FasterSkier

Category: XCFeeds

A collection of live feeds from cross-country ski blogs around the web.

  • Just another reason to be an XC skier in Alaska!

    Summer glacier skiing can make the front page of the SUNDAY Anchorage Daily News! Check it out here:

    http://www.adn.com/2011/08/06/2003773/mountaintop-training-helps-athletes.html

    Marc Lester, ADN photographer came up and joined us for the first night of our glacier camp. When he wasn’t taking pictures he even joined us in the kitchen and assisted our cook crew. (Thanks Marc!) Check out this awesome six minute video that he made about us:


    Eagle Glacier Training Camp from Marc Lester on Vimeo.

    Here is the text of the article in case the link isn’t working for you:

    Mountaintop training leads to medals podiums

    By MARC LESTER and BETH BRAGG
    sports@adn.com
    Published: August 7th, 2011 09:42 PM
    Last Modified: August 8th, 2011 06:50 AM
    EAGLE GLACIER — It’s always winter at Eagle Glacier, perhaps never more so than in the summer. June, July and August mark the cross-country ski season at the Thomas Training Center, the facility that sits high on a ridge above Girdwood in the Chugach Mountains.
    This is where the best skiers in Alaska come to get better. Sometimes, like at a recent training camp that featured an Olympic gold medalist from Canada and a World Championship silver medalist from Alaska, it’s where the best skiers on the continent come to get better.
    Here, skiers find an endless winter — even when skiing in shorts and T-shirts under a blazing summer sun — that is helping them gain ground in a sport long dominated by Europeans.
    “We kind of went across the world and looked at all the different programs that were having high-level success and looked for the different things they used in their training,” said Erik Flora, head coach of the Alaska Pacific University nordic ski program, which runs the Thomas Training Center. “The first thing that became apparent is that as a country, we didn’t ski as much as the rest of the world. The world leaders, that is.”
    APU didn’t need to search the world for a solution to that shortcoming. It needed only to look up.

    LONG DAYS OF SKIING

    A mile high in the mountains and about a 10-minute helicopter ride from Girdwood, Eagle Glacier has long drawn skiers jonesing for snow during an Alaska summer.
    A photo album in the two-story training center shows scenes from the 1980s, when Olympic skiers Jim Galanes and Bill Spencer used a wall tent for a base camp while glacier training. Even before that, in the 1960s, Lowell Thomas Jr., the famed Alaska bush pilot and former lieutenant governor who donated $1 million to the APU nordic program in 1999, brought his kids here to ski in the summer.
    These days, skiers usually arrive in an Alpine Air helicopter and can look forward to hot food and warm beds after long days of glacier skiing. They sleep in bunk beds, cook meals together and hang clothes — some damp with sweat, some damp with the rain that occasionally pelts the glacier — on indoor clotheslines that become colorful displays of gloves, hats and socks.
    At the end of July, the training center was the scene of a week-long slumber party for some of the world’s top women. Among the 14 skiers from the United States and Canada who shared close quarters — and maybe some training secrets — were Chandra Crawford, an Olympic champion from Canada, and Kikkan Randall, a World Championship silver medalist from Anchorage.
    “We’re geographically isolated from our competitors, so it’s really great to have the Canadians up here,” said APU skier Holly Brooks, a 2010 Olympian who will compete for the U.S. Ski Team at the first series of World Cup races this winter. “They can bring in their strengths and their ideas, and what they’ve seen from the international field.
    “I think that we’ve realized that in order to get better and to improve, we have to work together. We have to share some of our ideas and some of our quote-unquote trade secrets.”
    Not that all of the sharing involves skiing.
    Crawford, who won the sprint race at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, spent some of her downtime playing the guitar, teaching chords and organizing a three-part-harmony sing-along with APU skiers Becca Rorabaugh and Kinsey Loan.
    MISERY LEADS TO MEDALS

    At the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, after posting the then-best finish in history by an American woman, Anchorage’s Nina Kemppel paid tribute to Eagle Glacier. She had skied to 15th place in the women’s 30-kilometer classic, a race made messy and difficult by wet, falling snow and 33-degree temperatures.
    “Thank you, Jim Galanes, for making me ski on all of those horrible, ucky days with no kick wax up at Eagle Glacier,” she said.
    At a 2007 sprint race in Rybinsk, Russia, after becoming the first American woman to win a World Cup medal, Randall gave credit to the glacier. She had placed third on a sprint course pieced together with crushed ice.
    “Conditions were what you might see on a glacier in Alaska during the summer,” she said. “I’ve asked myself (at Eagle Glacier), ‘When am I ever gonna race on this?’ It was good today to have that experience.”
    At last season’s national championships in Maine, the APU ski team turned heads with its domination of the awards podium — and again the glacier earned praise.
    “Eagle Glacier is a critical component in that we’re able to come up here once a month and ski for seven days,” Flora said. “And so you never lose that snow feel.”
    ‘A LOT OF MILES’
    Because this is a glacier, there are hazards.
    Crevasses are a concern, so tracks are set in areas with low probability of crevasses and the course is marked by wands.
    The two-story building is bolted to an outcrop of rocks between the glacier and a cliff. The cliff features a nearly vertical drop and yellow tape warns people to keep their distance. If anyone is caught beyond the yellow tape, a helicopter is called and the person is kicked out of the camp.
    A staff of three, including Flora, runs the center but athletes are expected to pitch in. The staff is in charge of setting and grooming trails — a job made more pleasant this summer with the arrival of a new PistenBully — but athletes help with maintenance and by taking care of the cooking.
    Meals served at the recent women’s camp can best be described as heaping: a mound of food for every plate, with appetites to match — the result of two long workouts a day.
    “We’re expecting them to ski a whole lot,” Flora said. “We use this camp to build endurance. One of the ways to build endurance is to ski a lot. Ski a lot, a lot, a lot of miles.”
    Flora estimated skiers at the women’s camp put in 60 to 75 kilometers a day on an 8-kilometer loop. For the entire week, that added up to about 25 hours of skiing.
    Between workouts and in the evening, athletes enjoy living arrangements that are communal but quite civilized.
    There are composting toilets and a supply of water from a nearby pond. There’s a dresser filled with old VHS tapes and newer DVDs and a television to watch them on. There’s a big freezer stocked with food and an exercise room equipped with a stationary bicycle — and decorated with a poster of four-time Olympian Kemppel.
    “I love it,” Randall said. “It’s a great chance to eat, sleep and train. And the good camaraderie of everybody just working hard and suffering through some tough conditions and also celebrating some just absolutely beautiful days. We laugh a lot. We have fun a lot.”
    And best of all, the glacier is just an hour away from Anchorage, a trip that includes a quick helicopter ride to the training center.
    “This is a huge advantage,” Randall said. “I mean, it’s almost ridiculous when you can be at your house one minute and an hour later you’re up here skiing on the glacier. It’s an incredible facility, really.”



    Read more: http://www.adn.com/2011/08/06/2003773/mountaintop-training-helps-athletes.html#ixzz1URbUhTqs

  • Head-to-Head: Mika Myllylae vs. Thomas Alsgaard

    I haven’t done one of these in a while, but with Mika Myllylae in the news recently I thought this might be fun…

    This head-to-head matchup might not be the first you’d think of to look at, but you end up with an interesting graph nonetheless.  As always, I grabbed the 54 races where Myllylae (FIN) and Alsgaard (NOR) raced against each other directly in WC, OWG or WSC races.  Since these guys are both largely pre-sprinting era skiers, we’ll only look at distance races.

    Then we simply plot the difference in FIS points between the skiers:

    Remember that since lower FIS points are better, positive values represent a win for Alsgaard and negative values represent a win for Myllylae.  Each skier had their strengths, eh?  Alsgaard, true to form, kicked Myllylae’s arse in skating during the first half of the 90′s and Myllylae correspondingly kicked Alsgard’s butt in classic races.

    But then they each significantly improved their weak techniques (since it doesn’t make much sense that they would both get worse at they better techniques) until they reached some level of parity by the end of the decade.  The actual reversal of the trend lines here is somewhat misleading, most likely an artifact of the small number of races in 2000 and 2001.

    Just a simple picture of two somewhat one sided skiers becoming considerably less one sided.

    Related posts:

    1. <Head-to-Head
    2. <Bjoern Daehlie vs Thomas Alsgaard
    3. <Head-to-Head: Marit vs Justyna


  • Update from J2 Camp

    Brooke has sent us some pictures from the National J2 camp in Sun Valley. Weather has been great and everyone is working hard and having a good time.Thanks to SV for hosting the camp and all of the coaches for their hard work!
    Tyler found the warm springs again (we went there during spring series).
    Hamish running his favorite event, the hill climb.
    Brooke during a skating workout.

    Anika working on her V1.
    Ben and Hamish.

  • Can you play Dodgeball with 90 kids?

    Basketball is king at the North Minneapolis Boys and Girls Club. We have six hoops and ten balls and there is always a game being played.

    Alison teaching me a few things about Basketball. Research has said that it takes 10,000 hours to master something and the kids at the club are working their way there shooting hoops.

    I have some practice still to make with my shooting, but I have been able to teach the kids the importance of being fit and moving on the court. We have also been working on playing fair and honest.

    We close the gym down after snack each day to play some sort of new or different game. This week we played the largest game of dodge-ball I have ever played. It was awesome. We had about 45 on 45, but there is a good chance there was more than that. Everyone had a blast.

    It is Hot and Humid out so most of our activities have been outside. The LCO Club made their annual trip to the zoo and I met up with the crew to show them around and share with them my love of animals. The Minnesota Zoo has a new Penguin exhibit which was a big hit. It was the first time anyone in my group had seen a penguin. Of course we spent a lot of time in the fountain to keep cool.

    Yes, that is a tiger. Only 400 Amur Tigers live in the wild according to a 2005 survey. It is important that we do our part to be good the environment and help protect animals.

  • Can you play Dodgeball with 90 kids?

    Basketball is king at the North Minneapolis Boys and Girls Club. We have six hoops and ten balls and there is always a game being played.

    Alison teaching me a few things about Basketball. Research has said that it takes 10,000 hours to master something and the kids at the club are working their way there shooting hoops.

    I have some practice still to make with my shooting, but I have been able to teach the kids the importance of being fit and moving on the court. We have also been working on playing fair and honest.

    We close the gym down after snack each day to play some sort of new or different game. This week we played the largest game of dodge-ball I have ever played. It was awesome. We had about 45 on 45, but there is a good chance there was more than that. Everyone had a blast.

    It is Hot and Humid out so most of our activities have been outside. The LCO Club made their annual trip to the zoo and I met up with the crew to show them around and share with them my love of animals. The Minnesota Zoo has a new Penguin exhibit which was a big hit. It was the first time anyone in my group had seen a penguin. Of course we spent a lot of time in the fountain to keep cool.

    Yes, that is a tiger. Only 400 Amur Tigers live in the wild according to a 2005 survey. It is important that we do our part to be good the environment and help protect animals.

  • Can you play Dodgeball with 90 kids?

    Basketball is king at the North Minneapolis Boys and Girls Club. We have six hoops and ten balls and there is always a game being played.

    Alison teaching me a few things about Basketball. Research has said that it takes 10,000 hours to master something and the kids at the club are working their way there shooting hoops.

    I have some practice still to make with my shooting, but I have been able to teach the kids the importance of being fit and moving on the court. We have also been working on playing fair and honest.

    We close the gym down after snack each day to play some sort of new or different game. This week we played the largest game of dodge-ball I have ever played. It was awesome. We had about 45 on 45, but there is a good chance there was more than that. Everyone had a blast.

    It is Hot and Humid out so most of our activities have been outside. The LCO Club made their annual trip to the zoo and I met up with the crew to show them around and share with them my love of animals. The Minnesota Zoo has a new Penguin exhibit which was a big hit. It was the first time anyone in my group had seen a penguin. Of course we spent a lot of time in the fountain to keep cool.

    Yes, that is a tiger. Only 400 Amur Tigers live in the wild according to a 2005 survey. It is important that we do our part to be good the environment and help protect animals.

  • Can you play Dodgeball with 90 kids?

    Basketball is king at the North Minneapolis Boys and Girls Club. We have six hoops and ten balls and there is always a game being played.

    Alison teaching me a few things about Basketball. Research has said that it takes 10,000 hours to master something and the kids at the club are working their way there shooting hoops.

    I have some practice still to make with my shooting, but I have been able to teach the kids the importance of being fit and moving on the court. We have also been working on playing fair and honest.

    We close the gym down after snack each day to play some sort of new or different game. This week we played the largest game of dodge-ball I have ever played. It was awesome. We had about 45 on 45, but there is a good chance there was more than that. Everyone had a blast.

    It is Hot and Humid out so most of our activities have been outside. The LCO Club made their annual trip to the zoo and I met up with the crew to show them around and share with them my love of animals. The Minnesota Zoo has a new Penguin exhibit which was a big hit. It was the first time anyone in my group had seen a penguin. Of course we spent a lot of time in the fountain to keep cool.

    Yes, that is a tiger. Only 400 Amur Tigers live in the wild according to a 2005 survey. It is important that we do our part to be good the environment and help protect animals.

  • Can 90 Kids Play Dodge-ball at Once?

    Basketball is king at the North Minneapolis Boys and Girls Club. We have six hoops and ten balls and there is always a game being played.

    Alison teaching me a few things about Basketball. Research has said that it takes 10,000 hours to master something and the kids at the club are working their way there shooting hoops.

    I have some practice still to make with my shooting, but I have been able to teach the kids the importance of being fit and moving on the court. We have also been working on playing fair and honest.

    We close the gym down after snack each day to play some sort of new or different game. This week we played the largest game of dodge-ball I have ever played. It was awesome. We had about 45 on 45, but there is a good chance there was more than that. Everyone had a blast.

    It is Hot and Humid out so most of our activities have been outside. The LCO Club made their annual trip to the zoo and I met up with the crew to show them around and share with them my love of animals. The Minnesota Zoo has a new Penguin exhibit which was a big hit. It was the first time anyone in my group had seen a penguin. Of course we spent a lot of time in the fountain to keep cool.

    Yes, that is a tiger. Only 400 Amur Tigers live in the wild according to a 2005 survey. It is important that we do our part to be good the environment and help protect animals.

  • Can 90 Kids Play Dodge-ball at Once?

    Basketball is king at the North Minneapolis Boys and Girls Club. We have six hoops and ten balls and there is always a game being played.

    Alison teaching me a few things about Basketball. Research has said that it takes 10,000 hours to master something and the kids at the club are working their way there shooting hoops.

    I have some practice still to make with my shooting, but I have been able to teach the kids the importance of being fit and moving on the court. We have also been working on playing fair and honest.

    We close the gym down after snack each day to play some sort of new or different game. This week we played the largest game of dodge-ball I have ever played. It was awesome. We had about 45 on 45, but there is a good chance there was more than that. Everyone had a blast.

    It is Hot and Humid out so most of our activities have been outside. The LCO Club made their annual trip to the zoo and I met up with the crew to show them around and share with them my love of animals. The Minnesota Zoo has a new Penguin exhibit which was a big hit. It was the first time anyone in my group had seen a penguin. Of course we spent a lot of time in the fountain to keep cool.

    Yes, that is a tiger. Only 400 Amur Tigers live in the wild according to a 2005 survey. It is important that we do our part to be good the environment and help protect animals.

  • Can 90 Kids Play Dodge-ball at Once?

    Basketball is king at the North Minneapolis Boys and Girls Club. We have six hoops and ten balls and there is always a game being played.

    Alison teaching me a few things about Basketball. Research has said that it takes 10,000 hours to master something and the kids at the club are working their way there shooting hoops.

    I have some practice still to make with my shooting, but I have been able to teach the kids the importance of being fit and moving on the court. We have also been working on playing fair and honest.

    We close the gym down after snack each day to play some sort of new or different game. This week we played the largest game of dodge-ball I have ever played. It was awesome. We had about 45 on 45, but there is a good chance there was more than that. Everyone had a blast.

    It is Hot and Humid out so most of our activities have been outside. The LCO Club made their annual trip to the zoo and I met up with the crew to show them around and share with them my love of animals. The Minnesota Zoo has a new Penguin exhibit which was a big hit. It was the first time anyone in my group had seen a penguin. Of course we spent a lot of time in the fountain to keep cool.

    Yes, that is a tiger. Only 400 Amur Tigers live in the wild according to a 2005 survey. It is important that we do our part to be good the environment and help protect animals.

  • Can 90 Kids Play Dodge-ball at Once?

    Basketball is king at the North Minneapolis Boys and Girls Club. We have six hoops and ten balls and there is always a game being played.

    Alison teaching me a few things about Basketball. Research has said that it takes 10,000 hours to master something and the kids at the club are working their way there shooting hoops.

    I have some practice still to make with my shooting, but I have been able to teach the kids the importance of being fit and moving on the court. We have also been working on playing fair and honest.

    We close the gym down after snack each day to play some sort of new or different game. This week we played the largest game of dodge-ball I have ever played. It was awesome. We had about 45 on 45, but there is a good chance there was more than that. Everyone had a blast.

    It is Hot and Humid out so most of our activities have been outside. The LCO Club made their annual trip to the zoo and I met up with the crew to show them around and share with them my love of animals. The Minnesota Zoo has a new Penguin exhibit which was a big hit. It was the first time anyone in my group had seen a penguin. Of course we spent a lot of time in the fountain to keep cool.

    Yes, that is a tiger. Only 400 Amur Tigers live in the wild according to a 2005 survey. It is important that we do our part to be good the environment and help protect animals.

  • High in the Canadian Rockies

    After a couple months of building websites and battling out ethical debates in the classroom with my Westminster classmates, the time finally came to make a ski pilgrimage up north with Leif Z, Bettina and a whole crew of Bozeman skiers. My first time heading to Canmore, Alberta was also my first ever NorAm race series. Since then, I’ve been back three times for World Cup comps. Every time, the trails and town has treated me well. Now, it’s pretty special to spend a couple weeks in the less-snowy months and get to know the mountains, the trails and the town a little bit better.

    After a four hour run up, over and around Sentinel Pass, the icy cool waters of Lake Louise were a perfect way to end the morning session. More than a couple tourists visiting the environs couldn’t believe a crew of us would soak our bodies in the frigid waters for a quarter-hour.

    At the top of Sentinel Pass, Bettina decided to try her best imitation of the white tailed ptarmigan flying over the mountain meadows.

    Losing the arm brace has allowed me to get back into the running groove as well. It feels good to move via foot… and via rollerskis again.

    Until the next time. +

  • High in the Canadian Rockies

    After a couple months of building websites and battling out ethical debates in the classroom with my Westminster classmates, the time finally came to make a ski pilgrimage up north with Leif Z, Bettina and a whole crew of Bozeman skiers. My first time heading to Canmore, Alberta was also my first ever NorAm race series. Since then, I’ve been back three times for World Cup comps. Every time, the trails and town has treated me well. Now, it’s pretty special to spend a couple weeks in the less-snowy months and get to know the mountains, the trails and the town a little bit better.

    After a four hour run up, over and around Sentinel Pass, the icy cool waters of Lake Louise were a perfect way to end the morning session. More than a couple tourists visiting the environs couldn’t believe a crew of us would soak our bodies in the frigid waters for a quarter-hour.

    At the top of Sentinel Pass, Bettina decided to try her best imitation of the white tailed ptarmigan flying over the mountain meadows.

    Losing the arm brace has allowed me to get back into the running groove as well. It feels good to move via foot… and via rollerskis again.

    Until the next time. +

  • High in the Canadian Rockies

    After a couple months of building websites and battling out ethical debates in the classroom with my Westminster classmates, the time finally came to make a ski pilgrimage up north with Leif Z, Bettina and a whole crew of Bozeman skiers. My first time heading to Canmore, Alberta was also my first ever NorAm race series. Since then, I’ve been back three times for World Cup comps. Every time, the trails and town has treated me well. Now, it’s pretty special to spend a couple weeks in the less-snowy months and get to know the mountains, the trails and the town a little bit better.

    After a four hour run up, over and around Sentinel Pass, the icy cool waters of Lake Louise were a perfect way to end the morning session. More than a couple tourists visiting the environs couldn’t believe a crew of us would soak our bodies in the frigid waters for a quarter-hour.

    At the top of Sentinel Pass, Bettina decided to try her best imitation of the white tailed ptarmigan flying over the mountain meadows.

    Losing the arm brace has allowed me to get back into the running groove as well. It feels good to move via foot… and via rollerskis again.

    Until the next time. +

  • High in the Canadian Rockies

    After a couple months of building websites and battling out ethical debates in the classroom with my Westminster classmates, the time finally came to make a ski pilgrimage up north with Leif Z, Bettina and a whole crew of Bozeman skiers. My first time heading to Canmore, Alberta was also my first ever NorAm race series. Since then, I’ve been back three times for World Cup comps. Every time, the trails and town has treated me well. Now, it’s pretty special to spend a couple weeks in the less-snowy months and get to know the mountains, the trails and the town a little bit better.

    After a four hour run up, over and around Sentinel Pass, the icy cool waters of Lake Louise were a perfect way to end the morning session. More than a couple tourists visiting the environs couldn’t believe a crew of us would soak our bodies in the frigid waters for a quarter-hour.

    At the top of Sentinel Pass, Bettina decided to try her best imitation of the white tailed ptarmigan flying over the mountain meadows.

    Losing the arm brace has allowed me to get back into the running groove as well. It feels good to move via foot… and via rollerskis again.

    Until the next time. +

  • The Hot Hand (con’t)

    In a previous post I raised the question of whether biathletes might be more likely to shoot clean (i.e. hit all five targets) if they have just shot clean at their most recent trip through the shooting range.

    I left off with some numbers that suggested this was the case, but they were aggregated over all athletes.  So when we conditioned on ‘shooting clean’ we ended up with a group of skiers that were simply better shots.  What we need to do is calculate these probabilities for each individual athlete.

    First a quick review to get us all up to speed:

    • Biathletes alternately ski and shoot
    • Depending on the type of race, the sequence of shooting stages may be one of Prone-Standing, Prone-Standing-Prone-Standing or Prone-Prone-Standing-Standing.
    • Each shooting stage involves shooting at five targets
    • Shooting standing is much harder than shooting prone

    Because of that last point, we can’t simply look at the probability someone shoots clean given that they just shot clean, since it will make a big difference depending on whether that sequence of stages is Prone-Standing, Standing-Standing, etc.

    I took all the records for biathletes in major international races that I have back to around 1991 and then tossed anyone with fewer than 50 races.  For each athlete, I calculated six probabilities:

    • Probability of shooting clean prone
    • Probability of shooting clean standing
    • Conditional probabilities of shooting clean in each of the four possible shooting stage sequences: Prone-Standing, Prone-Prone, Standing-Prone and Standing-Standing

    For instance, the Prone-Standing conditional probability represents the proportion of times that that athlete shot clean at a standing stage when their previous shooting stage (within that same race) was prone and they shot clean there as well.

    Here’s a graph of the results.  It’s a bit complicated to read, so I’ll walk you through it…

    The four panels correspond to the four possible sequences of shooting stages.  Each dot represents a single athlete.  In each panel, the x-axis represents the overall, unconditional probability of shooting clean prone (top) or standing (bottom).  The y-axis in each panel represents the conditional probability for the indicated sequence (PP = Prone-Prone, etc.).

    If shooting clean in one stage had no effect on shooting clean in the next stage, all the dots would lie on the blue lines (i.e., they’d be equal to the unconditional probabilities).

    The closest we get to that conclusion is in the PP panel (upper left), where the points seem roughly evenly scattered around the blue line, although perhaps there are more above it.

    The horizontal banding you see in the PP, SP and SS panels correspond primarily to athletes who had small numbers of those particular shooting transitions.  Fifty races doesn’t assure an equal number of shooting transition combinations in all cases.  So if someone has done very few races with a SS sequence of shooting stages, the probability estimate for them will be fairly crude, leading to lots of 0′s, 1′s and 1/2′s.

    The bottom two panels are particularly interesting.  They appear to show that there is a noticeable effect of shooting clean previously on shooting clean while standing.  And on top of that, the effect appears to get larger as the athlete’s overall skill at shooting increases.  Recall that as we move right on the x-axis, we’re moving towards skiers who are generally more accurate, and shoot clean more often.  Those points appear to be further above the blue line!

    This would suggest that a biathlete is more likely to shoot clean standing if they just shot clean (prone or standing), and that this effect is somewhat larger the better shot you are overall.

    Related posts:

    1. <Career Retrospective: Kati Wilhelm
    2. <US Biathlon Preview: Women
    3. <Biathlon Briefs: Lowell Bailey and Laura Spector


  • NAWTA – CHECK!

    “NAWTA”…. yep, you read it, “North American Women’s Training Alliance!!!!”  We recently finished our two week camp here in AK and it was awesome. My previous post chronicled some of our dryland activities and the second week we took our non-Alaskan friends to “Eagle,” our glacier training facility just outside of Girdwood.  I can’t tell you how cool it is to have a world class facility less than an hour away from where we live – at our disposal! It was great to get to share it with other girls from around the country – not forgetting Canada too.  They seemed to think it was a special place as well 🙂 
    We love our friends at Alpine Air!
    The skiing last week couldn’t have been much better.  First of all, the weather cooperated.  If you know anything about glacial weather systems or Eagle in particular – we hit the jackpot.  I didn’t have a single ski where it felt like I was continuously getting shot in the face with a pellet gun. The coaches didn’t have to spend 5 hours in the middle of the night fixing the Pisten Bully (Groomer) …why? Because after years and years of fundraising we got a new one!  And finally, the last thing that made this camp unique is that there were no boys to complain about the plethora of vegetables or immense amounts of salad we made at meal times! Because, with the exception of the coaches, this was an all-girl’s camp! 

    I could write about the training detail of the camp but I what I think is more notable is the “NAWTA” Alliance aspect of the camp. This camp represented all the top girls in North America coming together for one, okay, maybe TWO causes.  To work on skiing faster and to have a GOOD time. We had girls from many different teams….. we are certainly friends but when the gun goes off, we are also fierce competitors – both with each other but more importantly, with the rest of the world.  The unifying factor in the girls that attended this camp is that we all have one thing in common – to improve our results on the International circuit.  Yes, it’s true that in the past, the World Cup has been dominated by Europeans, particularly Scandinavians.  They enjoy the luxury of living in a society that embraces our sport; they are the NFL players of Sweden or Norway.  The girls over there have role models with Olympic Gold Medals around their necks, strong teams, and even stronger infrastructure to be a cross country (ski) athlete.  An example of this is a story that Kikkan told about her recent trip to Sweden to train with Anna Haag…….apparently many of the restaurants in their town “Sponsor” the athletes such that after long training sessions, athletes can simply stop at a restaurant and eat/re-fuel, free of charge! 

    Anyways, the cool part about this camp and this group of ladies is that (I think) we all realize that we need to come together, and work together if we’re going to be able to compete against the European girls. They have a geographic advantage – they enjoy short travel to races, going home on weekends or when they’re sick. Racing each other throughout the summer and fall. Meanwhile, we’re thousands of miles away in North America. 

    The first night’s cook crew – check out Liz (on the left!) 

    Bringing a group of girls like this together does many things – first, it gives you a zap of energy and inspiration. It’s great to compare roller ski blisters or commiserate about missing another concert with your friends or family reunion. We also have the opportunity to ski with each other, a lot.  As Erik, my coach says, “steal some of their secrets and share some of yours.”  If someone else is really good at something that you need to improve, go ski 20k behind them and see what you can pick up. Then, let someone else follow you and do the same. In order to get better, we have to do this. We have to get better together, boosting each other to new heights. There are tons of other benefits… for example, getting to spend some quality time together in a low-stress environment. None of us are racing against each other tomorrow for the last spot on the Olympic team so we can do things like make cookies together or in some cases, watch a Justin Bieber movie….. (I choose ski work during this bonding opportunity)

    Kikkan breaking in the new grill

    Days and weeks on the road can get long and lonely and the ability to enjoy and relate to those you’re traveling with is crucial. While these girls won’t replace my husband or my mom or dad, after this two week period together they’ll be better “Stand-Ins” than ever before!

    I can’t say enough good things about this experience so I think I’ll just let the pictures tell the rest of the story. Enjoy!

    Me and Diggins, making cookies… loads and loads of cookies… 
    Core/planks, etc – even on the glacier… 
    We rewarded Mikey for all his hard work and help with a big smiley-face cookie!  Mike Rocks! 
    Turns out Jessie was using the cookie as a bribe for her first snow machine ride – ever.  For the ride she got to use one of the coach’s sweet onesies. 

    Need I say more? 

    The Rhyneer Clinic, my AWESOME sponsor. Check Dr. Rhyneer out for Orthopedic needs in Anchorage – He is “old school” in his approach to personalized attention and “new school” with techniques and procedures. 

    Go RUDY!

    Crucial glacier equipment – the drying room

    The facility is literally on the edge of the cliff, literally. One morning we actually experienced a 5. something earthquake. Funny enough, many of the Alaskans slept through it!
    How CUTE!

    Me with Canadian Olympic Gold Medalist (2006, Torino) Chandra Crawford. Also, the brains and spirit behind Fast and Female!

    Our best Lady GAGA or Michael Jackson Thriller pose… Fitz, Chandra, me & Kikkan with the White Out Glacier in the background

    Skiing in shorts and a t-shirt – not a bad day!

    Finally! Our new PB!!!! After years of fundraising and thanks to many generous gifts from the community we were able make this happen.  Good thing our coaches are all around useful dudes…. to get the PB up to the glacier they took it apart, it was flown in via 6 (?) helicopter loads, then they put it back together.  These guys have skills way beyond applying extra blue…. 

    Mikey approves of the new PB

    And so do we!  (Holly, Kikkan & Kinsey) 

    The new PB makes awesome tracks. On Skate days the snow was as firm as it could be and we could skate two abreast. On classic interval day we had three tracks side by side!  Thanks to Casey for his hard work and long nights driving the machine! 

    The facility from above. 

    Liz being contemplative… 

    Okay, this picture takes some explaining…. but here we are on one afternoon watching footage from World Champs in Oslo, Norway this past February. Almost the entire World Champs team was sitting in this room… we were sharing notes.  For the first week of World Champs it was so foggy that there was literally 10-50 feet of visibility for the WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP races. If you look at the windows, we were experiencing the exact same conditions on Eagle that very day!  As Erik likes to say, Eagle Glacier provides us with all the conditions that we’ve recently found at World Champs and the Olympics: Raining, foggy, slushy – and sometimes bluebird. 
     The Alpine Air helicopter brings a re-supply of food for the “boy’s camp” that started the night we left….. can you see the bacon? 
     Mikey and Casey detach the sling-load from the helicopter. Costco is our best friend! 
    We spent quite some times trying to get all the freezer and refrigerator good squeezed into storage. It’s amazing how much FUEL a group of hard working athletes can go through when we’re skiing 4-5 hours a day, everyday. 
     Here I am on the last day, the last ski with my NUUN bottle.  These guys make some great sugar-free electrolyte fizzy drink mix. Check it out HERE. It’s amazing how hydrated you have to be for optimal performance, even when you’re surrounded by snow… 
    The Boss 🙂 
    Fitz and Becca excited about our new stationary bike!  It’s sweet to have an alternative exercise option up there.  Your legs can get pretty stiff from the repetitive motion of only skiing – plus, if you’re sick or if the weather is blowing 60 MPH, the stationary bike is a great option.  Thanks so much to the ALASKA CLUB and Robert Brewster for this generous donation!  We are eternally grateful!
    On the last day of camp some folks opt to fly down while others opt to hike (Me, Jessie & Sophie)
    Casey, Becca & Fitz hiking through the ferns, Fireweed, and Salmon Berries towards the end of the hike

    And finally, here we are taking an “ice bath” trying to reduce the soreness from the 5,000 foot decent back into civilization! 

    This week is active recovery and I’m taking the opportunity to mix it up with training – some mountain runs, time on my bike, and maybe some yoga. We’ll be back up on the glacier for August camp before we know it! Thanks for reading and have an AWESOME day! 
    Sincerely, 
    Holly 🙂 

  • NAWTA – CHECK!

    “NAWTA”…. yep, you read it, “North American Women’s Training Alliance!!!!”  We recently finished our two week camp here in AK and it was awesome. My previous post chronicled some of our dryland activities and the second week we took our non-Alaskan friends to “Eagle,” our glacier training facility just outside of Girdwood.  I can’t tell you how cool it is to have a world class facility less than an hour away from where we live – at our disposal! It was great to get to share it with other girls from around the country – not forgetting Canada too.  They seemed to think it was a special place as well 🙂 
    We love our friends at Alpine Air!
    The skiing last week couldn’t have been much better.  First of all, the weather cooperated.  If you know anything about glacial weather systems or Eagle in particular – we hit the jackpot.  I didn’t have a single ski where it felt like I was continuously getting shot in the face with a pellet gun. The coaches didn’t have to spend 5 hours in the middle of the night fixing the Pisten Bully (Groomer) …why? Because after years and years of fundraising we got a new one!  And finally, the last thing that made this camp unique is that there were no boys to complain about the plethora of vegetables or immense amounts of salad we made at meal times! Because, with the exception of the coaches, this was an all-girl’s camp! 

    I could write about the training detail of the camp but I what I think is more notable is the “NAWTA” Alliance aspect of the camp. This camp represented all the top girls in North America coming together for one, okay, maybe TWO causes.  To work on skiing faster and to have a GOOD time. We had girls from many different teams….. we are certainly friends but when the gun goes off, we are also fierce competitors – both with each other but more importantly, with the rest of the world.  The unifying factor in the girls that attended this camp is that we all have one thing in common – to improve our results on the International circuit.  Yes, it’s true that in the past, the World Cup has been dominated by Europeans, particularly Scandinavians.  They enjoy the luxury of living in a society that embraces our sport; they are the NFL players of Sweden or Norway.  The girls over there have role models with Olympic Gold Medals around their necks, strong teams, and even stronger infrastructure to be a cross country (ski) athlete.  An example of this is a story that Kikkan told about her recent trip to Sweden to train with Anna Haag…….apparently many of the restaurants in their town “Sponsor” the athletes such that after long training sessions, athletes can simply stop at a restaurant and eat/re-fuel, free of charge! 

    Anyways, the cool part about this camp and this group of ladies is that (I think) we all realize that we need to come together, and work together if we’re going to be able to compete against the European girls. They have a geographic advantage – they enjoy short travel to races, going home on weekends or when they’re sick. Racing each other throughout the summer and fall. Meanwhile, we’re thousands of miles away in North America. 

    The first night’s cook crew – check out Liz (on the left!) 

    Bringing a group of girls like this together does many things – first, it gives you a zap of energy and inspiration. It’s great to compare roller ski blisters or commiserate about missing another concert with your friends or family reunion. We also have the opportunity to ski with each other, a lot.  As Erik, my coach says, “steal some of their secrets and share some of yours.”  If someone else is really good at something that you need to improve, go ski 20k behind them and see what you can pick up. Then, let someone else follow you and do the same. In order to get better, we have to do this. We have to get better together, boosting each other to new heights. There are tons of other benefits… for example, getting to spend some quality time together in a low-stress environment. None of us are racing against each other tomorrow for the last spot on the Olympic team so we can do things like make cookies together or in some cases, watch a Justin Bieber movie….. (I choose ski work during this bonding opportunity)

    Kikkan breaking in the new grill

    Days and weeks on the road can get long and lonely and the ability to enjoy and relate to those you’re traveling with is crucial. While these girls won’t replace my husband or my mom or dad, after this two week period together they’ll be better “Stand-Ins” than ever before!

    I can’t say enough good things about this experience so I think I’ll just let the pictures tell the rest of the story. Enjoy!

    Me and Diggins, making cookies… loads and loads of cookies… 
    Core/planks, etc – even on the glacier… 
    We rewarded Mikey for all his hard work and help with a big smiley-face cookie!  Mike Rocks! 
    Turns out Jessie was using the cookie as a bribe for her first snow machine ride – ever.  For the ride she got to use one of the coach’s sweet onesies. 

    Need I say more? 

    The Rhyneer Clinic, my AWESOME sponsor. Check Dr. Rhyneer out for Orthopedic needs in Anchorage – He is “old school” in his approach to personalized attention and “new school” with techniques and procedures. 

    Go RUDY!

    Crucial glacier equipment – the drying room

    The facility is literally on the edge of the cliff, literally. One morning we actually experienced a 5. something earthquake. Funny enough, many of the Alaskans slept through it!
    How CUTE!

    Me with Canadian Olympic Gold Medalist (2006, Torino) Chandra Crawford. Also, the brains and spirit behind Fast and Female!

    Our best Lady GAGA or Michael Jackson Thriller pose… Fitz, Chandra, me & Kikkan with the White Out Glacier in the background

    Skiing in shorts and a t-shirt – not a bad day!

    Finally! Our new PB!!!! After years of fundraising and thanks to many generous gifts from the community we were able make this happen.  Good thing our coaches are all around useful dudes…. to get the PB up to the glacier they took it apart, it was flown in via 6 (?) helicopter loads, then they put it back together.  These guys have skills way beyond applying extra blue…. 

    Mikey approves of the new PB

    And so do we!  (Holly, Kikkan & Kinsey) 

    The new PB makes awesome tracks. On Skate days the snow was as firm as it could be and we could skate two abreast. On classic interval day we had three tracks side by side!  Thanks to Casey for his hard work and long nights driving the machine! 

    The facility from above. 

    Liz being contemplative… 

    Okay, this picture takes some explaining…. but here we are on one afternoon watching footage from World Champs in Oslo, Norway this past February. Almost the entire World Champs team was sitting in this room… we were sharing notes.  For the first week of World Champs it was so foggy that there was literally 10-50 feet of visibility for the WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP races. If you look at the windows, we were experiencing the exact same conditions on Eagle that very day!  As Erik likes to say, Eagle Glacier provides us with all the conditions that we’ve recently found at World Champs and the Olympics: Raining, foggy, slushy – and sometimes bluebird. 
     The Alpine Air helicopter brings a re-supply of food for the “boy’s camp” that started the night we left….. can you see the bacon? 
     Mikey and Casey detach the sling-load from the helicopter. Costco is our best friend! 
    We spent quite some times trying to get all the freezer and refrigerator good squeezed into storage. It’s amazing how much FUEL a group of hard working athletes can go through when we’re skiing 4-5 hours a day, everyday. 
     Here I am on the last day, the last ski with my NUUN bottle.  These guys make some great sugar-free electrolyte fizzy drink mix. Check it out HERE. It’s amazing how hydrated you have to be for optimal performance, even when you’re surrounded by snow… 
    The Boss 🙂 
    Fitz and Becca excited about our new stationary bike!  It’s sweet to have an alternative exercise option up there.  Your legs can get pretty stiff from the repetitive motion of only skiing – plus, if you’re sick or if the weather is blowing 60 MPH, the stationary bike is a great option.  Thanks so much to the ALASKA CLUB and Robert Brewster for this generous donation!  We are eternally grateful!
    On the last day of camp some folks opt to fly down while others opt to hike (Me, Jessie & Sophie)
    Casey, Becca & Fitz hiking through the ferns, Fireweed, and Salmon Berries towards the end of the hike

    And finally, here we are taking an “ice bath” trying to reduce the soreness from the 5,000 foot decent back into civilization! 

    This week is active recovery and I’m taking the opportunity to mix it up with training – some mountain runs, time on my bike, and maybe some yoga. We’ll be back up on the glacier for August camp before we know it! Thanks for reading and have an AWESOME day! 
    Sincerely, 
    Holly 🙂 

  • NAWTA – CHECK!

    “NAWTA”…. yep, you read it, “North American Women’s Training Alliance!!!!”  We recently finished our two week camp here in AK and it was awesome. My previous post chronicled some of our dryland activities and the second week we took our non-Alaskan friends to “Eagle,” our glacier training facility just outside of Girdwood.  I can’t tell you how cool it is to have a world class facility less than an hour away from where we live – at our disposal! It was great to get to share it with other girls from around the country – not forgetting Canada too.  They seemed to think it was a special place as well 🙂 
    We love our friends at Alpine Air!
    The skiing last week couldn’t have been much better.  First of all, the weather cooperated.  If you know anything about glacial weather systems or Eagle in particular – we hit the jackpot.  I didn’t have a single ski where it felt like I was continuously getting shot in the face with a pellet gun. The coaches didn’t have to spend 5 hours in the middle of the night fixing the Pisten Bully (Groomer) …why? Because after years and years of fundraising we got a new one!  And finally, the last thing that made this camp unique is that there were no boys to complain about the plethora of vegetables or immense amounts of salad we made at meal times! Because, with the exception of the coaches, this was an all-girl’s camp! 

    I could write about the training detail of the camp but I what I think is more notable is the “NAWTA” Alliance aspect of the camp. This camp represented all the top girls in North America coming together for one, okay, maybe TWO causes.  To work on skiing faster and to have a GOOD time. We had girls from many different teams….. we are certainly friends but when the gun goes off, we are also fierce competitors – both with each other but more importantly, with the rest of the world.  The unifying factor in the girls that attended this camp is that we all have one thing in common – to improve our results on the International circuit.  Yes, it’s true that in the past, the World Cup has been dominated by Europeans, particularly Scandinavians.  They enjoy the luxury of living in a society that embraces our sport; they are the NFL players of Sweden or Norway.  The girls over there have role models with Olympic Gold Medals around their necks, strong teams, and even stronger infrastructure to be a cross country (ski) athlete.  An example of this is a story that Kikkan told about her recent trip to Sweden to train with Anna Haag…….apparently many of the restaurants in their town “Sponsor” the athletes such that after long training sessions, athletes can simply stop at a restaurant and eat/re-fuel, free of charge! 

    Anyways, the cool part about this camp and this group of ladies is that (I think) we all realize that we need to come together, and work together if we’re going to be able to compete against the European girls. They have a geographic advantage – they enjoy short travel to races, going home on weekends or when they’re sick. Racing each other throughout the summer and fall. Meanwhile, we’re thousands of miles away in North America. 

    The first night’s cook crew – check out Liz (on the left!) 

    Bringing a group of girls like this together does many things – first, it gives you a zap of energy and inspiration. It’s great to compare roller ski blisters or commiserate about missing another concert with your friends or family reunion. We also have the opportunity to ski with each other, a lot.  As Erik, my coach says, “steal some of their secrets and share some of yours.”  If someone else is really good at something that you need to improve, go ski 20k behind them and see what you can pick up. Then, let someone else follow you and do the same. In order to get better, we have to do this. We have to get better together, boosting each other to new heights. There are tons of other benefits… for example, getting to spend some quality time together in a low-stress environment. None of us are racing against each other tomorrow for the last spot on the Olympic team so we can do things like make cookies together or in some cases, watch a Justin Bieber movie….. (I choose ski work during this bonding opportunity)

    Kikkan breaking in the new grill

    Days and weeks on the road can get long and lonely and the ability to enjoy and relate to those you’re traveling with is crucial. While these girls won’t replace my husband or my mom or dad, after this two week period together they’ll be better “Stand-Ins” than ever before!

    I can’t say enough good things about this experience so I think I’ll just let the pictures tell the rest of the story. Enjoy!

    Me and Diggins, making cookies… loads and loads of cookies… 
    Core/planks, etc – even on the glacier… 
    We rewarded Mikey for all his hard work and help with a big smiley-face cookie!  Mike Rocks! 
    Turns out Jessie was using the cookie as a bribe for her first snow machine ride – ever.  For the ride she got to use one of the coach’s sweet onesies. 

    Need I say more? 

    The Rhyneer Clinic, my AWESOME sponsor. Check Dr. Rhyneer out for Orthopedic needs in Anchorage – He is “old school” in his approach to personalized attention and “new school” with techniques and procedures. 

    Go RUDY!

    Crucial glacier equipment – the drying room

    The facility is literally on the edge of the cliff, literally. One morning we actually experienced a 5. something earthquake. Funny enough, many of the Alaskans slept through it!
    How CUTE!

    Me with Canadian Olympic Gold Medalist (2006, Torino) Chandra Crawford. Also, the brains and spirit behind Fast and Female!

    Our best Lady GAGA or Michael Jackson Thriller pose… Fitz, Chandra, me & Kikkan with the White Out Glacier in the background

    Skiing in shorts and a t-shirt – not a bad day!

    Finally! Our new PB!!!! After years of fundraising and thanks to many generous gifts from the community we were able make this happen.  Good thing our coaches are all around useful dudes…. to get the PB up to the glacier they took it apart, it was flown in via 6 (?) helicopter loads, then they put it back together.  These guys have skills way beyond applying extra blue…. 

    Mikey approves of the new PB

    And so do we!  (Holly, Kikkan & Kinsey) 

    The new PB makes awesome tracks. On Skate days the snow was as firm as it could be and we could skate two abreast. On classic interval day we had three tracks side by side!  Thanks to Casey for his hard work and long nights driving the machine! 

    The facility from above. 

    Liz being contemplative… 

    Okay, this picture takes some explaining…. but here we are on one afternoon watching footage from World Champs in Oslo, Norway this past February. Almost the entire World Champs team was sitting in this room… we were sharing notes.  For the first week of World Champs it was so foggy that there was literally 10-50 feet of visibility for the WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP races. If you look at the windows, we were experiencing the exact same conditions on Eagle that very day!  As Erik likes to say, Eagle Glacier provides us with all the conditions that we’ve recently found at World Champs and the Olympics: Raining, foggy, slushy – and sometimes bluebird. 
     The Alpine Air helicopter brings a re-supply of food for the “boy’s camp” that started the night we left….. can you see the bacon? 
     Mikey and Casey detach the sling-load from the helicopter. Costco is our best friend! 
    We spent quite some times trying to get all the freezer and refrigerator good squeezed into storage. It’s amazing how much FUEL a group of hard working athletes can go through when we’re skiing 4-5 hours a day, everyday. 
     Here I am on the last day, the last ski with my NUUN bottle.  These guys make some great sugar-free electrolyte fizzy drink mix. Check it out HERE. It’s amazing how hydrated you have to be for optimal performance, even when you’re surrounded by snow… 
    The Boss 🙂 
    Fitz and Becca excited about our new stationary bike!  It’s sweet to have an alternative exercise option up there.  Your legs can get pretty stiff from the repetitive motion of only skiing – plus, if you’re sick or if the weather is blowing 60 MPH, the stationary bike is a great option.  Thanks so much to the ALASKA CLUB and Robert Brewster for this generous donation!  We are eternally grateful!
    On the last day of camp some folks opt to fly down while others opt to hike (Me, Jessie & Sophie)
    Casey, Becca & Fitz hiking through the ferns, Fireweed, and Salmon Berries towards the end of the hike

    And finally, here we are taking an “ice bath” trying to reduce the soreness from the 5,000 foot decent back into civilization! 

    This week is active recovery and I’m taking the opportunity to mix it up with training – some mountain runs, time on my bike, and maybe some yoga. We’ll be back up on the glacier for August camp before we know it! Thanks for reading and have an AWESOME day! 
    Sincerely, 
    Holly 🙂 

  • Meet the New Kids: Part 7


    Russell Boswell hails from Putney, VT. He will be a 7th grade winter term day student this year. No doubt he decided to come when he heard about our line up of 8th grade girls. He will have his hands full!
    Russell is an excellent runner, mountain biker and skier. Last winter he skied to school every day! If you want to see some “real” stone grinding, ask to see the skis he used for transit. Probably because of his new found interest in stone grinding, he has recently been hanging out with Gunnar Caldwell. I imagine that they discuss the pros and cons of grinding skis on different sections of the road (gravel vs pavement vs sand).