from the race event in Nelson on February 5 & 6. The Fernie Nordic Racers and several parents joined the fun and earned more points toward the 2022 Teck Kootenay Cup. This was the last event of the season in this series.
Several Fernie racers ended with podium finishes and all had a good time. Well done!
The result of the races in Nelson are on the website of the Nelson Ski Club. The Fernie Nordic Racers finished in 4th place out of eight clubs in the Teck Kootenay Cup series – see the rankings at CrosscountryBC.
Our young Nordic Racers are full of energy
Aurélie and Louison from the Fernie Nordic Racers team are inviting more young racers to join this dynamic group of young athletes. They explain that the key benefit of the club is having fun while training for races.
“If you enjoy Nordic skiing, racing, and the outdoors, you should join the Fernie Nordic Racers. We are a very encouraging group of people, and we all support each other. Each athlete has their own goals to reach. You should join us and reach yours” say the girls.
The girls outline two good reasons for joining the club. They explain the first reason is “Fernie Nordic Racers is a wonderful group of athletes and coaches, that are always enthusiastic, and ready to train. Our coaches: John Shaw, Jeff Williams, Naomi Lentz, and Helen McAlister, coach a group of athletes ranging between the age 9 and 18 years old”, with coaching targeted to two age groups — under 12 and over 12.
The second reason is the comprehensive fall training program. Both groups meet on Tuesday with the under 12 group going for a 45-minute run on the trails around the Aquatic Centre while the older group trains with the Fernie Secondary School cross country running team. In addition, the older group also trains with the running team on Thursdays. “Our workout (as older athletes) is formed of a warmup (10-minute run + A’s, B’s, C’s), a running workout (hills, tempo runs, intervals, etc.…), and a cool down (5-minute jog, and dynamic stretching). On Fridays we have a dryland training with the whole team for 1 hour. We start with a 20-minute fitness game then we roller ski for 40 minutes. Sometimes the older athletes have a long and slow run, on Saturdays or Sundays. Some older athletes also use Training Peaks to keep track of training outside of practices. We also go training camps, which are fun and instructive,” say the girls.
Article by Aurélie Smithson and Louison Dubief
Rental Ski Gear for Kids
Please send us a note if you need any information about the ski gear available to the children registered in the Skill Development Program. One of our volunteers will be in touch with you shortly.