XC skiers look worse than distance runners at the finish line. Is their sport harder?

Mid D Guy wrote:

bent wheels wrote:

What's the measured VO2 max for rowers, xc skiers, Tour bike riders and runners? Not being snarky. Just curious

As far as I remember, X-country skiers typically have the highest VO2 max of any sport.

In absolute values, rowers have the highest max oxygen uptake, but rowers are heavier than other endurance athletes, so their numbers/kg will be lower.

If you do it right, the hardest race is the one you are doing now or just finished.

That said, because xc ski racing involves significant use of the upper body and arms, and not just legs, it can involve more muscle groups than running. With the skating technique, sometimes 50% + of propulsion comes from the upper body.

The skating technique is also a very anaerobic motion. Esp. when sprinting at the end of a race. Almost a maximum contraction, and then a glide/rest/ recovery period. Then repeat. So the sprint at the end of a xc ski race is hard.

Also world class ski race courses must be 1/3 uphill and 1/3 downhill. You push really hard on the uphills and flats, and the finish is normally flat.

I believe the level of competition on the global scale is much higher/deeper in running than skiing. Running as a sport can be practiced by many more people than skiing. The amount of prize money available, and the number of races, in running far exceeds that in skiing.

People like Ben True and others who were top skiers and runners almost always gravitate toward running at the end.

Giving birth is the hardest, with rowing a distant second.

It's so much harder. Nordic skiing just kills you. Full-body workout, fighting resistance of the snow. Shortest race is 10k and the women do it faster than Bekele has ever run the distance. It's insane, best sport in the world.

The ski thing usually is at altitudes somewhere in the high to very high range. It certainly adds to the misery.

No matter what sport you’re doing that last minute where you’re giving it everything it’s all the same to me. Rowing and skate skiing will have you feeling ill far longer than running once the race is done though.

An athlete may be more willing to flop down on snow than dirt, asphalt, grass or mondo.

Tom

Agree - runner (4:13 indoor miler in my 20s) and cc skier I found cc ski could trash you to a much higher level and just running. In cc skiing (and it was just classic style in my days) you go longer and use all your muscles.

Waking up the next day you knew the difference...

Of course it is harder. Skiers actually use these things known as arms which on distance runners are more of a nuisance.

It´s the same with soccer and running. People who have a talent for soccer will choose that instead of running, because the money in running is peanuts compared to soccer.

CrossandCrew wrote:

I ran cross country and did crew in high school. The pain you get from crew was much worse than cross country. I almost blacked out from pushing hard in a race, that never would happen in cross country.

I truly don't understand this concept of "harder" when it comes to endurance sports. A maximum aerobic effort is a maximum aerobic effort regardless of whether you're pedaling , skiing, skating, climbing, or running.

The general fatigue and lactate feels similar regardless of which sport, and while the concentration of where the most intense fatigue/pain is might change a little (i.e. distributed purely in the legs cycling, more total body when skiing, arms when rowing, etc.) it's still a max effort.

Longer isn't harder either, in the same way that a half marathon isn't necessarily harder than an 800.

Xc vs Xc wrote:

?

Honestly, it isn't even a question.

Every muscle in your body is activated.

Glutes, hips, calves, hammies, quads, biceps, triceps, shoulders, Upper and Lower back, CORE...

This is why they are the fittest athletes on the planet. And it isn't even close.

Us runners love VO2 Max, so take a gander at this

I don't compete on skis, but in rock climbing there is a thing called the "screaming barfies" where your entire upper body goes into a near-seizure after say 15 minutes climbing an overhang at your limit. I have experienced this a few times and I can't imagine combining it with the leg fatigue of say finishing an 800m race simultaneously.

I occasionally do a session where I run hard up a slope of loose gravel/scree using poles for my arms and man that one HURTS.

Sports radio loudmouth Jim Rome used to opine about this subject a few winter Olympics ago. Having presumably gone as far as 20 minutes on a stairmaster once or twice in his own athletic career he felt quite secure in saying that this stuff was overdramatic if not outright staged. "Romey" just didn't think it was any different than any other kind of "cardio."

I still have a standing 2 Mile relay record from 40 years ago, I nearly made the Olympic trials in road cycling a few years after that and I've been x-country skiing since before the skate technique existed. With nowhere near the same level of success. I was always known for getting the most out of myself in running and I was cycling for six years before I developed the kind of burst mode and criterium savvy that could win premes. Before that I needed a big hill or a time trial to make money. My best cycling results were almost always attrition races. So for what it's worth I don't think the finish line collapses in Olympic cross country skiing are staged at all.

There is nothing else in endurance sports remotely as scary as hitting a critical downhill on a black (=most difficult) ski course maybe 2Km from the finish and knowing that one slip or just a missed pole plant on the way down will cost you 5-10 places. The same kind of hill that you would still have difficulty getting down in one piece even if you had stopped and waited five minutes at the top. (See Alexi Grewal's famous remark about the Olympic road race in LA; "At that point I could see an area on the back of his jersey maybe the size of a dime.")

Once you get that part behind you in a serious ski race you will really feel like you don't even need more than fifteen percent of your normal visual acuity between there and the finish line. Yessir, pretty hard to describe what's happening here and lots of courses are designed this way where the terrain permits. Yeah you can go 5-7 hours in a bike race but you are almost always on a closed two lane road and often with someone else to follow or catch up to. You steer with your arms and propel yourself with your legs anyway. Cycling still does stand out with respect to how deep you can go in the middle of a 3-4 hour event and still expect to recover and complete the course.

(I did get my ass kicked on skis by people who ultimately went to the Olympics and got their own asses kicked there but they were just 16 and 17 years old when they kicked mine.)

I've been a climber for a long time and have not heard the term "screaming barfies" used in that sense. I've always heard it from ice climbers to describe the nauseating sensation of regaining sensation in frozen hands as they unthaw. But maybe the use of the term has expanded.

In both sports you compete till exhaustion. It makes zero logical sense to say one is more difficult than the other. Same with virtually any sport where you race over a longer distance.

CrossandCrew wrote:

I ran cross country and did crew in high school. The pain you get from crew was much worse than cross country. I almost blacked out from pushing hard in a race, that never would happen in cross country.

You don't push hard in crew; you pull. 2/10.

yes and yes wrote:

The practice of flopping over is generally frowned upon by the race management community. I tend not to do this but the level of cardiovascular and muscular exhaustion at the end of an XC ski race tends to be more than when running a race. Just bent over and hanging on knees or ski polls for a couple minutes until you get your breath back, let alone ability to speak or feel.

Obviously you have never witnessed a girl's high school x-c race.

afadsf wrote:

Yes, skiing i harder. On top of it being more taxing on the body it is also much harder to maintain good form when you get tired.

So you're saying they didn't look relaxed?

I’ve done both running and cross country skiing for decades . There is no doubt you can push yourself much much harder skiing . 40 % of your perpulsion is from your arms . Not so in running . Plus, try balancing on 2 inch wide skis when exhausted