Right now, I’m in Park City, Utah with the US Ski Team for our second (and final) team training camp of the season. It makes me so, so happy to be living in team housing, getting to hang out together outside of training sessions and feel the happy team vibe! But first, an end of summer update, mostly photo diary style.
At the end of August, I was lucky enough to head to Oberhof, Germany with my club team, SMST2. Time is funny. Give me a long, amazing mountain run and it will fly by…but give me a treadmill and it creeps along painfully slowly. Which is why it’s been so surprising that training in the ski hall in Oberhof, Germany was anything but boring! We kept busy with so many technique drills, speeds, intervals and video work that the 8 days we were on snow flew right by.
It was super cool to work with the German team while we were there. We did intervals with Antonia and Victoria, and got to work with their coaches as well. It’s always fun for me to hear new ideas and see other perspectives on training. And of course I’m always struck by how similar we all are, rather than how we are different. No matter where skiers are from, what language they speak, what kind of foods their culture emphasizes or how they live, we often train the same, we have the same hopes and dreams, we laugh and we enjoy time together. It makes the world feel a little bit smaller the more I get to travel around in it!
This crucial touch of on-snow technique time was a huge help, and also a great confidence booster for me! Huge thanks to our staff and the German ski team for helping us make this camp such a productive one.
When we got home, we made sure to try and translate those snow ski feelings back to summer training modes!
We also mixed in a little late summer glory workouts. The transition to fall when the air is crisp with just a little bite to it always makes me happy (and so much more comfortable during intervals)!
I usually do one big, long adventure (often running) that I call my “Big Stupid”. It’s called that because it’s stupid in terms of trying to ski race really fast…nobody really needs to run for 8 hours in order to race a 10km really fast, for example, and the risk of injury or slow recovery is high. However, these sort of things really feed my soul and sense of adventure, and it’s the one concession I make to the other ways I hold back in order to race fast.
However, this being an Olympic year, I decided nothing is worth the risk. My support team and I have worked way too hard for too long for me to not see this year through with every smart decision I can possibly make. I still got to feed my soul and happy mountain running brain though, as Wade took me up to the White Mountains of New Hampshire for a night spent in one of the AMC huts! This was my 30th birthday present, and it was everything I wanted and love most in life; time with someone I love, adventure, time outside, good food and sunshine.
We hiked up to the hut with backpacks and smaller running hydration packs inside, and the next morning we stowed our bigger packs away and went for a 4 hour out and back run to the Bond Cliffs, one of my favorite spots that’s not super easy to get to!
I was a very, very happy girl indeed. This seemed like a good start to my 30’s!
When we got back, my amazing lovely teammates threw me a fun lake party too! Cake on cake. In case you haven’t been following along, we’ve really been crushing the cake game this summer. It’s ok to brag just a little, if it’s about baked goods.
We had some soggy days, too, but that’s ok! We race in the elements, and it’s good to know how to train in them.
We had a really fun 3-day mini camp in Lake Placid, NY with the team, and in addition to an incredibly gorgeous long run, we got to get a race in! NENSA and Mt. Van Hoevenberg hosted a skate sprint, and we enjoyed the chance to race each other, learn from each other, and practice race day timing and tactics!
And it wouldn’t be an Olympic year without a few exciting production days!
We’ve still been cautious and smart about covid protocols, and I know we are very lucky to have a bit of a bubble, living in a less populated area. The whole team is vaccinated and we wear masks anyways when in grocery stores, the post office, coffee shops…you name it!
On our way to Park City camp, Julia and I stopped in Colorado Springs to do some sports science testing at the Olympic and Paralympic Training Center there! This place is outstanding, and everyone in it works so hard every day to help the athletes represent our country as best we can. Huge thanks to the sports science team there for having us!
Which brings us to Park City, where we’re still being cautious about covid while enjoying productive team time together! I’m excited to see what we’re able to do while pushing each other at this camp, and ready to learn from everyone around me.
