Category: XCFeeds

The Eastern Cup openers in Presque Isle were definitely not as exciting as Ida’s Canmore races, and I didn’t go through quite the agony and the ecstasy that she did after falling and then making the A Final – but I had a few exciting-in-a-bad-way moments of my own en route to some of my best Eastern Cup finishes ever, and a really solid start to the season.

Saturday really suprised me as I am usually very bad at sprinting – I mean, not just not good, but actually bad. Luckily, Pepa has helped me grow some fast twitch muscles and I was shocked to see that I qualified in 7th. The real excitement began in my quarterfinal, though, when about two strides out of the start the basket came off my right pole. This was completely due to my own stupidity since I knew it was loose when I left Craftsbury and had just forgotten to find pole glue and fix it. That threw me off and I was in 5th coming up the first steep, awkward hill. Luckily, on the rollers on the next part of the course, I was able to do some really quick V1 and get by a lot of girls, ending up 2nd in my heat and advancing. Every time I planted that pole, though, it sunk into the snow and I was terrified that the bottom was going to just snap off, which would have been a big problem! Before my semifinal, Janice from NENSA was nice enough to find a new basket, some pole glue, and a heat gun, and fixed me up. Thanks Janice!

I entered Sunday’s mass start confident that my poles were all set, and caught a lucky break in the start. I was in the second row, but the girl who was supposed to start in front of me never showed up. In addition, I was on the inside lane for the turn at the top of the hill. So I got a good start. By 2 1/2 kilometers in, I was skiing in a lead pack of 8 girls. Then, somehow, I don’t know whether it was from me skiing up on Rachel Hall’s skis or Olga Golovkina skiing up on mine or some combination of the two, but the binding on my left ski opened. WHEN HAS THIS EVER HAPPENED???? It was on an uphill, so by the time I noticed that my skiboot was making direct contact with the snow, my ski had already started sliding down the hill. I stopped and frantically turned around to go get it, shouting to the spectators at the bottom of the hill, “Grab my ski! My ski!” and also, perhaps, cursing. I managed to get the ski, put it on, turn back around and ski up the hill again, but the damage was done. Sprint as I might, I couldn’t catch the pack – the closest I ever got was within 8 seconds going by the shooting range, although I did catch Rachel when she dropped off the back. I still had my best Eastern Cup result ever, but it was frustrating because I think if I had been able to stay in that pack instead of wasting my energy trying to sprint up to them for a few kilometers, I could have had a really excellent result. Oh well, at least I have more confidence for next time, because I know I can ski with those girls!

So, here’s to getting equipment malfunctions out of the way early in the season….

Another race day on the sprint  course in Canmore.  Today, it was a few degrees colder making slightly slower conditions than yesterday but other than that everything was exactly the same.  As I got ready to toe the line in the qualification, I was reminded that running starts were not allowed as apparently this was a problem in yesterday’s qualification.  I’m not sure how exactly one would time this feat but it definitely would have been entertaining to watch. I started out hard and successfully navigated the track change which was problematic in yesterday’s prelim.  In the hilly section of the course I was feeling awesome and knew this was going to be a good one.  I started getting really excited on the last hill as I was gaining quickly on my 15 second person.  The gap left between us was going to be the perfect distance for drafting on the downhill.  I was already thinking about how I would slingshot around her going into the finish.  I just had a couple more double poles left before I could fall into a tuck when I stuck a pole between my legs and was down before I knew it.  I untangled myself and got up but was swearing to myself for making such a silly mistake.  The qualification in sprint races is where sprint points are awarded and the US team is then using points to determine the Olympic Team.  Its also necessary to have low enough FIS points to even race in the Olympics.  This fall was going to be costly as every extra second racks up points quickly.  I still ended up 9th overall and the 2nd American but it was really frustrating to know I could have done much better.

Putting the qualifcation aside, I got ready for the heats.  After having raced the course yesterday I was confident of my strategy before even starting which is not something that usually happens in sprint racing.  Usually you have to ski a heat or two and go with the flow before you can truly know how the course will ski.  I had an uneventful quarterfinal and advanced into the semis.  My goal was not to finally be in the A final so it was really important that I had a good semifinal.  I took off hard from the start and was leading on the inside when I got to the first major corner.  Then somehow the girl directly behind me got her ski stuck between my leg and we both spun around.  We managed to stay on our feet but after untangling ourselves we well behind the rest of the our heat.  B final crossed through my mind and I went for it.  I took an outside line though the next corner to pass people cluttered on the inside and then ran outside the tracks as hard as I could to pass a few more and get into the top 2 positions again.  By now I knew it was either going to be a great heat or I was going die.  I managed to hold on and finish 2nd in the heat.  This was the first time I had ever made an A final in a competitive senior race so I was really psyched.  In the final, I used the same tactics and skied hard and aggressive through the first corners.  I was still with the leaders on the last big climb of the course but then I started to fade and the wheels came off quickly going over the top.  I didn’t have enough of a lead to hold off the draft of the 5th and 6th place girls so they both passed me on the downhill and I couldn’t quite pass them back double poling to the finish.  So I ended up last in my final but was close to 4th so it wasn’t nearly as much of a disaster as the final in the Bozeman SuperTour.

So its another race down and a few more lessons learned.  I won $50 in prize money and the Canadians were very confused when I said I couldn’t take it.  They kept asking me why because none of the officials were familiar with NCAA rules.  Even after I explained one official says, “Could you just take a little of it?” and another tells me, “Just pocket it and I won’t tell.”  Finally someone suggested that I donate it the Right to Play Charity which is a athlete-based organization that uses games and sports to help the development of kids from underprivileged areas or the world.  This sounded great so I agreed, and the officials were so excited that they gave me my $100 late registration fee back.  It was perfect!  A huge thanks to Rick Kapala and Travis Jones of the Sun Valley Ski Education Foundation for the great skis and for letting me join their team this weekend!