Early Season and the snow is coming!

So last time there was an update, we were only doing dryland. Well, that has changed. A week after the post, the generous General Manager at Cranmore Mountain Resort let us ski around the base area, a good 1.4km manmade loop. The team has been training there for the past 2 weeks, as we didn't get a decent snowstorm until just recently.

Hannah actually smiling during training!?!

We mostly skated, doing long loops around the base. Traffic got interesting at times, as some of the newer kids hadn't quite gotten the hang of skiing yet.

Eh?

Sean came back from his Sweden trip and skied laps around us for a bit, but everyone liked seeing him again.

An Olympian at work

But, I was only on snow for a week before the first Eastern Cup, which was able to be held thanks to a tremendous effort by the folks at Craftsbury Outdoor Center. Timing was a tad off for the Classic Sprints (it's okay, I'm not a huge fan of them anyways), and Chelsea Little wrote a great article about that here. I came in 117th in the 1.4km sprint, landing me in the top 15 J1's from New England. 

Sunday was a different story. I had done no distance skate training to date aside from rollerskiing in preparation for the 11.25km race, and I was seeded in the middle of a pack of OJ's from Quebec. I managed to slip in behind Jack Hegman from UVM for my first 2 laps (out of 7, and I did count correctly this time), and then behind a Quebequois OJ who started behind me. I held onto both of them, and finished in 70th overall, the #3 J1 for New Hampshire (13th overall including Quebequois, 7th sans Canadians), and ahead of the entire St. Michael's Ski Team. 

Since then, I have been on snow exactly once for nordic training. 

The Eastern Cup was last sunday.

Monday: practice was cancelled due to inclement weather, after having a 2 hour delay at school.

Tuesday was supposed to be our first race: Cancelled due to weather, after another 2 hour delay.

Wednesday: My first Alpine race of the season at King Pine (also my first day on skis), rocked it on tele skis. Ended too late to go to practice.

Thursday: Chip made me go to jumping practice. Stair jumping for an hour wasnt that bad.

Friday: Non-mandatory practice, which was called off, again, due to weather after having a 2 hour delay.

Saturday!: Went skiing for 2 hours at Jackson. Conditions were marginal at best, due to an epic downpour the night before. The International Course was rough. and the Yodel ungroomed. The Ellis River Trail was good, and I'm looking at hitting up Great Glen Trails today.

Snow is in the forecast, so things are looking up. Hopefully conditions all around improve for some good break training.

SNOW!!!!!!!

Eastern Cup #2: A Learning Experience

Last weekend, the NENSA Eastern Cup's Maine Weekend was held in Farmington, Maine at Titcomb Ski Area. I left home Saturday morning at 5:00 in order to get to the mountain for course preview, for which I slept most of the way north.

The first day was a 1.6 km classic sprint qualifier, which was for the afternoon sprint heats. My time of 3:24.79 was good enough for 102nd place, but not enough for the final heats.

Men's Sprint Quarterfinal

The big challenge, and the learning experience, came day 2 during the 12km skate: an 8 lap ordeal that could have gone better for me. The temp at the start had risen from -4 degrees (F) to a balmy 7 by 1pm. The race started out fine, and was going well til around lap 6. That day, I was feeling strong, to the point of arrogance. I neglected to drink anything that day, and it took 6 laps to kick in. I stopped twice that lap: once in the woods to dry heave, and another to talk to my coach about the possibility of a DNF. He told me to keep going, and lap 7 was the same thing... stop, heave, go, stop, put my poles on, lap 8. I was feeling better by that point, and powered through the final lap, finishing 7 seconds behind the guy I've been chasing since freshman year. Had I not stopped, I would've beaten him. Even with my rather painful performance, I still managed to pull out a 100th place finish.

12km - Lap 5

12 km - Lap 6

New Suit, eh?

It's a little big, and i can only wear it in aboot half of my races, but I have a new suit! It's red, and black and has little leaves on it. There's something aboot it that makes me think it's from Canada...

Ignore the old chair cover behind it.

It comes from the 2003 University Games (Universiade) in Tarvisio, Italy. Worn by biathlete Chris Hallardson and made by Sugoi Performance Wear. Bonus: It came with a jacket too!