Category: XCFeeds

The past week I have spent in the Canadian version of “Winter Wonderland”-otherwise known as Silver Star B.C. From the day we arrived, last tuesday, we have been lucky enough to have clear cold sunny days every single day. A sunny day in Silver Star is truly unbeatable! Following our first series of races in West Yellowstone, we decided to put in a a solid block of base training before entering into these next series of races. 

………

On top of Silver Star Mountain Resort

This down week has been really nice for me. Conveniently enough my semester of school ended this week, so I have been taking advantage of my spare time to hit the books and finish off my finals. In one of my classes I was required to give a presentation, so I got one of the girls on the team to video tape it and then I added it onto youtube so the class could watch it back in AK. My professors have been super awesome, letting me take tests and do presentations at my home away from home. My STATS professor even set up an online chat so that she could help me figure out what the heck chi-squared meant! I am constantly impressed with the APU education system.

Skiing in the sunset

One of the things that I did for school this year was write a marketing plan for a teammates headwear company, E’KLAAR Headwear. It was really fun to explore new possibilities around the city and try to find new markets for her stuff. The APU elite team has recently signed E’KLAAR Headwear as a  sponsor for our team- so it has been fun to see how fast the word has spread about her hats, headbands and sport scarves. So when you see those bright pink and blue colored hats we are wearing around all the time- those are the guys! You should go check out her website, she has lots of fun stuff! www.eklaar.com

During this off week between races, I have also gotten the chance to get to know my new skis. I have always had a small collection of skis I travel with, because I had one pair of “magic” skis that I would literally pull out for every condition, every race, EVERY time. Unfortunately I broke them last year in Europe, so I have been forced to move on. In doing so, I added four pairs of new “stranger” skis to my fleet that I have been playing around on with the coaches throughout the week. Maybe I didn’t replace the “magic” ski yet, but I think I am getting damn well close:)

Testing w/ coach, Erik Flora

Races are coming soon, two more days! Sovereign Lakes did some work over the summer on their venue and trails and came up with a new sprint course. Luckily it is much more hilly, and a bit longer- so I am super pumped for that. Saturday will be the classic sprint, and then Sunday we have a 10km. skate distance race. Lots of fun to come!

Practicing my lunges for this weekend

Hammer on!

Results should be posted pretty quickly from the weekend races at http://www.zone4.ca/default.asp

Rock on!

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a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEzCzt8uPI/AAAAAAAAFfQ/p_lpbFVv-bg/s1600/IMG_0036.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 369px;” src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEzCzt8uPI/AAAAAAAAFfQ/p_lpbFVv-bg/s400/IMG_0036.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5548772339232848114″ //aThis morning we had a wonderful classic OD. Great tracks, 20 degrees and 50 kms to choose from. It was like skiing on silk :)br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEy2VHVTAI/AAAAAAAAFfI/pDbXsbOW8kA/s1600/IMG_0042.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEy2VHVTAI/AAAAAAAAFfI/pDbXsbOW8kA/s400/IMG_0042.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5548772124859386882″ //aBridger and Austin cruise up the hill.br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEyoPeks1I/AAAAAAAAFfA/OvxRGDD6r5E/s1600/IMG_0046.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEyoPeks1I/AAAAAAAAFfA/OvxRGDD6r5E/s400/IMG_0046.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5548771882828084050″ //aFirst set the stage…br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEyZG5ruvI/AAAAAAAAFe4/h0mmaM3SCKI/s1600/IMG_0047.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEyZG5ruvI/AAAAAAAAFe4/h0mmaM3SCKI/s400/IMG_0047.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5548771622827834098″ //a…then spring the trap!br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEx41oEfLI/AAAAAAAAFew/cq9o6SGC2EQ/s1600/IMG_0048.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEx41oEfLI/AAAAAAAAFew/cq9o6SGC2EQ/s400/IMG_0048.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5548771068434742450″ //aHeading home. There is now enough snow to ski the 10 km back to the condos. It is a nice way to end an OD ski because the last 6 km is flat gradual down.br /This afternoon we are resting, cleaning and catching up on homework. After 5 straight double days, everyone needs a little r and r.br /Sorry there are not many pictures, I wss struggling to keep up and we didn’t see the other groups.div class=”blogger-post-footer”img width=’1′ height=’1′ src=’https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/4680416899705879324-2980898994745555859?l=smsxc.blogspot.com’ alt=” //div

a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEzCzt8uPI/AAAAAAAAFfQ/p_lpbFVv-bg/s1600/IMG_0036.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 369px;” src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEzCzt8uPI/AAAAAAAAFfQ/p_lpbFVv-bg/s400/IMG_0036.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5548772339232848114″ //aThis morning we had a wonderful classic OD. Great tracks, 20 degrees and 50 kms to choose from. It was like skiing on silk :)br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEy2VHVTAI/AAAAAAAAFfI/pDbXsbOW8kA/s1600/IMG_0042.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEy2VHVTAI/AAAAAAAAFfI/pDbXsbOW8kA/s400/IMG_0042.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5548772124859386882″ //aBridger and Austin cruise up the hill.br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEyoPeks1I/AAAAAAAAFfA/OvxRGDD6r5E/s1600/IMG_0046.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEyoPeks1I/AAAAAAAAFfA/OvxRGDD6r5E/s400/IMG_0046.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5548771882828084050″ //aFirst set the stage…br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEyZG5ruvI/AAAAAAAAFe4/h0mmaM3SCKI/s1600/IMG_0047.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEyZG5ruvI/AAAAAAAAFe4/h0mmaM3SCKI/s400/IMG_0047.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5548771622827834098″ //a…then spring the trap!br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEx41oEfLI/AAAAAAAAFew/cq9o6SGC2EQ/s1600/IMG_0048.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TQEx41oEfLI/AAAAAAAAFew/cq9o6SGC2EQ/s400/IMG_0048.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5548771068434742450″ //aHeading home. There is now enough snow to ski the 10 km back to the condos. It is a nice way to end an OD ski because the last 6 km is flat gradual down.br /This afternoon we are resting, cleaning and catching up on homework. After 5 straight double days, everyone needs a little r and r.br /Sorry there are not many pictures, I wss struggling to keep up and we didn’t see the other groups.div class=”blogger-post-footer”img width=’1′ height=’1′ src=’https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/4680416899705879324-2980898994745555859?l=smsxc.blogspot.com’ alt=” //div

As I was perusing some of the other assorted race results from last weekend, the FIS races in Norway caught my eye.  Of course, most of the press went to Petter Northug, with his victory in Saturday’s 30km skate race, presumably indicating that his fitness is returning.

A little further down the results sheet, but not too far, was Great Britain’s Andrew Musgrave in 6th, around 52 seconds behind Northug, good enough for around 26 FIS points.  He had some good results in November as well, so I thought it might be fun to take a closer look.

First of all, here’s a look at all the distance races I’ve got for him:

Saturday’s 30km skate race is the blue dot all the way down in the right hand corner, easily his best result, measured by FIS points at least.  I highlighted the technique of each race to point out that Musgrave seems to have had an affinity for skating over classic races.  I point this out mostly to say that Musgrave’s performance on Sunday in the 10km classic seemed like quite a let down after the day before (33rd, ~70 FIS FIS points), but that’s at the high end of his classic results from the past two seasons.

FIS points are an admittedly crude measure in this instance, so let’s look at a percent-back difference plot of Musgrave versus the top 40 from Saturday’s 30km skate race:

I’ve tweaked this graph format a little, hopefully for the better.  As always, each dot represents an instance where Musgrave raced against one of the top 40 finishers from Saturday’s race.  Values above zero mean they beat Musgrave that day and vice versa.  Saturday’s results are in blue and the red line represents the median for each season.

I added a red dot for the median percent back difference just from Saturday’s race, to aid in comparing his performance that day to the past.

First, we can see that Musgrave has indeed stepped things up quite a bit so far this season.  Also, Saturday’s race was not just good relative to his career, but quite good compared to just this season as well.  One of the things that I find intriguing about him is that he’s still only 20 years old, I believe.  It’ll be interesting to see where he is in 3-4 years if he manages to keep this up.

Related posts:

1. <FIS Scheduling Follies
2. <USST Preview: Andrew Newell
3. <Assessing The Weekend’s Racing

Yesterday I posted some data looking at a popular hobby horse within the US skiing community: Andrew Newell’s alleged tendency to ski really fast in the qualification round and then not advance far (or not far enough) in the heats.

Last night a friend emailed me to let me know that I kind of screwed up that post and so I went back and edited it to fix the problems.  Since I don’t believe in erasing my mistakes from the inter-webs, my edits are sort of interspersed throughout the entire original post.  Because I think that makes the post somewhat hard to read and because we^<1 here at Statistical Skier believe in drawing as much attention to our mistakes as humanly possible, I decided this error of mine deserved a follow-up post of it’s own.

So once again, here’s the graph we’re discussing:

This is the median difference in the qualification rank and the final rank of male sprinters with at least 15 top thirty results from 2006-2007 forward.  The error bars can be thought of as estimates of variability (as before they are bootstrapped 90% confidence intervals, if that means anything to you).

My mistake was including results from when the heats only used the top 16 skiers.  I’m doubly irritated by this mistake since for some reason when that changeover happened refuses to remain lodged in my brain.  It’s possible that my friend who alerted me of the problem has answered that very question for me at least 3-4 times since I started this blog.  Argh!

That means that there were many more athletes present in the old graph with very small median differences, since I’d included a lot of instances of people finishing in 17th-30th in races where only the top 16 moved on.

You can go back and piece through my edited comments from yesterday, but the basic picture remains the same, I think, at least regarding Newell.  His median difference is about the same and compared to the group he still seems to suffer from this occurrence more often than most of his peers (at least, those with at least 15 top thirty finishes).

In any case, I screwed up.  Sorry!

Related posts:

1. <A New Sprint Points Method
2. <Best Young Sprint Skiers: 2009-2010
3. <USST Preview: Andrew Newell

A couple of big names were doing some smaller FIS races this past weekend.  Petter Northug is trying to regain his form after a rough start to his season mixed with some illness, Aino-Kaisa Saarinen is recovering from a shoulder injury and Odd-Bjørn Hjelmeset is trying to work his way onto the Norweigan squad for World Championships in Oslo.

All three had seemingly strong results, Northug winning the 30km skate on Saturday, Hjelmeset winning the 10km classic the next day (both races in Norway) and Saarinen winning the 5km classic held in Grom, Switzerland.  As always, it’s difficult to know what any of these results mean.  Northug and Saarinen were likely treating these races as training as much as anything (Hjelmeset’s incentives were probably stronger) and the competition they faced wasn’t necessarily very strong.

We can shed a little bit more light on their performances by looking at how their victories stack up compared to how they’ve done against the particular group of skiers they beat that day.  Starting with Northug:

I tweaked these plots slightly, adding a red dot indicating the median for the race in question.  The red line still represents the median for the entire season.

Northug’s median difference in percent back (red line) clearly indicates that he normally handles this group of 40 skiers or so fairly easily.  Saturday’s race (blue) was certainly more in line with his past performances than his less than stellar races earlier this season.  So that seems like a pretty legitimate effort on Northug’s part.  Of course, he didn’t fare quite so well on Sunday:

Not terrible (he was 8th, I think) but that performance was much closer to his bad races earlier in the season.

Odd-Bjørn Hjelmeset only raced the second day’s classic event, and won:

This wily veteran (he’s 39!) had some rocky results earlier in the season, but Sunday’s race was more promising.  It was good enough to earn him a WC start this weekend in Davos, I believe.  He’s a bit of a classic specialist and the 15km WC this weekend is classic, so he could have a good result.

Aino-Kaisa Saarinen also did some tune-up racing in Switzerland:

Here’s a good example, I think, of why these graphs are useful.  Saarinen crushed a rather unimpressive looking field by ~36 seconds in a 5km race.  Additionally, many of the top 40 were skiers that she’s never raced against, which is why there are somewhat fewer points in her graph.  On the face of it, that can be tough to draw many conclusions from.  However, looking at her race compared to when she’s raced against these specific people in the past, it becomes more clear that she did fairly well.

Certainly it’s the case that there wasn’t anyone at this race that normally challenges her.  However, she beat this group by as much, or slightly more than she has in the past.  So I’d say she’s well on her way to full recovery from the shoulder injury and should be at full strength this weekend.

Related posts:

1. <Did Petter Northug Have a Slight Edge On Marcus Hellner?
2. <Head-To-Head: Petter Northug vs. Marcus Hellner
3. <Technique Specialization

Sorry for the delay in posting this update, the internet situation at our hotel in Düsseldorf was not good. 

Our team left Kuusamo Thursday morning to race at the WC sprints in Düsseldorf on Saturday and Sunday.

 After I had gone through airport security, I had a bad feeling about losing my luggage. Finnair’s flight attendants and baggage handlers were on strike. I went back out through security and asked the airline to go and retrieve my suitcase, so that I could grab my ski boots. If I didn’t have my skate ski boots, I would have to miss the races. Size 47 ski boots are not easy to find. Our flight was delayed an hour from Kuusamo which made us miss our connection in Helsinki by 10 minutes! Unfortunately, there were no more flights to Copenhagen that day, so we ended up spending the night in an airport hotel in Helsinki.

The next morning, we caught an early flight to Copenhagen only to find out that our connecting flight to Düsseldorf had been cancelled. We were able to find a flight later in the afternoon. Instead of sitting in the airport all day, Brent, Chandra and I decided to take the train to Copenhagen to look around the city. We had a great day and time passed quickly. Eventually,  we made it to Düsseldorf, only to find out that I was right about about our luggage… our bags were lost and they weren’t able to trace them. Great! Less than 24 hours before the race and I had no clothes or ski poles. I had visions of skiing in my jeans.  The wax techs shared all of their training clothes and race suits so we could race. One of my ski bags with training skis and my skating poles was also missing. the coaches and I were not able to find poles long enough for me before the race started. I normally ski on 177.5cm poles for skating, but 172 was the longest pole the techs could find with such short notice. At least I had some poles. I would try to work with them. The worst part about losing my bag was that I also lost all my asthma medication.

During the warmup I could already feel the tightness in my chest. I frantically tried to find a puffer from anyone, but had no luck. 

My qualifier started off very well, I intentionally started conservatively and planned to pick up the pace on the second lap. My asthma did not cooperate with my plan at all. My lungs did not take the intense breathing very well, by the end of the race I felt like I was breathing out of four straws.  My speed really suffered from the lack of oxygen. I felt like I was barely moving by the time I reached the finish. 

The result was not as bad as I thought; I ended up just missing qualifying by 0.4 seconds and finished in 34th. It was really frustrating because I knew that this was the perfect course for me and I could have skied so much better if I had all my gear. 

That afternoon the coaches went on a hunt to find me a puffer. Amazingly they found the same type that I normally used. I also spoke to the Estonian team to see if they had any long poles for me. One of the taller skiers offered to lend me his one spare set for the next day’s race. He told me that he was only helping me out because I am Estonian. I was pumped and ready to rock and roll in the team sprint the following day. 

Chandra had an awesome sprint day finishing 8th Overall! Congrats!

Stef Kuhn and I were paired up for Sunday’s team sprint. In the team sprint each guy does three laps total, tagging off after each one. Stef started the race which meant that I was the anchor. Both of our first laps were pretty easy, the entire field stayed together and waited for someone to make a move. My second lap was faster for me. I made a few surges and made up a few positions. I tagged off to Stef in 5th position for his last lap. Immediately after I tagged off to Stef, a Norwegian skier broke a pole, which made the French skier swerve, causing Stef to crash. Just like, that we were almost in last. Stef was forced to ski the lap alone without the aid of the draft in the main pack. He tagged off to me in 19th position. I gave it everything I had, I was able to reel in three teams before the finish; finishing 17th. This was a tough one. We were in great position until the crash. The American team had similar troubles as well,  finishing behind us.

The girls team on the other hand had one of the best days ever! Dasha and Chandra were able to stay on their feet and benefited from a couple late crashes to finish 3RD!!!! 

First World Cup medal for Canada this year. Great Job!

I am now in Davos, Switzerland preparing for this weekend’s skate sprint. I am ready to redeem myself. Some great news for me, while checking in at the Düsseldorf airport yesterday, Stef noticed my duffle bag sitting in a pile of luggage in the airport! So lucky! I am the only one to receive a bag thus far, there are still 7 missing including all of our ski poles…

Hope the next WC races go more smoothly than they did in Düsseldorf.  Personally, I can’t wait to hit the start line in Davos on Sunday.

Sorry for the delay in posting this update, the internet situation at our hotel in Düsseldorf was not good. 

Our team left Kuusamo Thursday morning to race at the WC sprints in Düsseldorf on Saturday and Sunday.

 After I had gone through airport security, I had a bad feeling about losing my luggage. Finnair’s flight attendants and baggage handlers were on strike. I went back out through security and asked the airline to go and retrieve my suitcase, so that I could grab my ski boots. If I didn’t have my skate ski boots, I would have to miss the races. Size 47 ski boots are not easy to find. Our flight was delayed an hour from Kuusamo which made us miss our connection in Helsinki by 10 minutes! Unfortunately, there were no more flights to Copenhagen that day, so we ended up spending the night in an airport hotel in Helsinki.

The next morning, we caught an early flight to Copenhagen only to find out that our connecting flight to Düsseldorf had been cancelled. We were able to find a flight later in the afternoon. Instead of sitting in the airport all day, Brent, Chandra and I decided to take the train to Copenhagen to look around the city. We had a great day and time passed quickly. Eventually,  we made it to Düsseldorf, only to find out that I was right about about our luggage… our bags were lost and they weren’t able to trace them. Great! Less than 24 hours before the race and I had no clothes or ski poles. I had visions of skiing in my jeans.  The wax techs shared all of their training clothes and race suits so we could race. One of my ski bags with training skis and my skating poles was also missing. the coaches and I were not able to find poles long enough for me before the race started. I normally ski on 177.5cm poles for skating, but 172 was the longest pole the techs could find with such short notice. At least I had some poles. I would try to work with them. The worst part about losing my bag was that I also lost all my asthma medication.

During the warmup I could already feel the tightness in my chest. I frantically tried to find a puffer from anyone, but had no luck. 

My qualifier started off very well, I intentionally started conservatively and planned to pick up the pace on the second lap. My asthma did not cooperate with my plan at all. My lungs did not take the intense breathing very well, by the end of the race I felt like I was breathing out of four straws.  My speed really suffered from the lack of oxygen. I felt like I was barely moving by the time I reached the finish. 

The result was not as bad as I thought; I ended up just missing qualifying by 0.4 seconds and finished in 34th. It was really frustrating because I knew that this was the perfect course for me and I could have skied so much better if I had all my gear. 

That afternoon the coaches went on a hunt to find me a puffer. Amazingly they found the same type that I normally used. I also spoke to the Estonian team to see if they had any long poles for me. One of the taller skiers offered to lend me his one spare set for the next day’s race. He told me that he was only helping me out because I am Estonian. I was pumped and ready to rock and roll in the team sprint the following day. 

Chandra had an awesome sprint day finishing 8th Overall! Congrats!

Stef Kuhn and I were paired up for Sunday’s team sprint. In the team sprint each guy does three laps total, tagging off after each one. Stef started the race which meant that I was the anchor. Both of our first laps were pretty easy, the entire field stayed together and waited for someone to make a move. My second lap was faster for me. I made a few surges and made up a few positions. I tagged off to Stef in 5th position for his last lap. Immediately after I tagged off to Stef, a Norwegian skier broke a pole, which made the French skier swerve, causing Stef to crash. Just like, that we were almost in last. Stef was forced to ski the lap alone without the aid of the draft in the main pack. He tagged off to me in 19th position. I gave it everything I had, I was able to reel in three teams before the finish; finishing 17th. This was a tough one. We were in great position until the crash. The American team had similar troubles as well,  finishing behind us.

The girls team on the other hand had one of the best days ever! Dasha and Chandra were able to stay on their feet and benefited from a couple late crashes to finish 3RD!!!! 

First World Cup medal for Canada this year. Great Job!

I am now in Davos, Switzerland preparing for this weekend’s skate sprint. I am ready to redeem myself. Some great news for me, while checking in at the Düsseldorf airport yesterday, Stef noticed my duffle bag sitting in a pile of luggage in the airport! So lucky! I am the only one to receive a bag thus far, there are still 7 missing including all of our ski poles…

Hope the next WC races go more smoothly than they did in Düsseldorf.  Personally, I can’t wait to hit the start line in Davos on Sunday.

Sorry for the delay in posting this update, the internet situation at our hotel in Düsseldorf was not good. 

Our team left Kuusamo Thursday morning to race at the WC sprints in Düsseldorf on Saturday and Sunday.

 After I had gone through airport security, I had a bad feeling about losing my luggage. Finnair’s flight attendants and baggage handlers were on strike. I went back out through security and asked the airline to go and retrieve my suitcase, so that I could grab my ski boots. If I didn’t have my skate ski boots, I would have to miss the races. Size 47 ski boots are not easy to find. Our flight was delayed an hour from Kuusamo which made us miss our connection in Helsinki by 10 minutes! Unfortunately, there were no more flights to Copenhagen that day, so we ended up spending the night in an airport hotel in Helsinki.

The next morning, we caught an early flight to Copenhagen only to find out that our connecting flight to Düsseldorf had been cancelled. We were able to find a flight later in the afternoon. Instead of sitting in the airport all day, Brent, Chandra and I decided to take the train to Copenhagen to look around the city. We had a great day and time passed quickly. Eventually,  we made it to Düsseldorf, only to find out that I was right about about our luggage… our bags were lost and they weren’t able to trace them. Great! Less than 24 hours before the race and I had no clothes or ski poles. I had visions of skiing in my jeans.  The wax techs shared all of their training clothes and race suits so we could race. One of my ski bags with training skis and my skating poles was also missing. the coaches and I were not able to find poles long enough for me before the race started. I normally ski on 177.5cm poles for skating, but 172 was the longest pole the techs could find with such short notice. At least I had some poles. I would try to work with them. The worst part about losing my bag was that I also lost all my asthma medication.

During the warmup I could already feel the tightness in my chest. I frantically tried to find a puffer from anyone, but had no luck. 

My qualifier started off very well, I intentionally started conservatively and planned to pick up the pace on the second lap. My asthma did not cooperate with my plan at all. My lungs did not take the intense breathing very well, by the end of the race I felt like I was breathing out of four straws.  My speed really suffered from the lack of oxygen. I felt like I was barely moving by the time I reached the finish. 

The result was not as bad as I thought; I ended up just missing qualifying by 0.4 seconds and finished in 34th. It was really frustrating because I knew that this was the perfect course for me and I could have skied so much better if I had all my gear. 

That afternoon the coaches went on a hunt to find me a puffer. Amazingly they found the same type that I normally used. I also spoke to the Estonian team to see if they had any long poles for me. One of the taller skiers offered to lend me his one spare set for the next day’s race. He told me that he was only helping me out because I am Estonian. I was pumped and ready to rock and roll in the team sprint the following day. 

Chandra had an awesome sprint day finishing 8th Overall! Congrats!

Stef Kuhn and I were paired up for Sunday’s team sprint. In the team sprint each guy does three laps total, tagging off after each one. Stef started the race which meant that I was the anchor. Both of our first laps were pretty easy, the entire field stayed together and waited for someone to make a move. My second lap was faster for me. I made a few surges and made up a few positions. I tagged off to Stef in 5th position for his last lap. Immediately after I tagged off to Stef, a Norwegian skier broke a pole, which made the French skier swerve, causing Stef to crash. Just like, that we were almost in last. Stef was forced to ski the lap alone without the aid of the draft in the main pack. He tagged off to me in 19th position. I gave it everything I had, I was able to reel in three teams before the finish; finishing 17th. This was a tough one. We were in great position until the crash. The American team had similar troubles as well,  finishing behind us.

The girls team on the other hand had one of the best days ever! Dasha and Chandra were able to stay on their feet and benefited from a couple late crashes to finish 3RD!!!! 

First World Cup medal for Canada this year. Great Job!

I am now in Davos, Switzerland preparing for this weekend’s skate sprint. I am ready to redeem myself. Some great news for me, while checking in at the Düsseldorf airport yesterday, Stef noticed my duffle bag sitting in a pile of luggage in the airport! So lucky! I am the only one to receive a bag thus far, there are still 7 missing including all of our ski poles…

Hope the next WC races go more smoothly than they did in Düsseldorf.  Personally, I can’t wait to hit the start line in Davos on Sunday.