Month: April 2011

Summer Biathlon Races

Summer Schedule is finally set. Listed below are the races for the summer 2011 season for NYB!

June 12-McCauley Mountain-Old Forge, NY-9 a.m. registration, 10 a.m. zero, 11 a.m. race start- Sprint

July 9th or 10th-Mount VanHovenburg-Lake Placid

July 16th-Syracuse Summer Biathlon

July 31st – August 7th- Jericho Summer Biathlon Festival-Clinic and Races

August 14th-McCauley Mountain-Old Forge, NY-9 a.m. registration 9 a.m., Zero 10 a.m., Race start 11 a.m. – format TBD

August 20th & 21st-Saratoga Biathlon Club-Day, NY

October 8th & 9th-Tri-States Biathlon Championships-Saratoga Biathlon Center-Day, NY-Race series TBD

Empire State Winter Games Are Set for Winter 2012

The Empire States Winter Games are going to be scheduled, at least for now, for February 2nd through the 5th.  This is a Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday.  There was much discussion between the chair’s of each of the winter sports and the Lake Placid Planning committee.  This past week through a phone conference the decision was made to go ahead with the dates listed earlier.  Throughout the summer and early fall plans will be put in place to set up a race schedule that will  be challenging to all.  One of the details that will have to be resolved will be the Lake Placid Loppet.  This 50 km. race is scheduled to take place on February 4th.  For us to have a two day event, we will need to come up with something that will allow our racers to compete on two days and that will also not force people to stay in Lake Placid the entire time.  More news will be posted as soon as a schedule has been put in place.

Check back often to see what is happening with the ESWGs and also the regular race schedules!

Empire State Winter Games Takes On New Look!

At the spring meeting of NYSSRA Nordic this past weekend we were made aware of some changes that are in the works for the 2011-2012 winter season. In the past the Empire State Games lasted for three days. Usually, at least the last several years, Biathlon was on the first two days, Friday/Saturday; Cross Country was on the second and third days along with Ski-O and Snowshoe racing. On Sunday when we meet we were told to discuss what or how we would set up our races if the dates were either February 2, 3, 4, 5 or February 26, 27, 28, 29. We were also told that the organizing committee wanted to make the races a more regional set of races instead of something exclusively locked into the village of Lake Placid. Our first questions were why those particular weekends? The first weekend was established to coincide with the Saranac Winter Carnival. The second weekend was just before the High School Sectional races, which are scheduled for the 28th and 29th of February. The Lake Placid organizers want to tie the two events together.
Since each discipline was asked to give opinions as well as solutions we gave our opinion, which started with leaving the process as it has been and then discussed weekday races (2nd and 3rd are a Thursday/Friday and the 27th, 28th, 29th are a Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday) and the difficulty of getting volunteers as well as racers to participate. Solutions were not as plentiful as opinions. If Biathlon is going to be part of either weekend we will have to drop from two races to one for this year. In either case the race would be on Sunday. Time will tell what happens, but in either case there will be a new look to whatever the decision turns out to be.