Cross-Country Skiing

Cross-country skiing (also known as XC skiing) is a winter sport popular in many countries with large snowfields, primarily Northern Europe and Canada.

Cross-country skiing as a sport is part of the Nordic skiing family, which also includes ski jumping, and a combination sport of cross-country skiing and ski jumping called Nordic combined. Free-technique cross-country skiing is also the method of locomotion in the combination sport of Biathlon, which adds rifle shooting to skiing.

As a sport, cross-country skiing may be viewed as a kind of "bushwalking on skis", where skiers tackle trails of various lengths and difficulties. Some skiers stay out for extended periods using tents and equipment similar to bushwalkers, whereas others take relatively short trips from ski resorts.

Equipment

The skis are long and thin, to distribute the weight of the skier and allow the skier to move quickly. Typical ski dimensions are 2 metres in length, about 5 centimetres in width and one centimetre in thickness. Like in downhill skiing, cross-country skiers carry two poles, usually made of aluminium or fiberglass. More expensive poles are made of graphite or some other light material.

Poles have a spike at the end to provide a fixed pivot when the pole penetrates through to a hard surface, and a plastic ring (or basket), to provide maximum force from thick snow and to ensure the pole only goes to its designed embedding depth, so as to optimise the angle of arm force. The skier's footwear is attached to the ski with a binding.

The equipment is different depending on the desired skiing technique. Skating or freestyle poles are usually longer than those used for the classic technique. Typically, skating poles should be long enough to reach the skier's chin or as far as the eyebrows, depending on the skier's preference. In contrast, classic-ski poles should reach the skier's armpit.

History
 
Cross-country skiing originated in Scandinavian countries in prehistoric times. It may have also been practiced by Native Americans for similar lengths of time, although the Norwegian emigrants Snowshoe Thompson and Jackrabbit Johannsen are widely credited for introducing the sport to North America.

The sport has been used by explorers by means of transport, and all Scandinavian armies train their infantry on skis for winter operations. Traditionally, all of the equipment was made of natural materials: wooden skis and bamboo poles with leather hand straps. Footwear was usually sturdy leather boots with thick soles.

Bindings evolved from simple straps made of twisted wood-based thread, to the so-called Kandahar binding with the fastening of both the boot’s front and back, to the ‘Rat’s Trap’ front-only binding, which is today known as the Nordic norm, and has evolved in various modern bindings.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Uses material from the article Cross-country skiing.