Skifitness

1. When to start a skifitness program

Late?
Don’t worry if you didn’t get started in time. It is not the same as to say, that you might as well just forget about it. A little training is better than no training and you can always improve your body’s reactivity and readiness for skiing. Just don’t start the week before and then work out like crazy, risking a muscle strain or worse just before leaving on your ski trip.

How often?
Once you have decided to start a ski fitness program, the only way for it to work is to make sure that you can stick with it and train on a regular basis. Consistency beats session volume any time, so it is better to opt for short efficient sessions, than long, tough ones that you will stop doing because you can never fit them in.

For how long?
You can improve your balance in a relatively short period of time. However when it comes to improving your ski specific strength, you should plan for at least two months of ski fitness prior to going skiing.

Convenience
In order to be consistent you need to find out how best to fit your skifitness program into your weekly schedule. This includes where to do it. You see, convenience plays a big role when it comes to consistency.

2. Where to do your ski workouts

Home Training
If you are pressed for time or you don’t like going to the gym, you can practice at home. You can easily get in shape for skiing by doing your ski fitness training at home with a minimum of equipment. I have posted more specific ski exercise tips here
In the Strong Skier you can get my train-along videos that you can do at home. You simply play the video on the device of your choice at home and you will be training your skifitness along with me. The programs have 2 progressions to get you in shape for skiing so you can choose according to your fitness level.

Gym
If you already workout in a fitness center or gym, you can of course also do your skifitness routine there. There is plenty of relevant equipment that you can use, for example dumbbells, swiss balls, medicine balls, cables and resistance bands.

When running
If you prefer to go out for a run, then you can incorporate some ski fitness exercises on your way. Running alone is not very ski specific and it will not prepare you efficiently for skiing.

On your run you can for example include

• lateral jumps when you run down a hill
• side skipping up a flight of stairs
• a few sets of walking lunges
• some core exercises.

Train-along skifitness videos
Where ever you decide to do your skifitness sessions, you can always integrate some- or all – of the exercises from the complete ski fitness programs, I have made and posted in the SHOP. If you don’t remember the exercises and you are in the gym for example, you can simply play the videos on your mobile.

So you see! There’s no reason why you should not be in shape for skiing this season. Just follow these simple guidelines for your skifitness!