New England Nordic Ski Association

The Home of Cross Country Skiing in New England

Mackenzie Rizio

BKL Parent Leaders and Coaches Symposium Registration is open!

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Registration is now open for the BKL Parent Leaders and Coaches Symposium on November 10th at the Holderness School.

Join the NENSA BKL Parent Leaders and Youth Coaches community for a one-day educational opportunity designed to prepare coaches for the upcoming 2025 winter season. This clinic is open to everyone, including club leaders, parents/caregivers, volunteers, and youth ski coaches from across the Northeast.

We’ll cover essential topics, including effective practice planning for various snow conditions, club development, strategies for encouraging skiers to challenge themselves, and much more.

Registration on SkiReg.

Schedule of Events: (subject to change)

8:45amOpening Remarks, group organization
9:00amMackenzie Rizio, NENSAPresentation: BKL Philosophy,  NENSA Resources
10:15amIsabel Caldwell, NENSAPresentation + Q&A: Club Development
11:15amTricia Groff, Ford SayrePresentation: Reflections on 1 year of Norwegian youth ski programming
12:00pmLUNCH
1:00pmSarah Holton, EMXCActivity/Discussion: Practice Planning, Low/No-Snow Adaptation
2:00pmTechnique sessionActivity: Technique Principles
3:00pmJamie Hannon, PSU ProfessorPresentation: Healthy Risk Taking in Youth Sport
4:00pmChris City, Patient LeadershipDiscussion: Group Management

We are looking forward to having our youth coaching community come together for a full day of youth-specific programming. For any questions, please email Mackenzie, at [email protected]. Hope to see you there!

2024 YES Rollerski Clinic

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This past Sunday, NENSA, EMXC, and YES collaborated to put on the fourth annual Youth Enrichment Services (YES) Rollerski clinic where we shared a beautiful afternoon of fun and games on rollerskis with YES and Eastern Mass Cross Country.

The goal of this clinic was to introduce young people in the Boston area to the summer version cross country skiing, build excitement for the winter season, and provide an opportunity for YES participants to get acquainted with the EMXC athletes who assist with coaching YES’s winter ski program. This program feautured a total of 24 participants all learning how to fasten their ski boots, strap on their skis, and get rolling! We even had a special guest working with Boston’s newest rollerskiers, SMST2/US Ski and Snowboard athlete, 2022 Olympian, Boston local, and longtime NENSA favorite, Julia Kern.

A massive thank you to all who made this event possible. Working with YES and EMXC is always such a pleasure and in addition to NENSA’s dedicated sponsors and grantors, this event would not be possible without the support of our generous donors, the Weston Ski Track who provided boots and poles for the clinic, and the Massachusetts Department of Conservation & Recreation for the use of their Tenean Beach parking lot.

Check out the Video Recap below:

Our next Introductory Rollerski clinic opportunity will take place after the conclusion of The Maine Event, in Rumford, Maine on October 20th.

2025 Festival Logo & Theme unveiled!

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NENSA is excited to share Quarry Road Ski Club‘s and Quarry Road Trails‘ 2025 BKL Festival logo with you all! We’ll continue to share Festival updates here in Breaking News, through our Trail Tales youth newsletter, and on social media (Facebook and Instagram). You can also keep tabs on the Festival website HERE.

Get ready to brave the elements at this year’s BKL Festival, where we celebrate the power and beauty of winter’s wildest weather! From swirling snowstorms to icy winds, experience the thrill of skiing through the heart of Central Maine at Quarry Road Trails. Bundle up and embrace the adventure as we explore how nature’s fiercest forces shape our world.

Join the Quarry Road Ski Club and NENSA on March 1-2, 2025, for a weekend of skiing, challenges, storm chasing, and wicked winter fun in Waterville, Maine!

The 2025 Festival logo was crafted through a collaborative effort, incorporating design elements contributed by coaches, volunteers, and athletes from the local Quarry Road community.

NONH & Maine Rollerski Clinic Recap

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Last Saturday was an exciting day at Fryeburg Academy as we hosted a fantastic learn-to-rollerski clinic in collaboration with Jackson XC! The morning kicked off with an enthusiastic group of young skiers from various clubs across Maine and New Hampshire. For many of these young skiers, this was their very first experience on rollerskis. Despite it being a new skill for them, by the end of the session, their ability and fluidity of movements were impressive—as if they had been rollerskiing for years. 

Our focus was on the fundamentals of skate techniques, where we worked on skills such as balance, agility, athletic body position, and more. Also featured was an agility course designed to enhance their balance and confidence on rollerskis. It was inspiring to see the kids mastering new skills and having fun while doing it.

In the afternoon, we shifted gears and hosted a clinic for high school students and adults. This session was a great opportunity for skiers of varying ages and experience levels to come together, share their passion for the sport, and further develop their rollerskiing abilities. 

We’re excited to see everyone hitting the trails this winter! Events like these truly showcase the joy of skiing and the strong sense of community in our sport. We can’t wait to build on these experiences and continue supporting the growth of skiers at every level.

NENSA Rollerski clinics are geared towards BKL-age children and the parents, caregivers and coaches that support them. Our clinics focus on teaching the fundamentals of skiing, including stopping, turning, basic techniques, agility skills and course, and engaging games. It’s a fantastic way to get ready for winter, connect with the nordic community, and have a blast mastering a new skill. 

If you missed the clinic last weekend, we have a few more opportunities for learn-to-rollerski scheduled in conjunction with our competitive programs this fall before the snow flies, and more information will be available at the below links:

Free Fall Ski Cross Sprints Rollerski Clinic – 9/22/24 – Burlington, VT

The Maine Event Rollerski Clinic – 10/20/24 – Rumford, ME

SMS Camp Day!

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George Forbes photo

Last week, NENSA had the opportunity to join the Stratton Mountain School (SMS) BKL and Junior Camps for a full day of agility, speed and learning. We started off the morning with an agility session with the Bill Koch campers at a nearby parking lot as well as a morning presentation for the campers on why cross-country skiing in New England is awesome (spoiler alert: we had a lot to say on the subject matter!) Some of the SMST2 team athletes skied through the course with the Bill Kocher’s at one point as a part of their cooldown! Other big points we covered included the importance of team, NENSA programming opportunities beyond the Bill Koch League, and most importantly, what makes skiing fun: being with friends, exploring the outdoors, going fast and much more!

George Forbes photo
Jessie Diggins mixing it up in our agility course with some BKL Campers. George Forbes photo.

Junior campers arrived in the afternoon to the SMS campus, and the agility set-up in the morning lent itself well to getting the junior camp moving in all the different ways that skiers end up having to move.

Campers skied up from the main SMS campus to the agility set-up, before we did a couple of warm-up speeds 10 sec on, 10 sec off, and played around on the agility features set up from the morning. Then, it was a couple of timed runs to see if skiers could look to improve on the elements.

From slalom through to our off-road ski, the beauty of agility skiing is that it teaches skiers that going fast over the whole of a course can sometimes mean being strategic with where they are putting their speed and power to match the terrain. Sometimes to go slow means to go faster, and timing a couple runs helps mark out some improvement. While we coordinated the timing, coaches Alex Jospe and Matt Boobar ran some skate drills with some campers. Overall, it was a successful session, and then, like clockwork, the rain came and washed all our chalk marks away!