The Flin Flon Ski Club is getting ready to open its doors for another season in the snow.
On Nov. 25, the club will hold its annual open house, showing off the club’s facilities and special programs, including youth skiing, racing teams and recreational options.
Dave Price, the ski club’s vice-president, said recent weather would contribute to the club’s trails soon being in perfect shape for skiing. Temperatures have been low and club members have been eager to get involved.
There’s just one more thing required: snow.
“Once we’ve had a few days of freezing, let it snow. We’ll be ready to go,” said Price, who added that having snow before the ground freezes may not always be the best thing for the club.
“If you have snow on the ground, it will insulate the soil underneath, so basically we’d like to have a freeze-up first, then the snow. I think we’re ready for some snow any time now, then we can get our equipment rolling and packing and setting those tracks.”
For the coming year, Price said the club plans on continuing all of its existing programs for young children, including the ever-popular Bunny Rabbit and Jack Rabbit programs. He said that area schools are likely to use ski club facilities during classes this year.
“We have had, for the past several years now, kids coming out to ski on our trails. It’s been a part of the regular schedule,” he said. “The Flin Flon School Division has used their own transportation to bring kids out and skiing on our trails. That’s been going on for quite a number of years.”
For major events, the club plans to continue the Val and Ivor Hedman Centaloppet. It will be the first Centaloppet since the death of it’s namesake, Ivor, a longtime ski club member and cross-country enthusiast who died in early November.
In addition to the Centaloppet, Price said the club will play host to a Saskatchewan provincial meet in February 2019, the first time Flin Flon has played host for an event of that stature since 2015.
“We’ll be hosting those this year and we’re already starting to plan for that, see which race suits we’ll be using. That will be a big event for us. We’ve done it several times before, so we’ve got experienced people to organize it, but we will need quite a few volunteers for that,” said Price.
“Looking at the records, since about 2000, we’ve hosted provincials several times; four or five times. Our trails are recognized as being excellent ski trails and we’re known for having experienced race organizers around here.”
