Page 60 - Wish Stream Year of 2018

Exercise NORSE CADET
OCdt Paterson
In early December, seven OCdts and one instructor, Mike, touched down in Norway to undertake Nordic Foundation 1 – a week
of Nordic skiing – in and around Sjusjoen. We immediately picked up two 4X4s and a very large (and very expensive) food shop courtesy of CILOR – obviously standing for Cook: Indians, Lasagnas or Rustlers – before arriving at our cosy Airbnb cabin, complete with a sauna.
Over the next couple of days Mike introduced us to this infamously exhausting discipline, with each morning seeming to bring slightly more and more glazed eyes (later attributed by experts to playing too much COD MW2). Nordic skis are smaller than Alpine skis, have less grip, and completely no edge. Mike ruminated on how the Norwegians apply wax to the bottom of the skis for grip or glide, explaining that wax has endless varieties, each corresponding to the temperature of snow underfoot.
Weaker members, like myself, at first struggled with the push and glide technique, often being overtaken by Norwegian children who would invariably be travelling at a far greater speed and in a much more elegant style on the loypes – the incredibly well-kept and nationally popular ski trails that cross Norway. So began our war cry for the week: “Maximum loype!”, which of course is gibberish. OCdt Montgomery-Stuart immedi- ately took an early lead in the tumble chart.
The loypes had grooves for the skis carved in, and when these grooves featured on descents, they proved to be the biggest cause of crashes. This was because one or half a ski would get caught in one of the grooves, twisting your body whilst the other groove-locked ski continued on its merry way, causing you to lose control in a spin and eat snow in the centre of the loype, much to the amusement of the rest of the group. OCdt Montgomery-Stuart thus kept pole posi- tion in the tumble chart midweek.
OCdt Richardson again proved his Sandhurst diet had not exactly cut the mass from his figure, as he broke the first and only piece of equip- ment all week, snapping his pole apparently just by using it ‘normally’ – remarkable! Because of this, Billy and I attempted to make a thin- ning evening meal of Scandinavian meatballs with their respective brown sauce (we’re unsure what it’s called but think Ikea). We fell well wide of the mark with our edition of the meal. Nev- ertheless, the group happily ate it if only to fuel up for the upcoming 35km ski we had the next day, which rounded our weekly total to 110km, or about the same number OCdt Montgomery- Stuart finally tallied in our chart. Mike was happy to tell us when he takes members of the RAF out for seven days (rather than five) to do the same course, they normally only manage 80km...
We’d like to thank Mike for dealing with our fire- side board games, OCdt Holland’s insatiable eccentricity, and Monty’s chat. We’d also like to thank OCdts Webb and Linnell, who planned the whole brilliant venture.
58 SANDHURST