Cross-Country Skiing Holidays, Tours & Courses
Tel: +44 (0)1969 663388
Please select any picture for a larger view (opens in new browser window)
Nordic Challenge provides high quality coaching in the challenging and increasingly popular sport of (Nordic) cross-country skiing. Uniquely, we also use this sport as a medium for delivering our own refreshingly original brand of Team Building and Leadership Training for Companies and other organisations .
We are located in North Yorkshire but run all our courses in Norway from January to April.
The Co-Directors of Nordic Challenge are Nick Gaskell and Tony Turnbull. They personally deliver the training on all our courses, assisted by consultants and instructors.
Nick served in the Army for 34 years as an Infantry officer, in national and international appointments in Europe, the Far East and Middle East. His main expertise was in operations, training and development. He taught leadership to potential officers, and to leaders in all three services to a senior level. He has been involved in sport management and coaching both in and outside the Services. He has been a Director of the British Association of Snowsport Instructors, BASI, the national governing body, and is a BASI National Nordic Ski Teacher. He has led expeditions in Norway and Canada and has coached cross-country skiing, including biathlon for many years. He is a Member of the Chartered Management Institute (MCMI) and a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society (FRGS).
Tony served for 31 years as an officer in The Royal Marines in national and international appointments, which included many winter deployments to Norway, Antarctica and the South Atlantic. He taught leadership to officers and leaders in the Royal Navy and served as the Royal Marines' representative at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. On leaving the Service he graduated from Oxford University with a BA (Hons). He spends the summer teaching English to foreign students. He is a BASI Nordic Ski Teacher and has delivered ski and leadership training in Norway for many years.
All our instructors are carefully selected for their experience, professional background and personal attributes; are British Association of Snowsports (BASI) qualified (or national equivalent) and have been vetted (Enhanced Disclosure) for work with children. Above all, they are passionate about Nordic skiing and teaching snowsports.
Together with the Company Directors, our instructors for 2012 are:
Pat is a BASI Nordic Ski and Telemark Instructor with many seasons coaching experience. He is also an International Mountain Leader with a long track record including Everest and Antarctica. He was the British Schools Explorers' Society’s Leader in 2007/08 and is one of our team of instructors for the Schools Cross-Country and Team Challenge Courses in Sjusjøen.
Nicky is a BASI Nordic Ski Teacher and has many years experience teaching Nordic skiing, which include several years coaching Army race teams. She also has considerable experience and skill teaching children, and will again be involved in our families programmes in 2012. She will be instructing on our Nordic track skiing holidays.
Nicky and Pat also run pre-skiing fitness courses in the Peak District for those joining Nordic Challenge holidays: www.middlemountains.co.uk
Jeff is a BASI Nordic Ski Teacher with many years teaching and coaching experience. He is a Mountain Leader and has worked as a leader with Operation Raleigh for 5 years. He has a wealth of racing and biathlon experience and will be one of our team working with both our 2012 Nordic track skiing holidays at Wadahl and our Schools courses in Sjusjøen.
Polly makes a welcome return after a year away. She is a BASI Telemark instructor and a Norwegian Ski Instructor (ISIA) and is a highly experienced skier, mountaineer and yachtswoman, and was the first Scottish woman to summit Mt Everest. She has been a member of the GB Nordic and biathlon squad. She has telemark skied down Mt McKinlay. She will be running our Telemark course in 2012 and also working with our Nordic track skiing holidays.
Silje is a qualified Norwegian Nordic and Telemark instructor. She was on the Norwegian Under 21 Nordic Skiing squad and was also the Norwegian U21 Dog Sledding champion for 4 years. She has a wealth of experience teaching every level of skier and will be instructing on our Schools Cross-Country skiing and Team Challenge courses.
Silje is also a personal trainer and runs her own business in Norway: www.denlillept.no
John is a BASI Nordic Instructor and International Mountain Leader. He is currently Deputy Head Teacher at Glenalmond College. He is one of our team available to work with our Schools’ Cross-Country and Team Building Courses at Sjusjøen and our Nordic track skiing holidays at Wadahl.
For further information on BASI
www.basi.org.uk (opens
in new browser window)
