Day after day, just the same. Cold temperatures, easy waxing,
consistent track conditions from first skier to last, and sunshine -
lots of it. We've got race two of three behind us now, with one more
national championship race coming up tomorrow - 20km for women, 30km for
men, 5km for junior women and 10km for junior men - all classic mass
start. The skiers went for an easy hour of skiing today to loosen up
from yesterday and prepare for tomorrow, while the coaches did a little
more ski testing for both glide and kick. We've had good skis all week
so far, but the waxing is easy enough that our own waxing decisions have probably
been pretty similar or identical to the other wax technicians out there
this week.
Yesterday, we were a little (a lot) more
in our element than we were in the sprint race on Wednesday, and our
results showed it. Marine was thirteenth overall and she was the second
RMISA college woman, while Lukas was 24th overall and the fifth best
RMISA college skier. We've been at altitude for about five days. This
is the toughest period of adaptation to altitude, in my opinion, and
some of our skiers felt pretty heavy in the legs. Not a surprise. But
we also had some really encouraging results, and we're feeling
optimistic about the coming college racing season. You can find results
at
www.summittiming.com
Erik
Bjornsen stopped by this afternoon to join some of our team for an easy
40-minute run. Erik was a member of the UAA Ski Team in 2011 before
moving on to the US Ski Team, and he won yesterday's race - his first
ever national championship victory.
In case you were
wondering, dinners here are amazing. Every night, a different athlete
head chef and his/her sous-chefs create the best food I've eaten in a
long time. Every afternoon I wonder what kind of epicurean delight
awaits at the evening's dinner table. It's going to make me miss this
team next week when they continue their journey around the rocky
mountains for more racing and I'm back home in Alaska with my peanut butter sandwiches.
After
a sunny, restful day today, we'll get the skis prepared tonight and
we'll be ready for another go tomorrow. These mass-start races are
exciting and I'm looking forward to screaming my lungs out at our skiers
from the sidelines - while getting a suntan.
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| Team stretching the night before each race. |
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| Outdoor ski waxing at our house. |
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| Marine in action |
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| Lucky |
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| Karina and Marine |
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| Training on tomorrow's race course. That's the ski stadium in the background, and Heber Valley. |
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| All of us |
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