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Waxing Reports

Noquemanon Service Report

This past weekend BNS made the trip to upper Michigan for the second time this month to do service at the Noquemanon ski marathon in Marquette. Service notes below:

The Noquemanon is one of our favorite races for service, great place, great people, and a really good atmosphere for racing. Another reason we like this race is the challenge it presents for testing, skis need to have perfect kick for the first half of the race up to the high point on the course and skis also need to be very fast for the second half of the race and the descent into Marquette. Our goal was to have the right ski and wax job to allow for both perfect kick and glide for the entire 50k without compromising either way. It’s a good goal for a marathon and one we tackled this year.

Testing ended up being relatively easy, the temperatures at race time on Friday were close enough to race time on Saturday that we felt the testing was very indicative of what we would encounter race morning. We tested in two places, at Al Quaal in Ishpeming at 9AM, and Forestville outside of Marquette at 10:30AM. We felt these two places would give us a good sample of the conditions throughout the course.

The paraffin call was simple, Ski*Go HF Orange/Green premix was very fast. We sell the premix as a single bar, it is also easy to make with HF Orange and Green mixed 50/50. It’s a great combination for long races in fresh snow – HF Orange is always fast in fresh snow and HF Green adds a hardness that helps keep the wax job durable and clean. Plus it was simply faster than a number of other paraffins that we tested.

The powder call was a little more challenging, there were a few that were close. Start SFR75 and Holmenkol Race Powder Mid both felt good, also Holmenkol Speedpowder Mid. In the end we chose SFR75, it had a better top end speed and had the slippery feel of a race wax that we like to have in a marathon.

For kick we tested everything we could with the goal of identifying a handful of waxes that we could test on race morning – our list included Rode Super Extra Blue, Rode T-line VO, Guru Violet ,Start RF Blue, and Magnar N3. We started our testing Saturday morning with this list.

Our final wax job was a layer of Ski*Go LF Graphite for durability, Ski*Go HF Orange Green Premix as paraffin layer, Start SFR75 as a powder layer and a topcoat of Holmenkol Speedblock Mid. We opted for no hand structure, uni/cold stone grinds were running well on their own. For kick we ended up on a thin single ironed layer of Vauhti SuperBase binder, 3-4 layers of Rode SuperExtra Blue, covered by a single layer of Magnar N3. To apply the powder layer we ironed a single layer of SFR75 fast at high temperature followed by an additional layer of SFR75 applied with a roto fleece. We had excellent feedback from this combination. Our congratulations to everyone who completed this challenging race!

US Nationals Service Report

The BNS service team of Roger Knight and David Chamberlain were in Houghton the first week of January testing waxes and structures for the 2016 edition of US Nationals. Races started on Sunday with the 15/10k classic race and Monday with the skate sprint. With team spots open for the U23 Championships, Junior World Championships, U18 Trip, and Youth Olympic Games, it was an exciting week.

The weather was much different than last year with warmer temperatures. The snow was a mix of fresh and older, transformed snow mixed in from below the snow deck. Below are our testing notes from the week:

For paraffin waxes Ski*Go ran well all week. We started testing on Friday before the races and HFP16 was a clear winner in our tests through the first two races. HFP16 is a hard paraffin wax that runs well in many different snow types. Later in the week as the temperatures warmed, Ski*Go HF Orange/Green Premix was our paraffin choice. This is also a wax that we have had good luck with in many different conditions and also has a wide temperature range. We sell this wax already premixed in 200g bars, it can also be made by mixing Ski*Go HF Orange and HF Green 50:50. Other paraffin waxes that ran well during the week were straight Ski*Go HF Orange and Holmenkol Racing Mix Mid.

Holmenkol Race Powder Mid was our most consistent powder through the week. This was not a surprise to us, last year we used Race Powder Mid exclusively in all the races even at colder temperatures than we would normally recommend. Ski*Go C44/7 powder ran well for the very first race, but was not as fast for the remainder of the week. We have often had these type of results with C44/7, it can be quite good, but it is a wax that needs to be tested before use. Other powders that ran well during the week were Start SFR75, Ski*Go C105, and Toko Jetstream Red 2.0.

We had a number of good topcoat options, including one of our perennial favorites Ski*Go C22 Block. C22 was in the top of testing all week and we heard from a number of teams using this block with excellent results, including a couple of podium places throughout the week. We have written about C22 before, it is worth mentioning again that this block is a must have in every wax box. For those investing in one topcoat, it is a near universal topcoat as we have had good luck with it in nearly every temperature and snow type. Other topcoats we had luck with were Ski*Go C105 Block and Holmenkol Mid08 Block. We also tested a number of liquids during the week and found that blocks were running faster.

We had a grind test fleet in Houghton that we tested periodically throughout the week. For the majority of the week our two most popular cold grinds S0.3 and S1.3 were our fastest grinds in testing, we tested these against other cold grinds in our menu and a few experimental grinds. Later in the week when the temperatures went up slightly, our S2.2 was fast along with two new test grinds that we have been working on to fill the spaces around our S2.2. We were encouraged by the results of these new grinds, and can expect to see a few additional grinds added to our menu next year. For hand structure the Holmenkol Cross Structure tool was running later in the week, a number of teams were using this tool to good effect.

It was a great week to be a part of, thanks to all the teams that checked in with us throughout the week. Also a big congratulations to all the competitors that took park in the races!