College Skiing Issues

Some interesting discussions with implications for our skiers at the EISA spring meeting on Monday:

- Looks like sprints are going to become an NCAA Championship event at some point in the next couple years.  Not official yet, but from what I can tell most coaches have warmed up to the idea in recent years.  It's going to happen sooner or later - probably sooner.  I have mixed feelings about this.  I think it's appropriate for us to include an event that's become such a major focus in international racing.  I just don't like how it affects the experience for a lot of our college skiers - it's not much of a race day for those who don't qualify for the heats.  That's fine for one or two races a year, but we're going to have to hold several sprint races a year for NCAA qualifying purposes - it's probably going to take up almost half of our season, and I'm not crazy about that.  That's a lot of skiers who trained a lot of hours sitting on the sidelines for a lot of races (after a 3-minute prelim).  The current proposal doesn't call for a championship sprint race every year, though, which makes me feel OK about the change - I think it's a reasonable balance if we have a sprint every other year or so.  Interestingly, the proposal also goes in the other direction and raises the possibility of a 30k race at the championships.  That's probably never going to happen, but I'd absolutely love it, and I think most of our skiers would as well.

- We also discussed a proposal for men and women to race equal distances.  Fasterskier published a pretty good summary of the arguments on either side of the issue.  Lots of interesting points, and it doesn't break down cleanly along gender lines.  I'm in favor of equal distances - it's 2016!  I've never had a good answer for my skiers when they've asked why women do shorter races, and I'd love to not have to answer that question for my daughters if they become ski racers a few years from now.  I'm not in favor of shortening everything to 5-15k, though, which is where many people seem to think this is heading.  I'd rather have all skiers racing the full range of distances up to 20k (or 30k - wishful thinking).  I think my ideal setup would be something like sprint & 10 or 15k alternating with 10k & 20k every year.  We'll see what happens.  I have a hard time picturing this change happening this year, but I won't be at all surprised if it happens a few years down the road.