xcskiforum.com does not exist?

[Ken Roberts]

When I just did a Google search on "cross country skiing forum", I found that xcskiforum.com did not show up anywhere on the first page of the search results. Or the second.

(although it does fine on a search of "nordic ski forum" -- but lots of people don't think of searching that way)

Skiers around the country and around the world can't contribute to our discussions and can't benefit from them if they can't find them.

Some ideas about how to make xcskiworld show up:

* put links to www.xcskiforum.com in your personal web page (together with saying what topics it's about -- even better if you put the words "cross country skiing" or whatever you hope people might search for in the text of the link)

* post links to www.xcskiforum.com in other public forums (including bicycling and running forums during winter)

* site administrators: put key search words out on the visible text of the home page. (currently lotsa critical searchable words are buried in a hidden "meta" tag, which Google and other search engines tend not to take very seriously.

* ? pay for some advertising somewhere ? (but seems like first do more of the obvious "free" options.

Ken

[Cloxxki]

It's amazing how hard it is to convince a skier to talk about their sport. Snowboarders won't stop yapping, cyclists are even worse.

Perhaps we could come up with great discussions here, and make sure to refer to them elsewhere.

Members make a forum grow. I learned that when a 29" MTB forum was opened. If the discussions rock, the audience will come to rock along.

[NordicSnipe]

It would be great if this forum was busier.

I was also wondering if anyone knows of any European forums? (Norway, Finland...)
It's more popular in Scandinavia and the Alps, so there must be something. Even if it's not in English, there can be some good things.

The problem with finding these forums is you need to search in that language to find it.

[Ken Roberts]

Good news is that while looking for XCskiforum on lower and lower pages of Google search "cross country skiing forum", I found another forum I hadn't known about (which I guess is also not doing much to get itself found on the first page of a google search).

If XCskiworld had come up on one of the first two pages of the obvious search, it would not have occurred to me to look far enough to find the the forum which FasterSkier finally started.

Bad news is that the anti-spam-bot protection is preventing me from joining that forum. (something that I warned against here).

So before we decide that American xc skiers don't want to talk, let's see what might happen if some basic infrastructure things got fixed.

btw There's a non-public discussion group called MHXCSS for Hudson valley New York cross-country skiing -- with a clunky infrastructure, but lots of people keep joining it, and there's healthy discussion when there's something to discuss, like snow.

Ken

[Shawn]

I like this forum,there aren't any other forums that are as active as this one or for Hardwood ski and bike.

The only detractor to using this site seems (for me at least) is the number of categories that are available to post in.
It does take time to go through the posts to see what is relevant to oneself and contributing toward the post.

Maybe fewer categories until the site really takes off. Once it does people can just head toward "their corner of the site" and participate.

Otherwise the site is great.

[tundra]

Actually found this site around 2005? when I started up xc ski. And was trying to learn how to ski and find the right equipment.

Maybe add a beginner section and do a write-up link to wikipedia on xc equipment (SNS: pilot, profil , NNN) BC etc... I found it confusing when I started out (bought SNS (BC) thinking they were all the same)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-country_skiing

skiing technique on different styles. links and youtube video.

http://ski.itrundle.com/techniques/
http://www.roberts-1.com/xcski/

This is the best youtube video I've seen so far: youth teaching progression. That one comment about doing a soccer kick cleared up the hip forward, power comes from your hip as much as from your push crystal clear.
I swear it felt like I was going 50% faster :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuKqJ4NuX0c

This was the 1st useful youtube video I found.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=brGZlZkC ... re=related

And if you really wanted lot of traffic maybe start up a politics discussion. Health care, bailout, nuclear war, tiger woods.

[Biffbradford]

Good stuff.

I just get a kick out of all this 'new' skating. The drills are often the same ones we did back in '84.

[Ken Roberts]

This is the best youtube video I've seen so far: youth teaching progression.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuKqJ4NuX0c

You're right -- that sequence of 6 videos from the Eastern Massachusetts club BKYSL is very helpful. Best I've seen so far. Thanks for finding them and now telling us about it.

Wish I'd had those to follow back when I was learning to skate (as an adult). Eager to look at their Classic videos next.

I think that link to videos really should be posted to the General Discussion forum so more people get to see it.

That one comment about doing a soccer kick cleared up the hip forward, power comes from your hip as much as from your push crystal clear. I swear it felt like I was going 50% faster :)

My theory on that is that it feels faster because you really are engaging a whole new set of big muscles: the knee-extension or quadriceps. I think to really engage them you need the sequence of both getting the hip + knee forward at the start of the leg-push and "kicking the ball" at the finish. (and both moves are included in the video drills).

The problem is that the quadriceps aren't used much in our natural speed propulsion of running, so our unconscious neuro-muscular coordinator doesn't know to use them. So have to do special drills to sensitize it to the possibility and feel the effectiveness.

Engage the quadriceps --> go faster.
Easy to say.
Those videos show how to start feeling it.

Ken

[rmattson]

This is a piece that Gregg never really looked into. I will do theleg work to get this site a better standing on search engines this weekend.