Canmore has been so good to us over the years, and this fall is no exception! The skiing at Frozen Thunder has been great, it’s been good to be on snow with beautiful mountains surrounding the town, and so far camp has been pretty relaxing!
Doing some one-pole drill skiing! (photo by Anne Hart)
I really like this on snow time for a couple reasons. Besides the obvious (it’s snow, duh!) it’s better for my technique practice to be on the real stuff instead of roller skis. Having kick wax that is just the tiniest bit slick on purpose forces me to stay honest with my striding, and really concentrate on feeling my foot connect with the snow. Rollerskiing is a great way to train, get fit and keep some technique gains over the summer, but nothing can replace the exact feeling of kicking and gliding!
You know what else is pretty great? We have a patriotic racing suit this year! While pink and black were awesome, they weren’t exactly on the flag, and this year we’re rocking the stars and stripes…bringing back the Olympic suit for everyday World Cup use. YES. I. AM. HAPPY. ABOUT. THIS.
Andy and Ben, sprinting it up and showing off the new race suits for next winter!!! (photo: USSA Nordic)
It’s also funny because some of the bad habits I have on roller skis, like having weirdly hyper-extensive joints and letting my knees come waaaaaaaay out on V1, disappear once I get on snow. It’s like a big boost of confidence….”see, you actually DO know how to ski, it just doesn’t always feel like it on roller skis!”
Anne “Goobie” was standing at the end of the course, taking selfies with every skier to pass by. What a little ray of sunshine!
While we have been taking advantage of the snow and skiing every morning for at least 2 hours, in the afternoons we have been switching it up. Sometimes I’ll ski as a warmup before strength, or we might go for a run, or roller ski as was the case yesterday. We wanted to do some hard, fast double pole intervals, and doing it on the pavement meant we’d for sure not punch through the snow or be in the way of all the skiers, dodging traffic. They were hard, but went well!
Getting psyched up for our afternoon double pole interval set! (photo from Pat)
Pounding the pavement! Ida, me, Liz, Peri and the SMS crew! (photo by Pat)
We have been staying in the Rocky Mountain ski lodge, as always. Same apartment, same girls (Liz and Ida and I), same beds. Same bad jokes, same order of waking up (I’m always last to roll out of bed), same departure times to get to the snow. It’s like nothing has changed! Except we are a little bit older, a little bit faster, we know each other even better than we did last year. Which is actually kind of amazing, considering how much time we spend with each other! 🙂
Simi, hammering out some laps. Also a wonderful mountain scenery shot! (photo by USSA Nordic)
To end the post, I couldn’t resist posting a couple more photos I just got from the USST Ski Ball…they were so fun!
The Olympic athletes welcoming committee! 🙂 (photo: Sarah Brunson, USST)
Bidding on live auction items! (photo: Sarah Brunson, USST)
Jonny Moseley really, REALLY won the costume contest. (photo: Sarah Brunson, USST)
