Tuesday, February 17, 2015

Swedish February

A travel day to or from Davos wouldn't be complete without a snowstorm, so on the day of our departure, the snow started to dump and we were were on our way. Luckily, we finally found some chains that fit our vans perfectly and have a few people on the team who have mastered putting on and removing the chains, so it didn't slow us down too much.
Simi and Erik supervising the chain application before leaving the snowy Hotel Kulm

Car snacks!

Some beautiful lighting on my last evening in Davos
We drove to Munich, Germany, where we dropped off our rental vans and spent a night at the the Hotel Movenpick. We woke up early the following morning to make two quick flights that would would land us in Ostersund, Sweden. When we arrived in Ostersund, we were greeted by fairly warm temperatures, and close to zero snow at our hotel. It was quite the contrast after being in cold snowy Davos. Apparently they had had a bunch of snow the week before, but had experienced several days of pouring rain before we arrived. Luckily, the organizers did a great job of keeping the race courses in good condition. Since we arrived on Monday, we had a few days of training on the race courses before the weekend races.

Liz and me after one of our morning workouts in Ostersund. We're attempting to send strong legs to my cousin, Anya, who just broke her tib and fib.
Photo with Canadian, Olivia, fresh off of U23s!

On our day off, Jessie and I decided to walk home from the venue. With some vague directions and no maps, we quickly got lost, but made the best of it!

Siri, where am I?!
There were two races in Ostersund over the weekend. On Saturday there was a classic sprint and on Sunday there was a 10k skate. I was only racing the classic sprint. The course was unlike anything I had ever seen before. It was a two lap course that winded in and out of the stadium and through the grand stands. There were two big hills on each lap that were so steep you had to herringbone them both. So it definitely wasn't a double pole course, but it also wasn't a striding course. I remember one of my first ski practices at Dartmouth where Cami made us dedicate an entire practice to herringboning. I was thinking she was a little crazy at the time, but it finally paid off! I was happy to qualify for my first classic sprint of the year in 24th. Sadie also qualified for the heats and we ended up being in the same heat. That was a little unlucky, but we had fun with it and although neither of us moved on, we gave it our best and ended up 20th and 22nd for the day. Our boys had a really strong day with Simi moving into the semifinals and Andy just narrowly missing the semis.
Racing our quarter final heat

Sadie and me sporting our Valentine's Day colors after finishing our heat

Happy Valentines Day!

Cooling down above the stadium and crowd

Sodie selfie with Coach Matt
It was really awesome to have my friends Morgen Newman and Kayti Sullivan, who are living in Hamburg, come to cheer me on this weekend. It's always nice to see familiar faces and to hear an American accent in the crowd! 

After a busy Valentine's race day, we had a relaxing morning on Sunday and packed up and made the long bus ride to Falun for World Champs. World Champs is exciting for many reasons. The first being, well, it's World Champs! Even though we're racing the same people we race every weekend, everything is more built up, so there is a lot of extra excitement surrounding the event. We also have a huge team this year and it's nice to see some of the athletes and staff who join us for the next couple weeks and haven't been on the regular World Cup circuit. And finally, my parents are arriving this afternoon and I don't think I've been able to wipe the smile off my face all day because of it! Racing starts Tuesday with the classic sprint. Make sure to download the Falun 2015 apps and tune into the US Ski team website to watch the races live. Thanks for following!
Team USA in Ostersund

All packed up and ready for World Champs



2 comments:

  1. I must say you Americans are the best at updating your blogs and other social media accounts. I hope you get good results from the Worlds.

    ReplyDelete