We have had a good time communicating back and forth, mostly bragging about our various home-cooked meals...although the culinary competition is a bit one-sided since we have a whole kitchen at our disposal and the Nats crew has been frying pineapples on a hotplate:
Tasty grilled pineapple in Michigan
The racing has been great. With so many events at Nationals and a crew of five, it's daunting to recap every event...In the 10/15k skate Erin and Blaine led the way in 55th and 65th, respectively, with Kate and Will also posting strong results in 84th and 82nd.
In the classic sprints Erin posted a 74th, and Will and Calvin demonstrated impressive sprinting for distance specialists in 67th and 79th. Blaine ended up having the longest day (in a good way), posting a 58th in qualification and moving through the rounds to hang on to his position as the 9th junior overall thanks to a 3rd place in the B-final.
If those numbers seem relatively high to be celebrating...consider that this field is far larger and deeper than most any EISA race...this is a combination of Eastern, Midwestern, Western and Alaskan skiers, plus professional racers from across the country, guests from other nations, and US Ski Team members. In many cases a top-100 finish is a noteworthy result: to see SLUSKI fighting it out at places half that high is quite an achievement...as Ethan recently stated in an email to the athletic department:
"So far this has been our best showing as a team at the US Nationals in my tenure as head coach and bodes well for our potential this season. "
I think that sums it up pretty well! Today will feature a 20/30k mass start for the older racers, while Blaine tackles the other juniors in his premiere event, the 10k classic. You can search through results here, including the equally-strong SLUSKI results in the "College Cup", which measures all of the collegiate teams in attendance.
For some very unique videos of the events, check out the edits Chumley has put together that capture the scene out there well:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9kCuO9UzXfk&feature=youtu.be
Here in Lake Placid we have been showing the cold who's boss, getting out on some great conditions at Van Hoevenberg. Despite that warm-up and rain a week ago, almost every trail remains skiable and in great shape thanks to the awesome grooming crew. Flurries every day have slowly changed the surface from crushed ice to packed powder with each successive round of grooming!
After the cold skiing each day we have been warming back up with group-cooked meals, lots of card games, and a trip to the local bowling alley across the street.
Last night we played the Bob Washo classic SALAD BOWL
India attempts to act out a word for Sliz to guess
We also hooked up the computer to the big screen to watch the world premiere of Chumley's films from nationals!
But back to the skiing: Yesterday we held a 2-part "Tour De LP" skate timetrial. First up was a 2k prologue, the times of which were used to determine a "hunting start" skate pursuit half an hour later.
Kyle busts out of the start in the chilly prologue
Prologue winners Kyle and Taren maintained their head-starts in the pursuit to win the overall event, though we are still putting together the individual split-times from the 5k where it was reported that Mrs. Dana Hatton went particularly fast.
Dana leads India into the finish of the prologue
After a mid-day journey to the Albany airport by coach Terko, Austin officially joined the crew...albeit minus all his baggage thanks to a classic United Airlines fumble: if anyone in the Syracuse area finds bags with his name please let us know!
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