Equipment Our Equipment co-ordinator, David Burton, can help you with skis from our factory deals via our Swiss Supplier. In the UK, Ski Bartlett is very good. Snow & Rock also stock plenty of things, if not quite the extensive range of race specific stuff that Bartlett carries. The internet is always a good source of many things. About once per year the club organises a sale of old equipment; typically on a Sunday morning at the slope, usually in October or November. Bring your outgrown clothing & equipment, sell it to parents with younger/smaller children & buy from parents with older/larger children. 10% of all sale proceeds to the club please. A handy way of clearing the garage & immediately filling it with larger items of equipment! The 2009 date for this event is still TBC.

Ski Prep Guide for Dads You can of course get your skis serviced in any good ski shop.... but given the frequency with which they'll need to be done this will be expensive & you'll be forever going to & fro with them. It's also the case that a ski racer really should learn to prep their own skis. When your kids are smaller you'll be doing much of this, although encouraging them to do some of the work is good practice! You can spend thousands on tools & waxes but below is a brief list of the essentials. Bench - Ski Bartlett make a very effective portable bench. Ski clamps or vices - you can't do the job without these - they hold the ski whilst you work Brake retainers - keep the brakes out of the way whilst you work on the bases & edges File(s) for sharpening the edges - go with the best you can afford - it'll be cheaper in the end File guide(s) fix the precise angle between the ski edge & your file - solid milled metal "World Cup" are the way to go. Available in various angles from 90° to 85°. You'll probably want 88° & 87° to start. I recommend you avoid the variable edge guides. Fixed is more accurate. You also need a spring clip to hold the file to the guide. Base file guides - do the same job on the base edge. Usually come in a set of 3: 0.5°; 1.0° & 1.5° Diamond file(s) - used after filing to polish the edges on snow skis. Come in various grades from 100 to 1200. 200 to 600 is the typical range for skis. If used regularly will keep the ski sharp with much less frequent filing which is good for ski longevity. Ski iron - for waxing the bases. Scrapers - metal & plastic Waxes. You'll want one for plastic - typically blue or green, and you'll want a few different choices for snow for different temperatures. Using the Toko system red wax does -4 to -10 & is the most common. They also sell grey which is the same temperature range but is for artificial snow. Yellow does 0 to -4 & you'll probably need this at Easter. Blue is -10 & below & you're not too likely to need this. All temperatures are snow temperatures not air temperatures. Normal, inexpensive hydrocarbon waxes are for training. "Flouro" waxes are considered faster for racing, but they're expensive. High & low flouro waxes exist & which to use depends on snow humidity! It's not advised to leave flouro waxes on the bases for long periods between races as they dry out the base. If you're serious there are various "top wax" products that go on as a final layer for maximum speed. They're not cheap! Brushes - you'll need a couple for brushing out the skis before waxing & after scraping. Harder steel/brass brushes for the base & nylon or horsehair after waxing. Not to mention a big tool box to keep it all in! And most vitally a decent leather glove to wear whilst edging. We've seen several trainees in hospital with cuts to the bone when they were prepping skis without gloves. Don't do it! A decent leather gardening glove is OK, or you can get specialist Kevlar gloves from Ski Bartlett or Snow & Rock. All this stuff is available from Ski Bartlett & much of it from Snow & Rock. You might also find it worth importing from the US via various websites; http://skatewerks.com/ is quite good. You can buy many, many things other than this list .... but it will get you going! Don't forget to name all your equipment & keep close control of it. It's not the role of this guide to offer a ski prep lesson. From time to time one of the more experienced parents will run a demonstration on a Sunday morning. Also, there are a number of on-line guides available. For example a good basic one can be found at Ski Bartlett One detail worth mentioning though is that new skis need 5 or 6 hot waxings - with a scrape & brush between - before they are used. This builds up wax in the base to protect them & make them faster! Many people suggest you have super-G skis "hotboxed"- certainly it's what the top racers do. This is a quick way to apply the equivalent of 20-30 hot iron waxings. Possibly the only commercial hotbox in the South of England is at - you guessed it - Ski Bartlett.

BARTS, BASS & FIS Points So you've got your licence & you've now got 999.99 BARTS & 999.99 BASS points. When you start racing you get to start last (well, you're drawn out of hat with all the other racers on 999.99 points). The top 15 racers are also drawn out of hat to see who starts first & then from number 16 to all those racers on 999.99 points, everyone else goes in order of increasing points. On plastic this makes little difference, on snow the course is usually faster & less rutted early on - which is why it's good to lower your points. The better the racers in your race the lower the "race penalty"; you add a certain number of points per second for each second you are behind the winner & the sum of these two numbers is your points result for that race. Once you have two results your points, in that discipline, are the average of your best two results. In practice it's 100 times more complex than that - but what I've just written is 99% accurate! You start losing BASS points from your first Children I race & continue until the end of Children II. Assuming you've qualified for your FIS Licence (see above) then you immediately revert to 999.99 FIS points & start all over again!

Race Licences As mentioned above you need a race licence once you go beyond LSERSA races on plastic & you'll need a race licence for all snow races. The application form is at: www.snowsportengland.org.uk/first_time_registrations-2730.html. Renewal is available online. As your child becomes a Junior they'll need an International or FIS licence Click here to apply You still need to have a Snowsport England licence to get your FIS licence & your application goes via Snowsport England to FIS. To qualify for a FIS licence you need your BASS (British Alpine Seeding System) points to be below a given level by the time you finish your last Children II, Year II race. Typically, in recent years, this has been 250 points (any discipline) for boys & 270 points (any discipline) for girls. It's normal for SPSRC racers to achieve this. There is more information about BASS points in the BARTS, BASS & FIS Points section .

Race Insurance Not to be underestimated when racing abroad. You are not insured by the club and your normal ski holiday insurance will not cover ski racing. There are several suppliers including Snowcard www.snowcard.co.uk & the British Mountaineering Council www.thebmc.co.uk/. If you plan to do several snow camps then an annual policy is good value & can cover the whole family, usually including things like off-piste skiing if you're so inclined. If you discover an alternative source for a good policy then please let the training committee know so we can pass on the information.