December 15-21, 2025

Thank you everyone for your patience and perseverence this week with the weather keeping us on our toes!! 

This week everyone will be headed to Canmore on different days. Please keep up-to-date with teamsnap for immediate updates. Otherwise most of the information that you will need can be found here. 

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1. If you are planning on trying out for the Arctic Winter Games team, registration closes on December 16th for the Alberta Cup Races in Canmore. Please register here; and if you're U16 and older you MUST have a Nordiq Canada race licence found here. Happy registering- we will need 3 days of day passes, and parents if you're wanting to ski as well, please add in your day licenses to your athlete's registration as it's cheaper than purchasing one at the day lodge. Yes, you will need to pay for the snow enhancement fee (everyone does). 
2. If you are driving down to Canmore you will need to purchase a Kananaskis park license (if you attended nationals last year, yours is still valid until next March- FYI) and are planning on attending Western Canadian Championships the end of January in Canmore, I'd suggest getting an annual membership as it's cheaper and is good for 365 days from purchasing (so wait until you show up in Canmore to do this). You can purchase this here.
3. Christmas break dates if you can make it work: We will practice Dec 23 1-3pm; Dec 27 10-12; Dec 30 5:45-7:15; Jan 1: 1-4pm (NYD Race); Jan 3 10-12. 

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Tuesday: Christmas potluck party. Bring a gift fo $15 value. If you need to wax your skis, please come early. There is a lot of ski sorting required as there are not enough classic skis in the classic ski bag!! When you get to the lodge, please ensure that your correct poles and skis are in the right bag and bins. We will then start the party at 5:30 and come in your best ugly christmas sweater. Parents, if you have room in your vehicle, we need vehicles to take 1 ski bench, 1 bag of skate skis, and 2 bins of poles please. Thank you! Plan to pick up athletes at 7pm. 

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Canmore information: 

Parents: if you plan to ski, please purchase your own day licenses at the day lodge. I believe they will tell you where you can ski and see the races. Team Snap will be used to communicate with the team while in Canmore. Updates, alerts, messages etc. 

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Friday: We will meet in Canmore at the waxroom for 2:30pm. I will teamsnap out the waxroom number when I know what it is. We will be on snow for 3pm and we will skate ski. Practice will be done by 4:30 with the goal being for you know your race course and for us to do some technique work! At 5:00pm ALL athletes (and a parent representative) trying out for the Arctic Winter Games meeting in our waxroom for 30 minutes. There is also an athlete social occuring from 5-6pm. We will discuss the games, selection criteria, and any other questions that anyone may have. As a side note- we will be sharing our waxroom with Ptarmagan Nordic, so it will not be used as a home base for you guys. Wapiti team meeting will be via Zoom- from this link. A teamsnap will be sent out with the time if we're running late. It is set for 7:30pm. 

Saturday: Race times will be identified the evening before at the team meeting via Zoom. Please ensure that you're at the wax room with 1.5hours to spare. You will test your skis for race wax approval (or disapproval) and then do your warm-up, and then race. You are in charge of your gear and your race. Coaches will try to be out on course, but sometimes we're caught up in the stadium helping run the sprint races and tagging zones. 

Team supper is booked for 6:45pm. We will be eating at the Patrino's Restaurant: 1602 Bow Valley Trail; under Claire. Coaches will be a bit late, but please start and order your food. We will have the team meeting at the restaurant as we wait for our meals to come. 

Wapiti team meeting will be via Zoom- from this link. I'm guessing 7:30pm again. 

Sunday: We will all be seasoned racers by this time. As it's a classic ski day, I'm asking that you show up at the wax room 2 hours before your race so that you can test your wax and give us time to fix it up. We generally try to hang around after each other's races to cheer however, as we're all rushing back, once your racer(s) are done racing and you have checked in with Coach Shannon, Coach Krista, or Coach Claire and athletes have cleaned up their gear and packed away their skis and poles, you can head on home. Please ensure that you return to GP with the equipment that you brought down. I won't be back with Classic skis until Dec 24th late in the evening. Classic skis can be picked up on Boxing Day or afterwards. Sorry for that inconvenience, we're going to Saskatchewan after the races and my box is the only one that can fit the length of the classic skis. If you want to take your own gear home, please just let one of us know. Thank you.