By André Santos

Despite it being the middle of the summer, Russian Winter Team is getting ready for the next Visma Ski Classics Season in hard conditions. From the North Pole to the Caucasus Mountains, team members show how tough they are, and how much they love winter.

It is undeniable that Russian Winter Team is one of the strongest teams in the Visma Ski Classics circuit. After finishing 4^th in the Pro Team competition, the Russian team presents a challenge to the Scandinavian dominance. And at the individual level, some Russian Winter Team members are among the strongest athletes in the circuit. Ermil Vokuev and Maxim Vylegzanin finished in the top 10 in the Champion competition, and on the women’s side, Olga Tsareva just finished 11^th. Also, it is worthy to note that Russian Winter Team has promising athletes, such as Dmitry Bagrashov and Anastasia Rygalina.

Last week, the good shape of Russian Winter Team athletes was tested at the Russian Roller-ski Championships in the region of Sarov. Anastasia Rygalina won the 10 km skating race while Aleksandr Grebenko and Alexey Shemiakin finished 2^nd and 5^th respectively.

Then, starting this Friday, the Russian Pro Team will have their training camp in the region of the Caucasus Mountains, where one of the main objectives will be to recruit young female athletes.

“In July, we recruited male athletes. Now that we are moving to a training camp in the Caucasus, we want to find and recruit young female athletes,” says Andrey Tyuterev, Russian Winter Team’s Director. “In the Caucasus, we want to spend some days with hard training up all those high mountains. It will be interesting to watch how the young athletes work with the rest of the group. This way, it is easier to identify the strengths and weaknesses they possess, and then help them with that,” Andrey continues.

The team director is optimistic about the next season and hopes that three or four young athletes show progress in the pink and green jersey competitions. He is even very open about the kind of training that the team will be doing during this training camp.

“We will do three very long double poling sessions, three interval workouts and several hikes in an altitude of 3500-4000 above sea level.”

The Russian Winter Team athletes are not the only ones training hard and looking for snow during the summer. There is another member of the team who has a hunger for adventures in extreme conditions. Nikita Tamm, the owner of the team, just came back from the North Pole, after a trip in one of the world’s most powerful icebreakers.

“It took us twelve days to travel from Murmansk to the North Pole and during the trip, we also visited the Polar Station of Franz Josef Land, which was built in the early 20^th century. And when we reached the North Pole, we had the pleasure of hiking on snow,” says Nikita enthusiastically.

Russian Winter Team shows that they really love winter and are looking forward to starting the new season with great success in mind.