What a week it has been. I got home yesterday from being in Aspen for a little over a weekracing. I was absolutely blown away byhow much snow the mountaintop received while I was gone. It is rare that I come back from a trip toColorado to more snow here than they had in Colorado. I can only imagine how great the skiingwas.
Initially, my trip to Colorado was only supposed to be forthree days. I have still been strugglingwith my back and paid a visit to Dr. Lozman at the mountain before leaving forColorado. After some x-rays and an MRIhe diagnosed the problem as a bulging disc. He prescribed some anti-inflammatory medication and said that it mighthurt for a while, but without another bad crash it would heal and be fine intime. It was relieving to hear thatnews. Because of the back pain, I hadonly planned on doing the super g races and the super combined. I was going to leave and skip the downhillraces to rest up.
We arrived to Aspen in a scene much similar to what Iimagine it looked like here most of last week. Aspen had not received much snow all season and the saying in ski racing"if you want snow, schedule a speed race series," held true. Over the first three days there the areareceived two feet of snow. Much to mysurprise every race got off when it was supposed to, but it did make for longdays filled with lots of slipping.
Through my earlier noram finishes I had the advantage ofbeing eligible to chose my start position for the first couple races. Usually this is not a huge factor, but withall of the fresh snow it made a difference. Sometimes with soft snow it is best to run early before ruts and holesdevelop. Other times the track in flat sectionsgets faster with each racer that goes and it is considerably slower for theearly racers. I knew start positionwould matter and figured that so much snow had fallen that there was no chanceof the new stuff getting scraped off and down to the harder faster snowunderneath. I decided to go early andchose number 3.
The decision paid off in first race. I skied a clean mistake free run and foundmyself in second place. It was not a runthat was way above the way I had been skiing all year. I simply skied well and took advantage ofrunning early and the deteriorating course conditions. The first super g was also part of a supercombined. This meant that the super grun counted by itself as a noram super g, but would also count with a run of slalomto have a noram super combined. Of theguys at the top of the super g I was one of the stronger slalom skiers. Not only did I have a strong super g, but Iput myself in position to win the super combined.
With how well slalom had been going in Europe, I was verycomfortable with my chances in the slalom run, despite the soft snow. Before pushing out of the start I knew thatsome strong slalom skiers had ran early and had fast runs so I would have tocharge to win. I went out pushing hard,but six gates into the run my tip got caught in some soft snow and I straddleda gate. That sure was a let down, but Icame to realize that I could have skied conservatively to finish and would haveended up around 5th place. Idid not want to be 5th, I wanted to win so I was happier charginghard and going out than just trying to finish.
For the second race I went with the same start positionfiguring it worked the day before. Ihad an even better run the second day and was able to clean up one section fromthe day before. The racers who werefirst and third the day before started right in front of me the secondday. I thought I had a good run when Icrossed the finish and the scoreboard said I was in first so I was reassuredthat it was a good run. Two racers afterI finished a Canadian came within 0.02 seconds of my time and as it would turnout that was the only person who challenged my time.
Before this trip I had never finished better than 3rdin a noram super g and that finish came two years earlier and in two days I hadmanaged to rack up a 2nd and a win. Those finishes took me from 15th in the season's super gstanding to 2nd. That isimportant for me because it is my path to the world cup and the US team. The top two athletes at the end of the seasonin each event are awarded world cup starts in that event for the followingseason. This has been a goal of mine fora few years now and I am now in position to reach it.
What the finishes also did was move me from 8thplace to 5th place in the overall noram standings. Being the overall noram champion is a bigaccomplishment and it is one that I now stand a good chance at winning. For that reason, I pushed my departure fromAspen back to do the downhill.
Downhill is not my strength. It is much harder for non-national team members to compete with thenational team members. This is becauseof equipment; the national team members have many more resources from theequipment companies. More often than notthey have faster skis, which is tough to overcome in downhill, especially theAspen downhill that starts with 30 seconds of gliding on flats.
Although downhill is not my strength, I managed to cut thegap in points down between the leader of the noram overall standings andmyself. I had solid races bothdays. In the first downhill I was 14thwhich was an improvement from the early season downhill races. During my run in the second race, I wasflagged to stop my run because my teammate who ran right before me had crashedinto the fences. Unlike Lindsey Vonn'scrash that required Julia to get a rerun, my teammate's crash took out a fewhundred feet of netting; he was able to walk away with a few scratches, makingit unsafe for me to continue.
Having to go around for a rerun is always a challenge. Each run takes so much preparation that itcan be very difficult to get that same focus and intensity only a few minuteslater. I was able to look at itdifferently. I had been given a chanceto better execute my game plan for the course. Doing this made a huge difference as I skied to my best ever noramdownhill finish, 7th. I wasable to keep the gap close between the leader of the overall standings andmyself during the downhills. That wasthe goal for the races and now I have a chance to take the lead in two weekswhen we have the noram finals in Burke, Vt. and Waterville, NH. Until then it is rest and training forme.