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Posted on Monday March 15th at 8:59 p.m.
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Hi,
The past month has been hectic. Three days after I got back from Europe, I left to go down to the States to race. It was a 13 hour drive to the location of the first series of races which was Jackson, Wyoming. I competed in four races over two days, two Giant Slaloms and two Slaloms. It was a girls only race which the French and USA tech teams were using as a prep race for the Olympics. It was a great opportunity to race against some of the best girls in the technical disciplines who were at the top of their game. Unfortunately, I didn't perform well and was unable to finish any of the races.
After the series was over, I stayed in Jackson for three more days and trained on the race hill. The snow conditions were excellent as the piste had been injected. I then drove to Salt Lake, Utah and had three days Super G training at Snowbird. This was very valuble as my Super G training up to that point had been very limited. After the completion of the training at Snowbird, I headed back on the road and drove to Carbondale, Colorado. This is where I stayed for the week while racing at Aspen.
The races at Aspen were my first speed Nor-Ams. The week started with two downhill training days. This was only my second downhill ever so it was really exciting to be racing against such good competition. The track was really fun and I was looking forward to the races. Unfortunately I crashed in the first downhill, so I was a little dissappointed. The second downhill went much better and I scored an okay result and finished within the top 30, which wasn't too bad. The next day was the US National Championships day. Unfortunately the light turned really flat a couple of bibs before I went, and not having much downhill experience, didn't perform so well.
The next day was a double codex Super Combined. I was having a pretty good run when I went off a roller with a loaded ski. I managed to land ok but ended up missing the next gate. It turned out that about 5 other girls did exactly the same thing. The final day of racing was a Super G. I had an ok run and finished in 16th place which is my best Nor-Am finishing position to date. It was a pleasant ending to a mixed race series.
Straight after the race was over, I got back in the van and drove through the night to make it back to Silver Star, BC in time for the last Super G there. I skied not that well because I was really tired and stopped in my run so I was pretty annoyed to have driven so far in such a short time frame when that day could have been a much needed rest day. I still ended up in second place but I would have still much rather had a day off. There were four days of tech following the dissappointing Super G race. The two GS races I didn't finish. I also didn't complete the first Slalom race. On the last day of racing, I managed to pull one together and ended up winning the Slalom race. It was the first Slalom that I had finished since August last year so I was pretty happy. I also scored my best ever Slalom result. It wasn't the best series, the snow was really crappy and I didn't perform my best but I was pleased to get one good result in there. The best thing about Silver Star was that I stayed "In the Pink Cottage". It was a pretty cool house.
I then returned to Calgary, after being on the road for 27 days. The odometer in the van read just under 6800km. That's a lot of driving! I had a couple of much needed days off but unfortunately I caught a really bad cold which then developed into a wee sinus infection after the Silver Star races and was forced to take an extra day off. Last Thursday I moved to Canmore which is a nice change as I really dislike Calgary. I trained at Nakiska for the past three days and I am feeling well again.
The next ten days are very busy. I have two more days of training this week before Canadian National Champs start. They start on Saturday at Nakiska with the first Downhill training run and include a Downhill, Super G, Super Combined, GS and Slalom. I'm not sure what the plan is after National Champs but I guess I will find out closer to the time.
That is all for now,
Allie