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Perisher X Country NEWS, 29th of June 2022, Newsletter Update #40

Welcome to the 2022 Winter, PXC News, newsletter

PXC PXC News

Welcome Archive!

Perisher X Country (PXC) is all about promoting the activity of Cross Country Skiing so that one of the best-kept secrets around is not a secret anymore. Please encourage everyone to go to the PXC website (Contact Us page) and subscribe to PXC NEWS, PXC EDGE and daily XC Trail Reports during winter. PXC News is focused on the activities of volunteers and those who have a keen interest in helping grow the sport of XC skiing. PXC is a sub-committee of the northern division of Snow Australia and aims to grow participation in XC skiing in Perisher Valley and beyond.

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Weekends Up at the Perisher XC Centre

Let's Get It Started - Winter 2022

Welcome to the 2022 Winter.

Already many people have got some great skiing in, and it is not yet July. Whilst many people can remember having early starts to the season in other years, few can remember having 1.2 m of snow on the trails, during the Queens Birthday Weekend.

What was going to be a big XC dry-land training/carnival on the June Long Weekend in Jindabyne, including the last of the 2022 Summer Roller Ski races, ended up on-snow. Fun ski races and ski technique training sessions were held. Thanks to Tim Greville and crew (SMN members and others) for organising what was one of the earliest ski races, possibly ever (as per usual don’t quote me, but it’s got to be close). The results are in the Events – Results tab in the PXC website.

Geraldine and Arnold were off and racing with the early morning Trails and Conditions reports. There were some teething problems early but now the reports go out quickly and to all who have subscribed (except for those with overactive firewalls or other protection). If not getting it, check your SPAM box too. If you haven't done so already, go to the Contact Us page and tick the box to receive daily winter trail reports.

July has full event calendar, which continues through into August and September - check the Calendars under Events on PXC.  XC Ski Week is planned to be as big as ever with no events needing to be cancelled, touch wood.  More about all this later in the newsletter.

Links to online entries are posted, as they become available, via the Events tab in both the Local and XC Ski Week Calendar https://www.perisherxcountry.org/events/local/

This newsletter is choc-a-block full of good information to get you pointed in the right direction this winter. A summary of contents:

  • XC Ski Week - 11 Events in 8 Days

  • NSWACT XC - The Program and Head Coach Alexei Sotskov

  • Perisher XC Centre’s July Events, with extra details of the Paddy Pallin Juniors and the Wilderness Cup

  • PXC Sponsors

  • APSI Course Calendar 2022 – Perisher XC Centre

  • Working Bee Report – 21st & 22nd of May

  • Huw Kingston - Alpine Odyssey For Our Yarning

  • The Nordic Shelter is Open

XC Ski Week – 11 Events in 8 Days

Last year we really thought we would get the whole XC Ski Week program done and dusted, but it was not to be, thanks to COVID. This year is a completely different story, all events are planned which includes the final big celebration, the End of XC Ski Week Presentation. The Bronze Ski will be given out to the lodge-based ski club deemed to have the best participation throughout the week with a $1000 prize up for grabs. There are also plenty of other prizes to be given out. PXC is still in the accumulation phase of getting all the prizes together so more information on this later.

IMPORTANT INFO!  Big changes to XC Ski Week - the KAC X-C Classic will be on Monday August 8 and the Charlotte Pass Open and Nordic Shelter Twilight Relays will be on Wednesday August 10. All other XC Ski Week events will be run on the same weekend/ weekday as per the normal XC Ski Week format, including the Mystery Coffee Tours on Tuesday and Friday. The Mystery Coffee Tour started in 2013 with only 2020 missing out due to COVID. It has only been held at a local café (due to bad weather) twice, so it has had a high success rate. The other schedule change is shifting the PXC Cup to the first Saturday. All entrants get a specially designed one-off event mug and some rather strange prizes. What better way to kick off XC Ski Week than to be bordering on the whacky from the beginning. See all the events by CLICKING HERE

NSWACT XC - The Program and Head Coach Alexei Sotskov

Find out what NSWACT XC has been up to with both summer and winter training programs supporting juniors, state and national team members and Master skiers. Training programs, dry-land and on-snow training and instruction are overseen by NSWACT XC Head Coach - Alexei Sotskov.  CLICK HERE  TO GET THE WHOLE STORY

Perisher XC Centre’s July Events

In the month of July there are no less than 12 events being held out of the Perisher XC Centre. There are tour races, championship races, Come & Try’s and a Ski de Femme event. All can be seen on the PXC website Local Events page.

On each weekend, unless there is really bad weather, the fundraising BBQ is on to raise money for the running of the Nordic Shelter and to fill the bellies of those hungry XC skiers.

All these events are run by volunteers, so if you would like to help in either assisting with the running of events or to cook a few sausages please either contact the event contact person or just jump behind the BBQ to give someone a break.

Two events that deserve further mention are:

Paddy Pallin Juniors

The Paddy Pallin Juniors ski event this year (on this coming Saturday) is in its 60th year, which makes it Australia’s oldest ski event. As the opening event on the Australian XC Ski Calendar for NSW, the Paddy Pallin Juniors is a fun and free event, which encourages children from three to 16 years to dust off their ski equipment and get their ski legs warmed up for the upcoming season. The event is free to enter, includes a hot dog lunch, team ski jelly snake hunt and fantastic prizes from Paddy Pallin.

Details as follows:

When: Saturday 2 July 2022 

Cost: Nil!  In fact we will even make you lunch!

Registration: Entries taken on the day From 9.00am to 10.30am

Bib collection: From 9.00am to 10.30am at the Sverre Kaaten Nordic Shelter

Event Start:  11am

Inclusions: A fun and free event with distances skied aligned to children’s ages, followed by a free lunch, certificates of participation for all, great spot prizes provided by Paddy Pallin and a teams jelly snake hunt to wrap up a great day!

Event sponsors:  Paddy Pallin, Perisher Supermarket, That Fruit Dude

 

Wilderness Cup

After a two-season COVID hiatus, the Wilderness Cup runs again! The 2022 event will be held on Saturday, July 9 at 1 pm. and will take the form of a 1.5 km individual time trial on the Interschools loop. All ages will be catered for and the fastest female and fastest male will have their names engraved on the perpetual trophies. Wilderness Sports has generously offered to sponsor the event once more and will provide spot prizes as well as a demo tent on the day. All winners and place getters will receive a certificate. Click here for the online entry link - https://www.perisherxcountry.org/events/local/
Info: karenforman11@gmail.com 

PXC Sponsors

To help PXC with all the costs, in running the website, running promotions and spending money on the trails, we would like to thank all the generous sponsors. This year these are;

Corroberee Lodge

Eiger Chalet

Foodworks- Perisher

Jindabyne -Yoga Shala

K7 SkiSchool

Lake Crackenback Resort & Spa

LendSure Finance

Rhythm Snowsports

Salomon

Sundeck Hotel

Wilderness Sports

APSI Course Calendar 2022 – Perisher XC Centre  

Ever wanted to become a Nordic Ski Instructor? The Australian Professional Snowsports Instructors (APSI) Inc runs certifications for all Snowsports in Australia. Once an Instructor reaches Level 2, they can be internationally certified with the ISIA stamp and can work anywhere in the world. Below is the APSI Course, Exam and Certification Refresh Calendar for 2022 at Perisher. We can run courses at any time for groups as long as we have a minimum of 4 people. Instructors can work for any Nordic ski school, with Wilderness Sports and K7 Ski School being your local Perisher cross country ski schools.

Please note that to enrol in a course, go to the APSI web-site at https://www.apsi.net.au/ and click on ‘Become an Instructor’. The Level 1 Course is the entry level course and focuses on Classical technique only. The cost of the course is $ 585 and includes APSI Membership and the Nordic Skills Manual.

APSI Certifications only last for three years, so to maintain certification Instructors need to do another course, do an exam or attend the Certification Update. The Certification Update is a single day scheduled for 2 July. It is free (but Instructors need to be APSI members to enrol). 

Any questions to Zac Zaharias the APSI Nordic Technical Director zac.zaharias@apsi.net.au

Level 1

  • 9-10 July. Perisher

Level 2

  • 5-7 August. Perisher

Level 3

  • 5-8 Aug. Perisher

Exam

  • Level 2 and 3 exam Perisher. Date to be scheduled. Contact the APSI Nordic TD, Zac Zaharias
  • Level 2 and 3 exam, Falls Creek. 28 Aug 22.

Certification Updates/Professional Development (all levels)

  • 2 July. Perisher
  • 17 Sep. Perisher

Working Bee Report – 21st & 22nd of May

Thanks to bad weather postponing the 7th & 8th of May working bee, the next working bee was scheduled for the 21st and 22nd of May, hoping for this to be the last one before winter. Well, weren’t we lucky as approximately 40 cm of snow was on the ground on the first weekend in June, and from there only got deeper?

Luckily a big turnout of volunteers was on hand to complete a large range of jobs with the main emphasis on getting all the drainage half-pies and covers down on the ground. Other final jobs included putting in the last of the trail sighter-poles and snow fence reflectors, plus completing all the work required to get the Nordic Shelter cleaned up and ready for the winter.

Over that last 2 months a trial of expanding grout rock breaking on four separate rocks demonstrated that this method of rock removal is a viable option. Thanks to Greg Sharp, with Peter Ward assisting towards the end

Peter Cunningham and his team, during all the working bees, laid more steel bridging in the sprint loop. Work progressed often in bad weather conditions where gum books was a necessity. As a reward for the bridge crew's persistence through horrible weather, this weekend was fine!

Over the course of all the working parties a total of 20 new wooden poles that had been damaged by the grooming machine were replaced.

Thanks to all the people who have volunteered their time over the previous 5 working bees, which often were held in challenging weather conditions. Thanks to the following who assisted on the 21th/ 22nd working bee.

Leslie Ludwig, Peter Ward, Virpi Komulainen, Peter Cunningham, Margaret Mahoney, Arnold D’Bras, Chris Smart, Llew Moore, Chris Smart, Jen Smart, Maureen Gardner, Steve Perry, Kaz Foreman, Greg Sharp, Robb McArthur, Jude McArthur, Henry McArthur, Wayne Pethybridge, Doug Cross, Robert Eddy & Kate Greenwood.

There ends another successful Summer/ Pre-Winter Work Party program. To help make this happen much thanks must go to Peter Cunningham and the Canberra Alpine Club who provide accommodation which is much needed as most of the volunteers are from outside the area.

As per usual in the late afternoon and evening of the Saturday, we all got together to have a very social time having no idea that skiing was only 2-3 weeks away.

Huw Kingston's  Alpine Odyssey For Our Yarning

This winter starting soon, Huw Kingston will be embarking on his own Alpine Odyssey, traveling the length of the Australian Alps, a journey of over 600km and 50 days. Huw plans to ski at each of the 12 snow resorts, all to raise money for the Save the Children's Our Yarning Project. Go further to find out about this modern day tale in the making. CLICK HERE  TO GET THE WHOLE STORY

The Nordic Shelter is Open

With the early heavy snowfalls, the Nordic Shelter was open the week before the Long Weekend, thanks to marathon shoveling by Geraldine.  It is planned to have the Shelter fully open this winter following two restricted winters.

Fundraising will be in full swing after two COVID seasons of next-to-no income and seriously increased operating costs.  There are various ways to make donations to support the operation, maintenance and development of the Nordic Shelter:

Remember to pack your plates, cups and cutlery as they are no longer available in the Shelter. The microwave, urns, sandwich press and toasters will be available again.

Many thanks to the volunteers who cleaned, painted, re-organised and finished important maintenance projects this summer to get the Shelter ready to open properly for the first time in quite a while!

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