'Sticky' snow for Nunavut's ski team as they train for the Arctic Winter Games

If you ask 13-year-old Callum Goddard how his skis feel this year when training outdoors in Iqaluit, he's got one word: sticky.

A relative lack of snow, along with cold and very dry conditions, means Goddard has to work much harder to push his skis forward as he practices for the upcoming Arctic Winter Games (AWG). 

“The skis feel really sticky ... Not enough glide I feel,” said Goddard, who's part of Team Nunavut for the games in Whitehorse. 

This week, the Nunavut team’s coach Benoit Havard started grooming a few hundred metres of the ski trail for the young athletes to train on. These games will be the second time Nunavut's cross country skiers are competing, after their AWG debut in Alaska in 2024.

With no trees in Iqaluit and snow conditions that are always changing, Havard says it’s important to have a well-groomed trail to ski on. That's been tough so far this winter, he says.

“This year is unique,” he said. “I've never seen a dry condition like that at this period. We’ll get snow, of course, eventually, and we'll ski until end of May, June maybe. But it's a long start. It's a late start.”

Igimaq Williamson Bathory, another team member, says the conditions mean he’s only skied outdoors in Iqaluit a handful of times. 

“This is probably like my third time skiing this year,” he said. "We don't have as much glide as we do in the springtime because the snow is a lot colder and drier, so it's a little harder. Also, the air is really cold, so it's hard to get going for a bit and it's pretty dark in the winter, so we don't get to ski too far out.”

Still, the team finds other ways to train all year long. 

In the summer and fall, Williamson Bathory says they do rollerblade skiing, and run two to three times a week. 

This year, they also have a SkiErg, special fitness machine that simulates cross country skiing. Williamson Bathory says the machine helps build strength for skiing outdoors. 

"It works your core out a lot and I find my calves kind of hurt after a bit too,” he said. “It's definitely a good thing to do inside."

Earlier this month, the team also travelled south for the Gatineau Loppet in Quebec, to compete and get "lots of skis in their legs” before the AWG, according to Havard. The team did well, with Goddard and Williamson Bathory placing second and third in some of their races.  

“It's definitely a really good time to go down there because their ski season is around this time, when we don't have much skiing to do. And it's closer to [the] AWG, so we get to get some skiing in before our big competitions,” Williamson Bathory said.