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Auburn Ski Club Coach Ben Grasseschi
Published: Fri Jan 12, 2007 2:06 AM MST Updated: Fri Feb 16, 2007 1:20 AM MST Editors note: This will be a weekly column highlighting our ski coaches from around the country… including elite coaches, college coaches, high school coaches, volunteer coaches, and learn-to-ski coaches. This is an effort to sample a diverse group of coaches and recognize the people who are the backbone of today’s skiers. If you would like to nominate a coach for an interview, please email robertwhitney99@hotmail.com . Please give coach’s name, email, phone, and a small paragraph describing the nominee. The more diverse, the better.  Guess-ti-mated Age? I am 25 with 10 years experience. But all the athletes and my therapsit think I am a teenager. ☺ Skiing background? I grew up xc skiing with my family in Montana and Idaho. For the most part, we were weekend warriors, but my brother and I would ski in the fields near our house; using the big irrigation canals as half pipes before that was even a concept in ‘new-skoolers’ eyes. We had wooden Trax skis and low-top Alfa boots. I don’t remember being on the snow much, as we were into “getting air.” My brother was/is a crazy skier. We used to jump off our garage roof, drop about three feet onto a snow ramp we had built from all the snow shoveling chores (grrr Mom and Dad!) and then slide across the yard and up another ramp, jumping the fence into the neighbor’s yard. Every day after school, for hours, we would do this lap. We spent very little time inside growing up. Outside all the time. My brother taught himself to telemark when he was a young teen, and then he taught me how when we would go out on weekends. It would take an acre or two of terrain to make one turn in those days on that gear, so we didn’t get a lot of turns, but lots of skiing, up and down, trying over and over. We didn’t alpine ski much because my parents made us buy our own tickets usually. I like alpine skiing though; even now I try to go once a year and go really fast and make a few turns. In 1980, we rented a TV and watched the Olympics in Lake Placid. I remember seeing Gunde Svan racing and thinking it looked easy. Haha. So I tried skiing really fast everytime we would ski as a family or I’d race my brother out to the ‘half-pipe’. It felt good to burn my lungs (huh?) in that cold Rocky Mountain air. I don’t remember hearing much about skate skiing until I went to the College of Idaho (near Boise). I asked the ski coach there, Chris Melgaard, if I could train with the ski team so I could stay in shape for my primary life-long sport at the time, soccer. Actually, I think I had a crush on one of the nordic team girls. Anyway, after some thought, he agreed. I never intended to race, just train. Near the end of the season, Chris suggested I try a race and I did. After only skating 8x’s total, I raced a 15km Skate race at Hoodoo Ski Area near Mt Hood, Oregon in a horrible blizzard. I finished 2nd to last and broke a ski on one of several crashes. Despite my dismal start, my ski teammates were super supportive and I was hooked. I continued to race and train through college, eventually leaving soccer for skiing. After college, I fell into the ‘Senior Abyss’ that plagues this country and attempted the ski race-bum lifestyle, chasing dreams and jobs, racking up debt and not skiing much faster. Without a coach or any structured training for many years, I struggled as a racer and never made it big time (but I made a nice transition to the next question, eh?). Why coaching? Why not sit in front of a computer all day long? ☺ I never really ‘decided’ to start coaching. I just fell into coaching because it suited my lifestyle at the time, and still does. Besides, coaching really helps me concentrate on my own technique and therefore become a better skier myself. I feel lucky to have learned, and continue to learn, from some of the best coaches in the US; technique coaches like Nancy Fiddler, wax gurus like Glenn Jobe and Ian Harvey, and motivational coaches like Jeff Schloss. All of them are well known and respected in the nordic community. How could I keep all that great information to myself? I feel the ‘need’ to pass it on. Maybe it will help some athlete reach his best. As long as I continue to get a positive ‘charge’ at the end of each practice and I remember the PHUN of it, I’ll continue coacing. To be a coach, I believe you must be curious…ie, you must be fascinated with learning. You must, above all, like what you are doing, what you are trying to accomplish, and enjoy the process along the way. It is more infectious that way. As far as sitting in front of a computer all day, as I am right now, trying to answer these questions….. they are hard to answer because I believe coaching is not about me, it’s about the athlete(s). That being said, I have self-diagnosed, computer ADD! I either get fidgety and can’t be near one or I get sucked in and find numerous sidelines to explore, usually trying to figure out how come my computer won’t open Micrsoft Word, when it did so just ten minutes prior. Things like that drive me crazy and I have little aptitude or patience for fixing them. Computers are handy, but I would rather receive a written snail-mail or a phone call any day. What helpful experience do you have? I think working in restaurant kitchens for many years helps my coaching. In the restaurant, you have to be able to multi-task, be organized, and be fast. Coaching is similar; you have to be able to do many different things, often all at once, prioritize, and execute when the time comes. You also have to be flexible; always. I think growing up in a big family helped…. lots of kids and their friends around all the time doing stuff. We always were outside playing and goofin’ off… never inside watching television. Is there anything you wish someone had shared with you before you started coaching? Where the pot-o-gold is hidden! Haha. Umm,... How to say; “NO”. Haha. No, (there, I said it) I don’t think so. Because of the learning process, no one can show you ‘the’ way. You have to find that yourself. However, I have had a few great mentors who have patiently guided and molded me and helped me find my way. Without them I probably would have liked to know more things before I needed to. Does that make sense? Like I said, even chosen mentors have their particular way, which is not necessarily my way, but their leadership helps me to find my way, make choices, and expand my way and grow what is already good into what is better… hopefully. Team Far West used to be called Team Far Worst. I‘d like to see them be Team Far Better. What is a typical day like on your job? I wake up, eat right away, no matter what time it is, and then get started on the day. I usually have 6 days a week of training and one day completely off. From June 1 to mid- April the Auburn Ski Club and Far West Nordic offer training programs and camps for xc skiing athletes aged 10-70+. I am responsible for about 40 junior athletes and 24 master skiers, both split into two ‘teams’ of varying ability. The goal is to continue growing and challenge these programs so that these athletes continually feed the xc skier pipeline in the US. Right now I am working two jobs- if you go into ski coaching in the US, don’t expect to make millions…. so I work in the morning, or train on my own with friends, and have every afternoon to practice with the junior teams. Practice can be at any location and typically takes 3-5 hours, all said and done. This year our focus is on increasing distance training and core/agility strength for every age group. I spend some time every other day or so emailing and doing administrative work… some days much are a bit too long! I spend every evening trying to stay in contact with at least one athlete- those in college, those who are sick or injured, those that need a little extra love. A usual work week is 30-35hrs. A usual camp or trip workload is 12-16 hrs a day. Very busy at those times. What's the best/worst aspects of coaching? I love skiing and all the different ‘tools’ for sliding on snow. I like the kids. I like being paid to be outdoors: doing fun stuff, traveling to cool new places, and meeting new people. The typical community of xc skiers are quality folks. I like watching athletes achieve their goals and over-stretch their bounds. It bums me to see them disappointed, or angry at their results. I dislike the paperwork and administrative aspects of organizing trips and camps. I like really good wax and fast skis. I dislike some of the personalities, teenage angst, and, ‘babysitting’ I have to deal with occasionally. I like waxing- trying to figure it out, see what works, what magic potion I can make up. I hate trying to figure it out why a wax doesn’t work… like why the magic doesn’t work today when it did yesterday…. same time, same place. Predictions for the World Cup overall titles? Didn’t Italy win the World Cup? Haha. Va bene. Multo Grazie de tutto... Wow, that’s tough. I‘d like to support the North Americans in everyway but I think that will be a few years out. It would have been so great to see Beckie Scott win it last year. She deserves it. For this season, I’ve got my money on the Norwegian men and woman. I predict the German men will fall behind their early season success and Mathias Fredrickkson and Marit will win the individual titles. Anything else you'd like to add? My 8 track player just quit (as I typed this interview!) on me and the coffee is cold. Thanks for including me in the Fasterskier.com coaches inteviews. “See you in Houghton” ….. that should be the name of a movie! 
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