Eastern Cup review

The first Eastern Cups were a disaster for me. There were plenty of awesome races by SLUSKI, but there's also a lot to be taken from the off days as well. Saturday's classic sprint and Fridays skate race featured a huge field and plenty of snow. Wolcott was the only one to make the heats, and he was clearly fired up (when is he not?) about the head-to-head racing. Unfortunately a tangle on the downhill prematurely ended his racing. Some of the rest of us laughed off our own performances in the classic sprint too. We wanted to do well, for sure, but back at my house it was clear that we were all much more serious about throwing down in the 10k skate the next day. I wouldn't say my races leading up to the weekend were my best, but they weren't horrible per-say. This I needed something awesome. I was psyched to get out on the course and show what a summer of more training, better preparation and my most focused efforts could do. Wolcott avenged his unfair tangle (word is there was some offensive and aggressive moves) the previous day by storming to 15th and looking professional doing it. I ended up embarrassing myself. I never would've thought I'd see the day when I race better in a classic sprint than a 10k skate, but my placing (almost twice far back as my previous worst finish in an EC) didn't lie. After eating away our feelings in greasy pizza form at Piecasso down in the village, Steve and I drove back to my house in disgust. We hadn't even bothered to stay for the results to be tacked up. We just knew. After some time away and reflection, I know it's not the end of the world. I thought about the race reflection sheets, the conversations I had with other skiers, other times this had happened, and added up what went wrong and how to change it. The most important thing I did, however, was sit down and read.
Whenever racing is going on (and even when it's not), I find myself reaching for Momentum, Pete Vordenberg's book about ski racing. I read it in a day, and now it's full of notes, highlighted lines, rips and tears. I remember many parts word for word, and read certain sections before every race. No matter what I'm feeling, it seems there's always an answer in that book, my literal ski bible. After the race I found what I needed almost instantly.
“...when I found my rhythm and could match it to the terrain, I gained momentum and I flew. I found myself engaged in a sensation of utter enjoyment. But when my rhythm faltered, I labored. To regain it, I had to let go of the future, of how I was doing, of how the results would look when it was over, and focus on the present moment-on skiing perfectly...In this state I was not exempt from pain, but because I felt myself absorbed in the moment, skiing as well as I could, I was able to accept and even enjoy it” (35).
It's time to move on. To accept what happened. It is what it is, and its a learning experience more than anything else. Pain is going to happen, and sometimes it will be slow-going. Above all, you have to remember that bad days are going to be out there. If you don't take what you can from them and move on, they'll just show up a lot more. Take time to remember what the bad races feel like. It'll remind you of how much better great races feel, and it'll get you that much closer to them.


Piecasso-the best pizza East of Sergi's

Hello from Seattle Airport!!

As I sit in Seattle airport preparing to buckle down for a long night sleeping in the airport I’ve decided this is a better time than ever to do my first blog post.  So if you are wondering why this is so long and boring its because I am fighting my own boredom.  If I were you I wouldn’t read this….

Last year I was talking with E-Town about the options I had to take advantage of the extra season of eligibility I have from a red shirt year I took due to a back injury when I was a freshmen.  It came down to deferring for the next two fall semesters so I could return in the spring just in time for the start of carnival season.  Once we realized that this was my only option I got my creative juices flowing so I could make the most of my time off.  My good friend at the time was taking time off of school to ski with the Sun Valley Ski Education Foundation Olympic Development Team so I got Rick Kapala’s phone number and after a few weeks the plan was to meet the Sun Valley team in lake placid for their annual two week camp in late September.  I was a little bummed because I had already committed to teaching sailing in Martha’s Vineyard and as a result sacrifice solid summer training.  Then again I was going to Martha’s Vineyard to do what I love most in the summertime so I was hard to be that upset. 

 My summer training started off biking home from St. Lawrence to Cumberland Maine, which also resulted in a good knee injury from the two day, 335 mile suffer fest. Thankfully my dad met me half way and got me a hotel room, big dinner and freezing cold ice bath, a combination essential to making it all the way home.  Some people ask me why I did it and I say 95% of it is so I could say I did it and 5% was because I’m currently banned from driving in NY…for some reason. Two weeks later I was back on the road running, rollerskiing and totally avoiding my bike.  Post injury I was able to put in some good hours even though I was busy getting my family’s boat up to safety regulations and driving to places like Newport Rhode Island to get last minute parts so we would be ready for the Newport to Bermuda race.  We were off racing on June, 20^th for the 4 day 6 hour off-shore yacht racing adventure.  We didn’t get into any crazy storms, which was unfortunate but we had our fair share or sail changes and mishaps, which was exciting.  Once we landed in Bermuda training was the last thought in my mind.  We cleaned the boat as fast as we could then ran to the moped store, got our 1 minute instructional session and just before we set off we were warned that 1 and every 3 people that rent mopeds get into accidents.  Well there was 5 of us and all but one crashed.  Anders crashed while racing down main street weaving between cars, George crashed trying to do donuts, Ben crashed attempting wheelies and I crashed while off-road rally racing but it was all TOTALLY worth it. 

              The day I got home I had 12 hours until I had to be in Martha’s Vineyard to begin my 5^th year as a sailing instructor teaching kids to sail/race 420s.  I was super excited to get into a daily routine of work and good solid training.  Like every other summer of training I started off super strong with morning jogs, double sessions and steady gym workouts and by they end I found myself struggling to get out of bed in the morning and was wasting money on a gym membership.  I was able to get some decent hours in but my fear of flat terrain before getting to the island became a frustrating reality.  There are good hills on Martha’s Vineyard but just on the opposite side of the island from where I lived.  My roommates were also on the opposite side of the spectrum as far as our summer goals were concerned.  My goals of the summer were to get a good base of training built up and have a bomb-proof core so my back would be able to handle another season of hard ski racing.  My roommate’s goals were to have a “good time” which means party your face off.  They enjoyed bring the party to them, meaning our house.  It got to the point where our house was nicknamed the animal house both figuratively and literally.  Between the 2-6 parties per week, the beer lake in the basement where the beer pong table lived, mold in the bathroom, the beer can garden in our “lawn”, multiple police break-ins, food/dish/mold pile in the kitchen and….my all time favorite, multiple raccoon/skunk/whatever break-ins in the living room and basement from people leaving the sliding glass door open as they left the party.  To make up for it all, my house did have an outside shower to which I am officially in love with.

             Once I got off-island and after my short visit to SLU I was exhausted.  I wanted to do a 3000 TT to see where I was compared to last year but had to stop 3 laps into it…I was spent.  The latter end of sailing camp I was working 60-65 hour weeks and desperately trying to get into good shape so I would be able to survive the fall training with the Sun Valley team and was just burying myself deeper and deeper into exhaustion.  Thankfully two days after my trip to SLU I got my wisdom teeth pulled which forced me to take 10 days completely off and really think about what I needed to do to be ready in the 3 weeks I had until I planed to meet the SVSEF in Lake Placid. 

            I had never met Travis Jones who was the ODT coach and had only heard of the people on the team from going onto FasterSkier and looking at the top of results pages throughout the years. I felt awkward and out of shape since the team had been training together through the summer but I made friends quickly and slowly got the hang of training twice the hours I logged this summer.  We logged some 40 hours those two weeks which was a big change from the 10 hours per week I was struggling to get in the summer but when all you are doing is training and resting its amazing how many more hours you can log without getting tired.  The climb to the castle marked the end of the camp and was a result that I was happy with. 

            Training in Sun Valley was awesome.  The paved bike paths have a good amount of flats for the easy distance days and hilly terrain for intervals and such.  Sun Valley is surrounded by mountains and hundreds of miles of mountain bike paths where you can switch it up and easily go for a 4 hour running od without running on the same trail twice.  I lived in Ketchum, which was perfect because I didn’t have a car and it wasn’t a big deal biking to practice or if I was feeling lazy there were plenty of people on the team to bum a ride from.  I also ended up not getting a job, which I am not proud of but I feel like it was a good decision because otherwise I would not have been able to put in the hours I did.  I also found that everyone that did work got sick at least once when I was there and those that were fortunate not to work had a way better chance of staying healthy. On the harder weeks I would get into a routine of waking up around 8, eat, meet team at 9, come home anywhere from 10:30 to 12:30, eat, stretch, shower, eat, nap, go to grocery store or library, eat, pm workout (run, ski or gym), eat, shower, eat then hang out until bed around 10 or 11.  I was living the dream.  People would ask me if I got bored but I found that I am very good at keeping myself busy so I was rarely bored.   

            I was in Sun Valley for about 7 weeks before we left to travel the west for virtually the rest of my time with the team.  We went to West Yellowstone for a week and Silver Star British Colombia a two-week camp.  I raced 6 times in the 3 weeks we were gone and wasn’t able to pull a good result which was disappointing but at the same time I have two months until I want to be racing fast.  Had I been racing well I would have been worried that I was following the same path I was last year of peaking early and burning out in the heart of the season. 

            Every year before race season I evaluate the 6 or so months or training that I have done.  Biking home cost two weeks of training, the Bermuda race cost another week and a half and Martha’s Vineyard was a Nordic skiers training nightmare.  Training with Sun Valley allowed me to train and race with some of the top skiers in the US, got my butt into shape, allowed me to learn much more about training but I am officially dead broke.  I guess the big question is if I were to do it all over again would I change anything?  Absolutely not. Sure biking home was dumb, racing to Bermuda cost me, Martha’s Vineyard was stressful training and Sun Valley sucked my bank account dry but I have loved every second.  Had I been in Sun Valley for the summer through the fall I would be in much better shape and probably have a better season but to me its not worth giving everything else up.

Some people tell me that this week marks the end of my fun and I have to go back to reality but truth is that I am not. I tell them that I get to be home for Christmas, see my family then I am off to lala land training in Canada and then going back to SLU to see some of my best friends ever and to the school that I love.                

NYSEF opener

Here are some photos of the team at the NYSEF opener in Lake Placid today.  Conditions were good but a bit soft.  Aside from a few Mid Atlantic racers the field was basically the St. Lawrence team, although the event was rather well attended.  My fast rossis were enough to keep Ogden barely behind me into the finish but not enough to catch up to the other guys.  I didn't get to see it but Steve managed to take the win after skiing with Zach, Wolcott, and Kyle for most of the race.  On the women's side Kristen and Caroline lead the way with Caroline pulling away after what sounds like a pretty wild crash by Kristen on the rutted up downhill trying to pass some of the slower racers in the men's field.  On the whole I think most everyone was rather pleased with their race but not psyched to be heading into exam week.  Lots of parents were able to make it over today which was great, it is going to be fun enthusiastic crowd at the SLU tent this winter.  I have not seen full results posted yet but you should be able to find them at www.nysef.org when they are.

Looks like winter

Campus was covered in snow this morning with more throughout the day.  We probably even could have been skiing at Higley but we had already committed to continue grooming at Star Lake.   Certainly more snow and better conditions at Star Lake anyway so worth the extra van time.  Skate intervals went well, Nera was enjoying the snow as well.  It looks like we are going to have some options going into the weekend.  We are currently planning to go do the NYSEF opener at Lake Placid on Sunday and it also looks like Gatineu in Ottawa is getting quite a bit of snow today and so skiing should be excellend there by Friday so we may want to check it out.  Going into exam week for some means lots of extra work so having the time for travel can be tough.  Exam week though also offers some quite a bit of extra time for training, it varies a lot from student to student.

groom it up

I spent the morning grooming at star lake prior to the teams workout.  Typically Bob Washo handles this for us but with the short notice he was not available.  I kind of enjoy doing this from time to time anyway.  Unfortunately it sounds like a snowmobiler came through just after I finished and destroyed some of the work.  Not much we can do about that so I try not to get to frustrated by it.  I had to leave early but Knut thought the team got in a great workout anyway.

Snowed in at Star Lake

There is about 2 feet now of snow on the golf course at Star Lake.  The past two days we have just skated on it and packed as we skied it.  Today I really wanted to get it groomed but had some issues with parts missing from the groomer.  I sorted it out by the afternoon and Star Lake is now groomed, should be excellent skiing tommorow and through next week. 

Christmas Cookies!

We had the women's team over for annual cookie decorating.  We usually have the entire team over but the women's team has gotten so big we left the boys out.  They will probably still get to eat some of the cookies though, and I will have to come up with a tradition for the boys, maybe holiday van cleaning or something else that would be really cool.

We skied at Star Lake today and will probably be going there through the weekend as probably the only place with more snow is the Tug Hill plateau and given the academic strains that trip is only a last resort for getting on snow at this point.  Assuming all goes well we should be able to get Star Lake groomed early tomorrow morning in time for our workout, with about 6inches to a foot on the golf course there it should be great.

Thanksgiving camp, recap and pictures

By wednesday everyone was so busy skiing I think we didn't get many pictures.  Some of these photos are from skiing at the Stoneham Mountain base lodge on Tuesday afternoon and the others are from some classic no pole drills on Thursday.  A couple from Thanksgiving dinner as well.  

All in all it was quite an excellent training camp and we are all still rather tired, myself included.  Just two more weeks of classes left and then we get a break as everyone heads home after finals are completed.  We are not attending US Nationals as a team this year for the first time in the past six, given the hassel and expense of getting to Alaska I am certainly not regretting this decision.  We are going to focus on being ready for the college race season first and foremost.

We should be able to get on snow this weekend but are currently back to the dryland training.

huit kilometers patin et classic

They actually had much more than 8K, but that was what the woman said when I called Wednesday morning. They got about a foot overnight and then it continued snowing throughout the day, what a relief. Even without snow, camp had been going very well, the team remained very positive and seemed up for anything. However with a few wet inches on the ground in Stoneham our rollerskiing was not looking possible on the park road and running was not going to be very pleasant either. The snow was well beyond what I was expecting when we headed up the hill on Wednesday morning.
We now have about 20K open up at the Foret and a time trial planned for Saturday, should be some great skiing from here on out. Thanksgiving dinner was superb.
I might just leave the photography to Terko, see his post below.
We may even get a chance to ski at Mt. Saint Anne, last I checked they were beginning to groom but planning to open next week. It would be fun to ski there Sunday before leaving if they open.

You just had a near-life experience

Watching Canadian TV the other night, we all thought this ad was pretty funny. It also seemed to summarize our situation pretty well. Here in Stoneham, there's not much to think about except skiing. In a three-story chalet minutes from awesome trails, we spend our time in alternating states of ski workout butt-kicking and a lethargic daze. It's demanding, and it works.

Packing rollerskis was a little disheartening, but we still managed to find some reasonable snow skiing at the resort base, a golf course and a closed access road up the road from Foret Montmorency. After crunching away our ski bases on gravel and pounding the singletrack trails in a nearby park, the snow came. This morning we awoke to a blinding mid-winter whiteout, and instead of slicing our classic skis up cheese-grater style we should be hitting some fresh tracks tomorrow, either at Montmorency or Mount St Anne. Actual skiing is the closest you can get to really being there. In the moment. When you're spending a whole week with one focus, one goal, you can feel yourself getting closer to that moment when everything comes together. When you're not beating your body into mashed potatoes, though, you've gotta recover somehow.

So what do you do in Canada besides train?


Pool in the game room


Mariokart


Get work done (?)


Sleep



Pepper and Bogden continually competing for style points


Scuba Steve's having a better week after (almost) losing his passport and cutting his thumb open falling in a Tim Hortons parking lot


It's blurry, but this is our house pre-snow

News From Canada

Despite my best efforts to disrupt training (a few honest mistakes I'd prefer not going into), the team has managed to put in some quality sessions during the past few days. Despite a notable lack of snow, the ski area and a nearby park have provided remarkably good dryland opportunities. We managed to get on snow at the base of the Alpine area for about an hour this afternoon and roller-skiing and running at Jacques-Cartier Park has been a real treat. With snow in the forecast morale is high.

Star Lake finally comes through again

The Lake effect snow machine kicked some up to southern St. Lawrence County so we went to Star Lake today and skied on the town golf course.  With a little ice underneath about 1 inch of snow sometimes less we had just enough to skate around for a little over an hour.  While it really wasn't good enough to merit the 40min drive tomorrow it was fun for today.

Right now we are willing it to snow more in Quebec.  Looks like a couple inches on the ground currently but snow showers throughout the week and weekend and the temps are forecast to be cold.  Whatever happens with the ski conditions we should be able to get some high quality training in.  

NCAA XC Regionals at SLU

Congratulations Johannah!

Just wanted to mention Johannah's spectacular second place finish at today's NCAA regional meet, hosted by SLU. Together with Wendy Pavlus, she led the way to a third place team finish that hopefully will qualify them to the national meet in Indiana.

The SLU boys also impressed. There were two SLU runners, Ramsey and Kiplagat, in the top ten (or possibly top eleven) and the team placed fourth.

Although we still have some work to do, watching the races definitely got me excited about the up-coming winter.

I'm also willing to take today's SLU results as a good omen for our own season!

Pumpkins and Pics

I had a few members of the team over today to carve pumpkins after our TT on River Road. In the true Halloween meets nordic skiing spirit, our pumpkins were ski inspired.

Here's a leftover pic I owe the team from mid-semester break!

Also, here are a few pictures of the Triathlon venue for those interested...
And the start of the swim...

Higley photos

It looks like I didn't really put to much depth into my "most memorable experience" post earlier. Luckily, the skiing we've had the past few days takes the cake as far as memorable experiences go. Here's some shots from Higley, as well as a mini sprint Steve, Kyle, Ben and I set up on the Intramural soccer field Tuesday night.


Snowing buckets in October


Steve in the storm


Midwinter conditions


Nearly-groomed trails


On top of the world


This makes 6:30am practice really feel worthwhile


Exhibition sprints on the soccer field

Higley Digley open for business

This is I am fairly certain the earliest I have ever skied at Higley.  Sorry to not have pictures, forgot the camera, but Sam took some this afternoon that hopefully she can post them soon.  We had over a foot of snow to work with that Knut packed down with the snowmobile to about 4 inches of very firm but rather wet snow.  There were a few trees down that made it so we couldn't get a drag groomer in.  The skiing was good though and should be even better tomorrow morning.  Looking at the weather forecast it may not hold out past Friday but who wants to stop rollerskiing now anyway.  Campus is very wintery looking with about 5 or 6 inches falling in Canton overnight.

It looks like Gatineu even groomed but they got about the same amount as Canton.  You can check it out at www.xcottawa.ca.  If this was on the weekend we might have gone.

Most memorable experience thus far

I neglected to post these a while back, I asked all the first years around the beginning of October to tell me their most memorable experience thus far.   Here were the answers, at least at that point.

Ben Ogden: Pittsfield, MA

So far, I think that a really fun and certainly exciting memory was our hike up St. Regis the other week.  Though the RUN up wasn't necessarily that fun, once we got to the top, I was very satisfied with what we had just accomplished.  There were incredible views of the Adirondacks and the lakes in the valleys in between.  It was an unforgettable site.  I think all hikes are good as long as there is a worthy reward at the top.

Leah Hart: Meredith, NH

There have been many memorable moments, probably too many to count, but there is a certain practice that sticks out in my mind. Some of the girls and I trekked through Canton one oddly warm, humid Sunday morning to classic rollerski on the road of Hell. This is no joke. Never ski on 310, never. First of all, the shoulder was coated with a layer of dead frogs/frog body parts/frog guts. It was a Frogger gone way wrong. Once I got over the gross-ness of the situation it was a remotely fun pastime to dodge them in hopes of taking my mind of the second component of this horrible, terrible, never-to-repeat-again ski. The road was flat. All flat. No hills and no turns. There were fields to the left and fields to the right. (Oh yeah we saw a dead deer and skunk too). So here we are double poling through a flat war zone of decay and destruction. But wait it got worse; here came the third piece of the Perfect Storm. After an hour of double pole we decide to turn home. When Libby, Caroline, and I started the endless pole back to campus we noticed something was different. Yes some of the frogs were gone by this point, but with less frogs had arrived a headwind! Awesome. Taking turns leading and experimenting with aerodynamic formations, we struggle against the headwind (while drafting off the occasional Amish wagon)barely making it back to campus. Yes there was the option to go the way of the frogs, deer, and skunk, but we poled on...and on. We eventually made it home. We try to put that day out of our minds as a way to cope, but unfortunately I think it got the best of us....

Adam Terko: Shelburn, VT

So far one of my favorite experiences here was doing rollerski intervals with little kids standing outside yelling "Go USA! Go USA!" when we skied by.

Kelly Prime: Canajoharie, NY

I would definitely have to say that mine was getting an alpine start (3am) on my Pre-O trip and hiking to the top of Mt. Colden for the sunrise. 

Tri-ing in Arizona

Upon arriving in Arizona, I was no longer nervous, which actually made me more nervous, but I was totally exhausted. Turns out, it takes longer to get to Arizona than I thought, or maybe I had just become soft when it comes to travel. Either way, we arrived, slept and woke up on Saturday around 5:30 a.m. local time.

After picking up my bike (sans one pedal…so I had to buy a whole set to complete the bike) we headed over to the venue. The crowd was actually less intimidating than I thought, or at least, than it could have been. It helped that the race had around 2,000 triathletes in it, so most of the people were Arizona locals doing the quarter or half iron. The rest of Saturday was pretty uneventful. I did a quick little mini-tri, doing the swim course, a quick bike and a really short run. We finished the day with a BoUS informational meeting, dinner and some walking around Tempe, which had been invaded by a sea of mustard-yellow t-shirts as Arizona had a home game that night.

To set the context, the race was taking place at Tempe Town Beach, which is a few blocks from Arizona State, and right next to a large, river-looking pool. The locals actually called it a lake, which blew my mind, because as far as I could tell this cement-lined, run-off filled, life-form-less body of water was far from what I would classify as a lake. We spent much of the race crossing and re-crossing the various bridges along the “lake” many times, and also swam underneath the cement pillars. Success number one of my day: not swimming into a pillar.

Anyway, race morning came and came early. Thankfully, while I don’t think I was still on east coast time, I certainly wasn’t on west coast, so my waking up at 4:30 didn’t seem all that early. Race started at 6:30 and the BoUS athletes had our own wave (the first one). As we entered the water at 6:30 a.m. the sun had not yet risen. It was such a surreal experience to climb down the bleachers into the water, dive in and start a race with a slow glow rising from the horizon and the moon still high in the sky.

The swim was uneventful, except for the fact that I felt like I was all alone, definitely a bad sign, when I got out of the water. It was my first experience with wetsuit “strippers” which made the transition zone an interesting site. No sooner had I turned the corner than I saw bodies on the ground and volunteers tugging the wetsuits from them. I managed to have help getting my shoulder out of my suit, but took it the rest of the way off when I got to my bike.

The bike course was really interesting. We essentially weaved around the water for what was supposed to be a 27-mile course, but actually turned out to be 32 (a little detail they seemed to have forgotten to mention before the ride). The course was interesting with lots of 180 degree turnarounds and sharp corners. The only hills were on-ramps to bridges, which was actually a bummer because a few good climbs probably would have helped me. Regardless, the second lap of the ride was significantly more crowded as the other triathletes who started in the waves after us, joined us on the course. I got passed by A LOT of women on this ride…which was not unexpected, but still unfortunate.

I was pretty happy until the last 15 yards of the bike. Coming into the transition was a series of sharp right hand turns. There was no one in front of me and I was thanking my guardian angel for getting me through the bike without a flat or other malfunctions, UNTIL, a woman from Maine sprinted around me as I was turning into the parking lot. Hearing her, I braked slowly but she took a hard line into the corner and cut me completely off. I slammed on my brakes, attempting to avoid hitting the curb, and then spiraled over the handlebars. There was probably a loud gasp by the crowd and a few choice words from myself. But I said I was fine and slowly pried my feet out of my clips before getting up and running the bike the rest of the way to the transition area. Luckily I was fine, except some minor wrist bruising, and you can bet that I passed that lovely woman from Maine VERY early on in the run.

The run was hot, but dry, and it seemed very long. The course was very exposed, very flat and very boring. I caught a few people slowly, but was caught back by the woman from Texas with about a mile left. I had been chasing the woman from Nevada the whole race, although she apparently got lost because she blew by me at the line, when I thought she was in front of me.

The race in general was a rewarding experience. While it certainly wasn’t my best race, it was a fun race to be a part of. In the future, I now know that 2 months after the “season” is no longer post-season racing, as I certainly would have benefited from some more triathlon training. But considering my lack of preparation, I guess the race was a success as I accomplished both of my goals: to not die and to not finish last.

More on Whiteface

Though Adam has already posted (with utmost detail) on our trek up Whiteface, I thought I would share some more pictures and videos.