Wintery Mix

New England weather at its finest. I am currently living in the Northeast Kingdom, making my way through a training block that has gotten off to a bit of a slow start due in part to the snowy and rainy weather, or as they say around here "wintery mix". This descriptive phrase was unknown to me before my voyage out East, but after 5 years or so of dealing with this slush from the sky I have learned to factor it in a couple of times every winter. The good news is that the temperatures are slowly dropping back below freezing and snow fall is beginning to dissipate. Pretty soon the race track up at Burke Mountain, my training site and home of some important upcoming races in the next couple of weeks (NorAm Finals, Eastern Cup Finals), should turn rock hard as it gets colder, making for some great racing conditions.

Tomorrow the Vermont schools return from vacation meaning I will be back at work with the Ski and Ride program after training or during some off days. My ankle is not yet fully healed so some relaxing skiing should be just what the doctor ordered, allowing me to excercise the ankle in a compressed atmosphere and activate the muscle (good) without jamming it from a rut on a course (bad).

Finally, nice job USA! I can't decide if I am more impressed by the medal haul of the US alpine or nordic teams. My only experience watching nordic races is from rooting on my teammates at various NCAA Championships, so to watch so many races over the last couple of weeks has been pretty cool. I'm not sure how nordic skiers feel about the coverage from NBC, but it seemed pretty good. I can't say the same  for the coverage of alpine skiing, which was never aired live and canned into spotty 15 minute segments. Hopefully by the time Sochi rolls around whoever is covering the Games will have figured out how to get good ratings and allow viewers to see more than the top 3 and a token American racer. Of course, if I am a competitor I won't have to worry about it!

Olympics

How sweet is the Olympics. It’s no secret that every four years all kinds of people, including some whom normally don’t watch TV (my parents) turn their attention to the Olympics and its athletes for exactly 17 days before typical sport story lines take over the airwaves again. But for these two and half weeks D Wade can’t top Apollo Ohno in popularity; the Duke-UNC basketball game winner isn’t as important as who takes gold in the downhill. So when I watch the opening ceremonies and see people that I have competed against for the better part of my life smiling while decked out in USA gear, it reaffirms that making it to the big show is a real possibility and also how bright the spotlight of the Olympics is.

I’m only 3 years 350 days before the next Olympic selections, currently in Park City for races that many Vancouver Olympic racers in the tech events are using for practice. The Swedish Olympic team is also here training before the tech events, donning their new Olympic suits, which ups the intensity a little bit. I however was not able to race today. 5 days ago I compressed my ankle in a GS at Stowe, breaking my ski and binding in a crash. I was hopeful that I would be able to race in these high quality races, to the extent that I still flew out here and had a bib this morning. But after a warm up run I realized that it wasn’t in the cards. I am going to sit out tomorrow as well and prepare for the two slalom races on Wednesday. I’m crossing my fingers.

On Thursday I head back to the East. Looking to rest up during the next couple of week before an onslaught of racing later in March. Go USA! Talk to you soon.