29Mar 2020 by Tyneside Loipers

Tyneside Loipers go back to Dalseter, Norway

News
Sixteen Loiper members turned up at the Dalseter Hoyfjellshotel for this year's GB Nordic season organised by our own John Mordue. Loipers Martin Read and Stephen MacShane arrived at the beginning of March and the rest of us turned up a week later on 7th. This was the 3rd time for some of us - it wont be the last! The Dalseter hotel is friendly and comfortable and Grethe, the hotel manageress, made us feel very welcome as usual. There is plenty of good skiing to be had (both hill-touring and cross-country track skiing). On the tracks Out on the hills - Robert enjoying off-track touring The season had started with an abundance of snow. For our week (7th March) there were well over fifty GB Nordic guests and leaders…
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28Feb 2020 by Tyneside Loipers

Tyneside Loipers skiing in Japan

News
Kevin and Kimberley sent through some photos of their Japan skiing trip Jan/Feb 2020. The Japanese powder snow looks great! The group included Loipers Martin Read and Steve Campbell plus various friends from our occasional Loiper trips to Canada. Japanese/Canadian guide Yuji and his colleague did a great job finding the best skiing each day. Wow! Great telemark skiing from Loiper Martin Read. Great snow too! Kevin telemarking in fine form - with selfie camera fixed to his right ski tip!
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26Feb 2020 by Tyneside Loipers

Tyneside Loipers at the 2020 Dolimitenlauf

News
Mike Hall and Les and Gwenda Cavill enjoyed a top-quality week of cross-country race training with Totally Nordic at Obertilliach in Austria and then followed it up by competing in the 50th running of the Dolimitenlauf Ski Marathon. Read Gwenda's description of the week here. Have a look at these great videos of the race taken by colleagues at the Totally Nordic week. The start of the freestyle race (click here) is quite inspiring - perhaps I will try it one day! And Les Cavill finishing the marathon (here) - well done Les, demonstrating Skate 2 technique (very impressive after 3 hours and 38 minutes of skiing)!
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22Oct 2019 by Tyneside Loipers

Ski Guiding for the visually impaired, Akaslompolo, Northern Finland – Feb 2020

News
If you would like to give something back to the sport and also have a great week skiing with a sociable group of visually impaired skiers, then your help would be greatly appreciated. A group of blind and partially sighted skiers are going to Akaslompolo in Finland for the last week of February 2020. Ebony Hall of Tyneside Loipers has signed up as a guide for this year. Anyone else interested in acting as a guide should please contact Lyn Street as soon as possible.  Download the information sheet here. Alasdair Wilson volunteered as a guide in 2014 and his report is in the Feb 2015 Loipers newsletter. And here is another more recent article from 2018. Stop Press If you would like to ski at Akaslompolo for the last week…
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22Oct 2019 by Tyneside Loipers

Loipers AGM and Social, 8th October 2019

News
Thanks to all who attended the AGM at the Northumberland Club in Jesmond on 8th October. What a surprise - the existing committee were re-elected unopposed (hopefully we will have some new faces one of these days)! We had some good discussion about club kit, Loiper activities and ski trips for this winter. Alan gave a quick demo of our updated website and Mike gave a nice explanation of our new club logo (both of which were well received). Thanks particularly to Neil for chairing the meeting and Charlie for the minutes and thanks to the Northumberland Club for the buffet (much better than last year!). The meeting rounded off with a few slides including some impressive photos of the Hetton roller ski event and race, plus some historic photos…
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22Oct 2019 by Tyneside Loipers

Alasdair upgrades to Level 2 Club Coach at Lancaster Roller-Ski weekend

News
Congratulations to Alasdair Wilson who attended the Roller-ski Coaching Weekend at Lancaster on 5/6th October. A successful follow-up to the Snowsport England On-Snow Coaching course at Kvitavatn in April, Alasdair had to take a one-hour observed coaching session with a group of roller-skiers to satisfy senior tutor Patrick Winterton and pass his Level 2 On-Snow coaching qualification. He is already qualified as a Level 2 Club Coach for roller-skiing. Alasdair competing in the 2016 World Masters. Alasdair is now 'bang up to date with current best techniques' having also attended the 1-day coaching workshop with top quality teaching from Scott Dixon and Patrick.
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12Sep 2019 by Tyneside Loipers

SSE Roller-ski Coaching Weekend at Hetton, Aug 2019

News, Summer 2019
The August Bank Holiday weekend surprised us with a mini heat wave (too hot for some!). Twenty participants from around the UK turned up for two days of top quality coaching from Martin Watkins, Dagmar Junghanns and Adam Pinney, with each of the coaches covering all aspects of classic and skate skiing technique. Alasdair organised the all-comers race on Saturday afternoon, part of the 2019 GB roller-ski race series, with great competition particularly from some of the GB Nordic Juniors who made the trip down from Scotland. And a particularly impressive performance too from ex-Olympian Martin Watkins. Many thanks to our three coaches. And especial thanks to Alasdair and others from Tyneside Loipers for the efficient smooth running of the event, at short notice, with the 'organiser' undergoing lifesaving surgery…
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26Jun 2019 by Tyneside Loipers

Summer roller skiing and the Snowsport England Coaching weekend in August

News
The August Bank Holiday coaching weekend at Hetton is only 2 months away. We will have some top roller ski coaches, led by ex-Olympian Patrick Winterton who will be taking the advanced group. Adam Pinney and Dagmar Junghanns are sharing the beginner/improver and intermediate groups. And Katya (Ekaterina Rachel) is lined up for a second advanced group if numbers warrant it (which is looking fairly likely). Bookings are coming in for the course at a steady rate. The weekend of coaching will definitely improve your skiing technique on roller skis and on-snow, at whatever your current level. For more details, see the course information dossier. Or contact Alan who is the course organiser on behalf of Snowsport England. Les Cavill, who has recently taken up roller skiing, has written a…
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08May 2019 by Tyneside Loipers

Mike Hall’s Engadin Ski Marathon – March 2019

News
I have been dabbling with cross country skiing for some years now and have had a go at most of our free heel skiing disciplines.  More recently I have been contemplating a Nordic ski race.  My former employer (Architect- Sir Norman Foster) takes part in the Engedin marathon most years.  I am nearly thirty years his junior and, if he can do it, so can I!  I signed up with Totally Nordic, run by Alan Eason, for the short race week culminating in the main 42km event on the Sunday, the biggest race in Europe.  Despite upping my roller-skiing in preparation, my first day on snow was pretty shabby.  I couldn’t believe how bad my technique seemed and I was wasting so much energy.  Alan Eason somehow disassembled my skiing technique and reassembled it in 3 days - No mean feat!   Come the race day itself…
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