More Skiing and Strength Testing

I cut down my XC ski poles a bit this week. It wasn't too hard. I skied again yesterday; it was much colder and the snow seemed faster. Unfortunately, the tracks weren't in as good of shape, several hikers had walked all over them. Anyway, I still had a good time, and my poles were at a much better height for me.



I did some strength benchmark testing last night after the kids went to bed. James Wilson published some benchmarks for mountain bikers. My idea was to check my progress against the benchmarks at the start of each phase.

There are two upper body tests (chinups and pushups), two lower body tests (deadlift and single leg squat) and one core / full body test (Turkish Getup). I haven't been training most of these movements, so I was interested to see how they would work out. The results were a little surprising. I passed the first level of both upper body exercises. My deadlift was just OK, but not good enough to get to the first benchmark. I got stuck at the bottom on my 1-leg squat. My technique on the Turkish Getup was bad enough that I decided not to test that one.

So, I hit the first benchmark on 2 out of 5. Not so bad for one month of training. Still, it's interesting that it's the upper body tests that I passed. Just sort of reinforces that I need to be doing strength training.