Category: XCFeeds

Yeserday I had the honor of being one of 5 women chosen to read to over 300 children at the World Cultures Magnet School and American Indian Magnet School in St. Paul, for the annual Read for the Record Event. The book was “The Snowy Day” by Ezra Jack Keats, and since the theme was winter 5 women athletes were chosen to read and share their favorite winter experiences. Joining me were Olympic Silver Medalist and Captain of the Women’s Hockey Team Natalie Darwitz and Whitney Pratt, Carly Facchini, and Erin Layden of the Augsburg Women’s Hockey Team.

The Book Read Across the Nation

During the four years since it began in 2006, Jumpstart’s Read for the Record has continued to break the world record for the most children reading the same book on the same day with an adult in their life. The program is designed to draw attention to the reading crisis by pointing out nearly half of the children in low-income neighborhoods lag years behind their peers when they start first grade.

The Readers

Nearly 3 million children have been involved in the reading day efforts so far, and an estimated 2.5 million were expected to join in Thursday. Jumpstart has raised $6.2 million for books and supplies and sponsored nearly 800,000 books for low-income children.

Breaking up into classes we had question and answer time.

Sharing my favorite part of winter!

 Thanks to Morgan Bray for contacting me and letting me be a part of such a great cause. Thanks to all the kids who listened to the story and shared their favorite moments from the winter. It won’t be too long until we can enjoy a snowy day ourselves!

Yeserday I had the honor of being one of 5 women chosen to read to over 300 children at the World Cultures Magnet School and American Indian Magnet School in St. Paul, for the annual Read for the Record Event. The book was “The Snowy Day” by Ezra Jack Keats, and since the theme was winter 5 women athletes were chosen to read and share their favorite winter experiences. Joining me were Olympic Silver Medalist and Captain of the Women’s Hockey Team Natalie Darwitz and Whitney Pratt, Carly Facchini, and Erin Layden of the Augsburg Women’s Hockey Team.

The Book Read Across the Nation

During the four years since it began in 2006, Jumpstart’s Read for the Record has continued to break the world record for the most children reading the same book on the same day with an adult in their life. The program is designed to draw attention to the reading crisis by pointing out nearly half of the children in low-income neighborhoods lag years behind their peers when they start first grade.

The Readers

Nearly 3 million children have been involved in the reading day efforts so far, and an estimated 2.5 million were expected to join in Thursday. Jumpstart has raised $6.2 million for books and supplies and sponsored nearly 800,000 books for low-income children.

Breaking up into classes we had question and answer time.

Sharing my favorite part of winter!

 Thanks to Morgan Bray for contacting me and letting me be a part of such a great cause. Thanks to all the kids who listened to the story and shared their favorite moments from the winter. It won’t be too long until we can enjoy a snowy day ourselves!

The ski season is approaching quickly, so it’s about time to revive the blog! Before I launch into my recent travel and training adventures, I want to quickly recap the second half of summer.In short, I got to train and play outside to my hearts content. We had a record breaking 31 consecutive days of rain, but as an athlete, coach, and fisherwoman, I feel like I got to make the most of every

The ski season is approaching quickly, so it’s about time to revive the blog! Before I launch into my recent travel and training adventures, I want to quickly recap the second half of summer.In short, I got to train and play outside to my hearts content. We had a record breaking 31 consecutive days of rain, but as an athlete, coach, and fisherwoman, I feel like I got to make the most of every

The ski season is approaching quickly, so it’s about time to revive the blog! Before I launch into my recent travel and training adventures, I want to quickly recap the second half of summer.In short, I got to train and play outside to my hearts content. We had a record breaking 31 consecutive days of rain, but as an athlete, coach, and fisherwoman, I feel like I got to make the most of every

The ski season is approaching quickly, so it’s about time to revive the blog! Before I launch into my recent travel and training adventures, I want to quickly recap the second half of summer.In short, I got to train and play outside to my hearts content. We had a record breaking 31 consecutive days of rain, but as an athlete, coach, and fisherwoman, I feel like I got to make the most of every

We had a busy day in the dreary weather today. The PG’s had a good skate interval session this morning and followed it up with strength this afternoon. We have a couple of kids fighting colds or injury and they spun and did strength. The bulk of the team headed to Manchester for a running race. The race was hosted by BBA at the Robert Todd Lincoln estate (Hildene). It was a new venue for us and it was fun to run by the house and through the grounds.br /Here are a couple of pictures. As always, click on any picture to enlarge it.br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TK0XLKzzSdI/AAAAAAAAEqU/VoJX_-0Xdco/s1600/IMG_8647.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/TK0XLKzzSdI/AAAAAAAAEqU/VoJX_-0Xdco/s400/IMG_8647.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5525097798501091794″ //aThe lead pack for the boys near the start of the race.br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TK0WcCb2mjI/AAAAAAAAEqM/3oDBlegdv2g/s1600/IMG_8648.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/TK0WcCb2mjI/AAAAAAAAEqM/3oDBlegdv2g/s400/IMG_8648.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5525096988799310386″ //abr /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TK0WAfTJQ0I/AAAAAAAAEqE/FelyWZ9MLFE/s1600/IMG_8652.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/TK0WAfTJQ0I/AAAAAAAAEqE/FelyWZ9MLFE/s400/IMG_8652.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5525096515511075650″ //aPaddy pulled away for a convincing win.br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TK0VeZ6MUaI/AAAAAAAAEp8/bVL-OA25EJQ/s1600/IMG_8654.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TK0VeZ6MUaI/AAAAAAAAEp8/bVL-OA25EJQ/s400/IMG_8654.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5525095929948688802″ //aMac cruises into the finish after a good race.br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TK0U3L8A_OI/AAAAAAAAEp0/fywK4D7Ep_Q/s1600/IMG_8656.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/TK0U3L8A_OI/AAAAAAAAEp0/fywK4D7Ep_Q/s400/IMG_8656.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5525095256183340258″ //aThe girls start with the main house at Hildene in the background. br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TK0TtJA4G6I/AAAAAAAAEps/xViir-_0Aw0/s1600/IMG_8657.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/TK0TtJA4G6I/AAAAAAAAEps/xViir-_0Aw0/s400/IMG_8657.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5525093984088103842″ //aRachel pushed Amber Legacy (MAU) hard towards the end, but Amber held on for the win. Issy P, Heather and Cam came in close behind in 3rd, 4th and 5th leading our girls to a strong win. Pheobe charged hard today and had her best race of the season. Tess had her first bump in the road when she didn’t feel good, but she still gave a good effort.div class=”blogger-post-footer”img width=’1′ height=’1′ src=’https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/4680416899705879324-2952305971402891092?l=smsxc.blogspot.com’ alt=” //div

I sort of just stumbled across these graphs accidentally.  If there’s a point to them, it might be that this is what happens when you have a small ski team that manages to produce a really, really fast skier (or two).

You hold on to them for as long as humanly possible.

First up, Estonia.

All I’ve done here is plot the FIS points for all Estonian skiers in major races (WC, OWG, WSC) and varied the color of the dot with the age of the skier.

You can literally watch the Estonian ski team aging!  (I’ve used FIS points for sprinting as well, just for a change of pace.)  Just how long will Andrus Veerpalu and Jaak Mae ski for?  What will Estonia do when they retire?  The world awaits an answer…

Estonia is a pretty extreme case, though.  France, for instance:

France has considerably more skiers than Estonia, including some fast younger skiers like Maurice Magnificat.  On the men’s side, the aging we see is from a combination of Vittoz, Jonnier and Rouselet, all of whom are over 30.  For the women, it’s mostly just Karine Philippot.

Related posts:

1. <Variability In World Cup Ski Racers
2. <Week In Review: Friday July 16th
3. <Week In Review: Friday July 23rd

My plan for our 17 days in Lake Placid, NY has been to do two 7.5 day blocks of training.  The first one went really well, this second one has been a bit tougher.  This week is a bit little lower in volume and intensity but I can tell the fatigue from last week is with me.  I caught a small head cold at the start of the week and have been training through it.  The recovery here at the training center has been fantastic, but I finally had to hold off on a day of intervals to let my body recover.  I am now feeling great and excited to finish up the week with a few distance sessions and the Climb to the Castle roller ski race on Friday.  Then it is off to Chicago for some recovery and a clinic for the XC Chicago Skiers.

Beautiful day for an easy ski: Liesch, Newell, Elliott, Kuzzy

Looking back half-way up Whiteface Mountain

Recovering

One of the recovery tools at the Training Center is the Normatec compression suits.  These are inflatable leggings and sleaves which fill with air to provide pressure to five different compartments squeezing the fluid in your legs towards your heart.  It is sweet to have the opportunity to play around with them in addition to the standard foam rolling, sauna, stretching and icing.