Hafjell

Yesterday was a great day to be me!! It would have been better if my skis would have shown up, but I did get to do a full day of training on the race hill at Hafjell, the site of world cup finals and junior world championships!  Verdict, I can ski very well on that hill.  It is pretty terrainy, with lots of rolls, and some moderately steep pitches, but I felt really solid on the hill, and the jump.   I think that if the course setters set like they did yesterday, I could have a really good couple of races there.  I have been working to correct some of the problems that plagued my season this year.  Hopefully by the time we start racing again, I will be solid on my skis and ready to show the world whats up!

Training, finally!

Yesterday we started training here at Kvitfjell!  Yesterday we got do some good tough training in the national slope, which used to be the women's downhill course at the 1994 Lillehammer Olympic games.  The top section is pretty steep with some gnarly roll overs, and the botom half is pretty flat and its a real thigh burner!  So we got probably six or seven good runs on that one, just getting a feel for the snow here, then did some good free skiing drills in the afternoon.  This morning we set up a brush course on the training slope to work on the form and do some skating.  In the afternoon we ventured down to the bottom half of the olympic downhill to do some jump training on the maaasssiiivveeee drop offs down there!  It was really fun, but a litte scary do hit some of the jumps. We were going quittteee a long ways on some of those jumps.  Tomorrow we will be back on the national slope for more good training!  Hopefully my skis get here soon so that I can get em fasstt!!

Strannggee feeling!

So the last two days I have skied on Alpine skis, just as a little midseason fun break sort of thing, and its been willdd!!!  I skied on slalom skis for the first time in...a long time and WOW are they fun.  They turn sooo fast its like you have little rockets under your feet!!  Also not very long, and easy to tip over..fyi!  Right now I am allll alone at Kvitfjell so I am just free-skiing, letting my body relax, making some fun turns, and overall enjoying skiing!  Shane pulls into town late tomorrow night, and we start training on thursday! Lets get this party started!!

Still snowing in Kvitfjell

I got to Kvitfjell on Wednesday night...it was snowing.  I woke up on thursday morning, still snowing.  We skied all day, and it snowed all day.  I wake up this morning...and you guessed it...still snowing.  Since I have been here....it has literally snowed the entire time, non-stop.   It really hasn't amounted to much though, the snow is sooo light.  Its like skiing through dish-soap bubbles.  Bu it is good to be on snow!  I am now the proud owner of a Norwegian seasons pass!   I am going to be here long enough that I just bought one...pretty sweet!!   We don't start training until next week, when Shane gets here, so for now we are just enjoying the free-skiing! That also gives me plenty of time to sort out my ski situation.  I just appoxied my top-sheet back onto the base of my ski so we will find out how well that worked, but it was worse than I thought, the screws looked like they were pulling out too, which is noott good, so we will soon find out if my repairs are going to work, or if I am in the clear and they are ready to race!

Rottefella!!

I got to go to the one and only Rottefella factory in  Drammen, Norway!  I was shocked to see how small it is!  Only seventy people work for Rottefella! The building is really not that big, but they can really churn out a lot of product!!  We got the full tour of all of their production, assembly, everything except product development...not sure why, but I can probably guess!  They also left us will a shopping bag FULL of ski straps...most of them for the two danish boys, but even them with all their skis could never use all of them...I think there are probably fifty pairs!!  All in all a very cool experience to see how all of our bindings are made, and to meet the people who make it happen over there!  Right now I am staying at Sara Guribye's house in Oslo!  She was an exchange student in Littleton last year, and her family was nice enough to let me spend the night at there house on my way to Kvitfjell!  Tomorrow I will take the train up north and we commence the training!!

Back on the NET!!

Since I have last checked in, I have raced a terrible classic, driven 2490 kilometers, including driving...me driving 3 hours of me driving on the German Autobahn!  The most terrifying and awesome experience ever (more on that later).  Back to the classic in Spain.  While I was tuning my skis before the race, I noticed that my binding was pulling out of my skis, pulling the top sheet of the ski with it...not good!  So I raced on my training skis, which did not go so well.  They are in pretty rough shape after some rocky skiing in Thyon and Spain.  The gases got a couple huggeee "gashes" in them.  And there are a couple big chunks taken out of the edges.  So I am either going to have to have some serious work done to them, and my race skis...or I am going to have to get new skis.  Right now the latter is looking more likely, since I have a long time before I am racing again....we shall see!  

The drive here was willllddd!!  Twenty something hours...and some craazzyy stuff.  I slept for the first eight hours while Thomas drove, and that got us through France, then I took over for about four hours through Germany...crazy.  I was driving about 130 km/h, the "recommended" speed on the autobahn.  From 2:30 to 6:30 there are only a few things on the roads, lots and lots of trucks, going 90 km/h, a few cars and vans going about the smae speed as me, and then every once an a while you run into a few cars that are fllyyinnnggg.  You can see them coming from behind you, and they come quiickk.  Then just like that they are past you and 100 meters past you like you aren't even moving...like that.  Its awesome to see, but at the same time is terrifying!  Anyways....we are now on a giant ferry from Keil, Germany to Goetteborg, Sweden for the next...long time!  Final destination: Norway!!

Espannaa day 2

Well today was nothing special...I had a pretty mediocre first run, followed by a crash in the skate. I think my binding was on crooked after I went through the wrap a little rough.  Soo I ended up getting a little tangled in the skate netting annddd started dead last in the second run.  The second run course was a little bit like skiing a skiercross course  for people like 4 inches tall.  Those bumps were craazzyyy!!  But I was still able to move up to 31st...so not all bad.  Hopefully tomorrow I can do better in the classic.  I seemed to liek the classic pitch a little it better than the one we skied today!

Esssppannnnaaa day 1!!

Another beautiful day here in Spain!  We had a pretty gnarly course today!  Not too too steep, but the turns were very tight and after the jump lots of people got knocked out there today.  I had a decent first run, but with lots of penalties.   The second was much better, I was laying down a pretty good run, I nailed the gates after the jump, and carried maybe a bit too much speed on to the flat.  I had to dump all of it when the course got a bit tight.  I was skiing a very tight line, straight and late, and just never got back on line.  I still ended up in 15th place, with 10 penalties.  So, tough race today but hopefully I can nail it in the sprint tomorrow!

ESSPPANNAAA!!!

We made it to Spain mostly in once piece.  The Long's car broke down so they finished the trip in a ttinny little car!  Its beautiful here, in a summer sort of way.  As in I just got back from a quick soccer game where shorts and a tee-shirt were too many clothes.  The skiing is still good though.  The snow is super hard underneath, and I felt pretty solid in training today!  Tomorrow we are racing GS, I am pretty stoked to race here!  Getting ready to shred!

Well..

Yesterdays classic was a ccraaankkkerrr!!  They cut the jump back over a meter, the TD said he wanted seven men to make the line..and I am pretty sure he was quite successful!  The thing was a monster! I had another one of those races that was good, just not great.  The course was not quite as turny as I had hoped, but I still skied it okay.  I think I ended up in 21st place overall.  Obviously not what i was looking for.  I think all the little tiny mistakes i am making are starting to add up.  I am starting to develop a pretty terrible habit of droping my inside hand to the snow which pretty much makes the end of my turns wash out.  So I am not really getting the lateral acceleration that I was getting earlier this year.  Hopefully I can pull out of that in Spain!  We are going to make the 9 hourish drive tomorrow...blaaaahhh!!

NIght SPPRRIINNTT!

So the furstrated meter went waaayy down today...overall.   I laid down a sweet first run, 13th. Laid down another sweet second run, until my skis decided to diverge causing a nice little crash.  So I ended up 23rd.  I still scored so thats nice, but overall it was a tough day.  Tomorrow is the classic.  I am pretty stoked because my favorite course setter, one of the french coaches Denis, is setting.  Hopefully I can go out and lay down a ripper!  He sets courses that have more gates, but smaller turns, so you have to stivot a lot and make fewer clean turns.  They are more alpine style GS courses, but they suit my admittedly messy style a little bit more!

Night Sprint!

I am pretty stoked for our night sprint here in Meribel, France!!  We had some pretty decent training runs this morning on the super hard snow here.  Apparently it hasn't snowed here since December 25th...and it shows.  The hill is rock solid!  Thats okay by me though.  The course is already set, and it looks like a ripper, turny and steep!  Inspection starts at 3:30 so we are just resting up before its time to go get shreddy!!

Better...

Well we are back in action.  I had a solid run today, not great, not even good, just solid.  I skied more the way I wanted to, I just hit a brick wall on the really sweet uphill skate....But the skiing was good so thats what I was looking for.  I missed the jump line by ohhh about 6 inches, and I lost a little speed on the flat before the jump, so at least I know I can jump!  So tomorrow we are driving to Meribel for a sprint and a classic.  Along the way I will have buy a new pair of poles after breaking one yesterday...could have been part of my skating problems today, Shane's spare poles were a smidge short.  Looking forward to hard snow in Meribel!

ok..this is getting old.

So today gets another short post.  My computer decided it didn't want to charge...soo I have been internet-less for a couple days.  Shane and I got to train with Bastien Dayer on the race hill on monday and tuesday, which was sick!  I had some great training runs especially on tuesday.  Then today came along and everything fell apart.  I pretty much skied like a ten year old.  Thats all it really comes down to.  I just did not ski the way I am capable of.  Tomorrow is a brrruuttaallll classic course so hopefully I can lay down one solid run, seeing as thats all I have been able to do lately.  Jump is huge, skate is long, course is fast...just the way I like it.