Racing Basics

Nordic Skiing has many race dates in the season, allowing skiers to truly learn how to race well and perfect their racing strategy throughout the season before large, important races like Conference, Sections, and State roll around. Be sure to check the meet calendar often (on the homepage) to make sure you don’t miss any race dates.

Skiers will quickly learn that ski races are not done well by simply toeing the line and waiting for the start signal. Instead, a good race result requires a pre-race plan that involves proper nutrition and hydration, good sleep, a thorough warm-up before the race, good technique, good conditioning, and functional gear (i.e. no broken/ill-fitting equipment). This may sound like a lot of factors, but most of these are taught by the coaches and older teammates throughout the season and become a habit for racers once they reach the Varsity level.

Races are usually 5km and sometimes shorter (2.5-3km) for younger/newer skiers. This format is the most common, and they switch between skate and classic techniques depending on the week. They are usually wave starts, which means one or two racers from each team at the meet will start in a group every 15-30 seconds.  The kids line up at the starting line in rows and go when their start time is called up on a large clock at the front of the starting line. A skier’s start time is subtracted from their finish time to get their overall race time.

A Skiathlon is a race where the racers ski both a classic and skate portion and switch, on the fly in an exchange zone, between equipment. We typically participate in one of these races a year, and they are wildly fun to both race in and spectate!

A Pursuit style race is where the racers ski two 5km races in the same day, one classic and one skate, with a rest period between. The first race is an interval start as described previously. The second race is a pursuit start, which means the racers start the second race in the order that they finished the first race. The racer currently in first place goes out first. The racer currently in second place goes out second the number of seconds they finished behind the first place racer. So if the second place racer was 5 seconds behind on the first race, they start 5 seconds after the first skier on the second race. All following racers start in this manner. The first racer across the finish line for the second race is the overall winner of both races. Only Varsity skiers do pursuit-style races, and they are typically at the end of the year (Conference, Sections, and State) with one or two exceptions. Junior varsity starts both races with an interval start.

Finally, sprint races are usually 1-1.5km long and are run in heats. The top finishers of a heat move on to the next heat, continuing until the final heat. Racers who don't move on to the next heat do not continue on and are usually done with competition for the day. Sprint relays consist of two-person teams with each person racing two or three legs and they alternate legs with each other for a total of four to six legs.

All meet formats are pre-determined by the coaches’ council and are scheduled ahead of time. In very rare cases, a meet’s format or technique discipline will be changed due to weather or trail conditions. In these cases, a Remind message will be sent out to the team upon hearing of the change in plans.