SLUSKI takes Lake Placid

By Drew Houx '18

The forecast predicted rain, cold temperatures, and numbing wind… but SLUSKI packed the vans anyway. With high hopes for a great training weekend in Lake Placid, nothing was going to deter us from getting in two really good workouts to top of another big week of training.  We were planning on going to Mount Van Hoevenberg (site of the upcoming 2015 NCAA Championships) for bounding intervals, then back down into the village for lunch, and then out towards Whiteface to do a grueling double pole work out. With a great day of training on the schedule, the team was ready to make the absolute most of the trip.

For many freshmen this was our first trip to the historic Olympic site of Mount Van Hoevengerg, and we were excited to see the trails that we would be racing and training on this winter.  With the rain and wind picking up and the temperatures dropping, the team got ready for our bounding intervals on the Ladies 5k course. Those of you who know the Ladies 5k know about the abundance of hills, which made for a perfect bounding work out. We completed three rounds through the 5k loop bounding each of the up hills and resting the down hills. This was a really great workout for the team not only because we got on the Mount Van Ho trails, but also because of the great interval session. After getting thoroughly acquainted with these trails, we cannot wait to see them again with snow. Cold and wet, we finished up the work out and were ready to head to town for some lunch.

Isaac Wright ’18 and Calvin Swomley ’17 kill it in a bounding interval on the Ladies 5k

We decided to get lunch at a nice restaurant called 46 Sandwiches. This might have been the highlight of the day for the team; whether because of the great food or the fact that it was dry and warm, we may never know. Lake Placid was a great town to stop in for a few hours to get some good food, warm drinks, and just relax.

After lunch we headed to down to the town of Jay to start our Double Pole workout. Just as we were beginning our warm-up, the skies cleared and we saw some much-needed sunshine for the remainder of the workout. We double poled from the center of Jay to the tolls of the access road on Whiteface. This was a great, grueling, work out to round off the great day of training. As Coach Terko would say, “this is a workout that you're going to be telling your grandchildren about from your rocking chair!”

Dana Hatton ’18 crushes it up to the tolls

After successfully making it to the top, a few members of the team decided to celebrate the long day with jumping in the freezing pond at the tolls (pictured below). Moments after getting in to vans, the clouds came back and within minutes the rain started up again; like always, time is everything and we had it down.

Here, Austin Meng ‘15 takes the leap of faith in to the body-numbing pond at the tolls

This picture was is the mapping of our DP workout. The shorter line, on the map, is our warm-up, and the longer one is our route up to the tolls. Above the map, the green line represents our elevation gain over the course of the workout, while the red one represents my heart rate.

Overall, it was a great day in Lake Placid and we cannot wait to get back and train there again soon!

Editors note: for many more photos of this trip visit the Team Facebook Page's LP Album!