Is It Still Summer?

This summer has flown by! Holy cow. It’s been pretty busy too, at least for me. After my last post in… May, May?! Wow, time has gone by quickly. Anyways… after my crutches fiasco, I moved out to Park City for some summer training.

Park City (aka PC) is such a fun place to be in the summer, granted I’ve never been there in the winter (although I’ve heard it’s pretty fun). There is always something to do there whether you want to hang out in the park, go for a ride (mountain or road), hike up a mountain, float down a river, or drive 20 minutes to Salt Lake City, you will find yourself doing something 24/7. It also doesn’t hurt that it’s sunny like… every day. However, summer classes at Westminster (yes I go to school, kind of) started in June and I found myself not doing as many of the fun activities I’m used to. With work outs, physical therapy, school, and babysitting, I was a little more busy than I was prepared for.

So June and July flew by like they were nothing and all of a sudden I was about to leave for my first ski camp of the summer, which is where I am right now! What! Good ol’ Mount Hood! Did you know I’ve been to Mt. Hood every summer (besides two) since I was 10? That’s not exactly factual, but it’s close. The point is, I’ve been here a lot. There are only a few differences between being here now and then and they are as follows:

1. I’m not staying at the Huckleberry Inn anymore.
   1. This means a few things. I don’t get 4 milkshakes a day anymore (I think that was the most I ever got in one day). I don’t buy Bubblicious bubblegum by the 5 pack anymore and try to eat every piece at once. And I don’t share a bunk room with 3 other girls anymore.
2. I don’t have nearly as much energy.
   1. We used to wake up at 6AM, take 15 ski runs, get off the hill with more energy than what we started with, then go play capture the flag in the woods for 2 hours full on sprinting through the trees, and then somehow still have way too much energy for the rest of the day.
   2. Now we still get up at 6, take maybe 12 runs (on a good day), get off the hill wiped out, go on a hike for recovery, take a nap, and go to bed at 8.
3. We make our own dinners.
   1. That’s pretty self explanatory.

The skiing is still awesome, the snow just as hard in the morning, the sun just as bright. It hasn’t changed that much.

I’m here for another four days, take about ten days at home (YAY!) and then we head down to Chile, which is beginning to turn into another Mt. Hood for me (this will be the sixth birthday that I’ve celebrated there). I’m not complaining, don’t worry, I just hope there’s enough snow, I’ll let you know (that was an unintentional rhyme)!

 

This is only from 5 years ago. Only 5… Mt. Hood X-Factor camp in 2009.

This is from 6 years ago, so my first camp in Chile. I turned 16!

 

 

 

 

 

Summer Is On It’s Way!

Summer is almost here in the Rockies, although I have already spent two and a half weeks in summer. The Crazy Canuck and I went to Maui to rest up after a long winter. This season was interesting, for both of us. You can read about his on his blog: www.dustincook.ca .

My season, was very difficult, mentally and physically. After dislocating my elbow at the end of October, I missed my opportunity to start the World Cup circuit. I never another opportunity and without any World Cup starts, I had no chance to qualify for the Olympics, which was a long-shot no matter what, but disappointing nonetheless.

The hardest challenge I faced this year was getting my head back into actually racing. I thought I was racing right when I went out of the gate the first time this season, but what I didn’t realize was that I was mostly going to the motions of racing instead of trying to win. It was hard to realize that, but once I did, I knew that my injury threw off my game a lot more than I anticipated and I had to approach things differently. I trained a lot more than seasons previous, but not quite enough for my race mode to be automatic.

Eventually, I had two good races and won the NorAm Overall in Super-G, which was unexpected! This title allows me World Cup spots in Super-G for next season, which is a huge relief! The US Ski Team is pending announcement. Cross your fingers for me, as I await their decision.

Dustin and me with our trophies and hats.

On the podium!

Now that I’ve told you, roughly, about my season, I can tell you about MAUI!! Crazy Canuck started planning our vacation some time in January. Because of our crazy schedules, we basically had to pick a date and hope that our coaches wouldn’t schedule any camps during that time. It ended up working (surprisingly) and we spent two and a half weeks in paradise. Randomly, we were there at the exact time that seven of our friends were there, staying in the same town! What are the chances!

The first few days of the trip, Crazy and I did the touristy thing, rented a Jeep and drove the Hana Highway. It rained most of our drive which made for some spectacular waterfalls, and some slippery hikes. We bought the world’s best banana bread (which was so delicious) and walked through a bamboo forest. The next week and a half was filled with fun group activities; a lot of surfing, barbecuing, sun bathing, hiking, and for the ladies, some bathing suit fittings. Yes I said fittings. Resi Stiegler has a friend that makes bathing suits, and we got some Maui appropriate bathing suits. We pretty much looked like locals by the end.

Maui local?

Looking through the tops of the bamboo. So much bamboo!

Heavy flowing waterfall.

 

A beautiful Maui sunset.

 

World Cup Debut

These past couple of weeks have flown by. We started racing right before Thanksgiving, and before I knew it, it’s 13 days until Christmas! A lot has happened, that’s what I’m here to tell you!!

So… last season, I qualified to start World Cups in Downhill and Super-G for this season. My schedule had me doing my first World Cup in Lake Louise for the Downhill on the 30th of November. The Friday before Thanksgiving, we had a GS race, which doubled as a qualifier for the Aspen GS World Cup, and to my surprise, I qualified! This was extremely exciting for me because I’ve raced at Aspen my whole life, and I know the hill, and it’s practically my second home hill. I was also extremely nervous because I see GS as a very challenging event. The field is very deep and the race hill in Aspen isn’t very forgiving.

I kept my nerves in check the days approaching the race. We had a lovely Thanksgiving dinner with my family and extended family from Tahoe (most of whom had changed their flights so they could watch my first ever World Cup!) and then I left the next morning. The athletes got to free-ski the hill the day before, and that was the beginning of the steady uphill of nervousness. I played it cool, did my normal routine and went to bed. The whole night, I woke up at different intervals, wide-awake and ready to go.

Going up for inspection!

Finally it was the morning. I warmed up, ate breakfast, and took a couple free-runs. Then it was time for inspection (even this I was nervous for!). Being on the same hill, inspecting the same course as girls I’ve been watching for forever, knowing I was going to race against them today, was a crazy feeling. Waiting for the start was getting hard to handle and then once I was at the start warming up for my run, the butterflies were going nuts! I was breathing so forcefully and so quickly in the start trying to get the nerves under control, that I got lightheaded. The run itself wasn’t my best skiing ever, sorry to disappoint. But it was fun. I made my way through the finish corral, signed a bunch of autographs (which was one of the coolest parts) and finally got to see my family waiting for me. They had made posters to help cheer me on, which were super cute. I didn’t end up qualifying for second run, but it was a good experience and something I will never forget.

 

During the GS. Photo by: Kevin Pritchard

My sisters and me!

Two days later, I departed for the Lake Louise World Cup! After getting kicked off our first flight because the Swiss team had 49 ski bags and screwed up the weight of the plane, we flew up to Calgary, and drove the three-ish hours to the Lake Louise Chateau. Let me tell you, this hotel is so cool, especially right before Christmas because it’s all wintery, and there’s Christmas music, and a huge lake with mountains towering around it. It’s breathtaking.

View from the top.

The next three days were full of inspecting, waiting around for my start, taking a training run, barely making lunch at 2:30, recovering, doing video, doing meeting, eating dinner, and then going to bed. Each day was basically the same, but then the first race day was here. By then we had inspected the course four times (including that day) and ran it three times so I wasn’t nearly as nervous for this as I was for the GS in Aspen. Then we had to wait… and wait… and wait some more for weather holds. Finally, about three hours after start, I got in the gate. I ended up 51st… which was last, but I skied well! I could’ve skied better, but it was a great feeling being the 51st fastest women’s downhiller in the world. Cool right? The next day was about the same, with about an hour less of waiting. I was 48th! Still last though…

Waiting for the DH…

The next day was the Super-G, which I was really excited for. I love Super-G because after only one look at the course, you get one chance to ski the fastest you possibly can. It’s so thrilling to put everything you can into just over a minute of skiing. The course was really fun, and I skied well, but I made a few mistakes that cost me some time and I ended up 45th, which wasn’t last!

Three days after that, I won my first NorAm by .96 in the Downhill held at Copper Mountain. So, even though I didn’t get the results of my dreams in the World Cups, I know I have a ways to go, and I’m skiing well. I also know that just because I started in three World Cups, it doesn’t make me a World Cup skier. I’m working at it, and I’ll get there, but right now, I’m taking it day by day, trying to ski the fastest I can ski in whatever race I’m doing.