Sophie Caldwell: Quick Trip Home

Between our training camp in New Zealand and our training camp in Norway (where we are now!), I had just under two weeks of time at home, in Vermont. As far as jet lag goes, I had no idea what to expect when I returned home. I had heard a handful of jet lag horror stories about returning from New Zealand, so I arrived home expecting to be messsssed up. I won't say I was fine, but I don't have any horror stories. I think I basically walked around like a bit of a zombie for a week or so and my sleep schedule was the opposite of what I expected it to be, but somewhere in there, I think I recovered. With such a short period of time between training camps and a travel schedule that consisted of basically flying around the world within two weeks, I had one goal while I was home: to recover. I tried to be smart about training and in this case, that meant doing close to nothing. The first week I was home, my training consisted of playing with my sister. I hadn't seen her since early June, so we went for some walks, tried going for a couple runs (one that turned into a walk when I got to the bottom of the driveway), did some yoga, tried to stay awake during the day, and ate a lot of blueberries.

A walk home from yoga with some sunflowers for Lil Mama

Summit Sisters hike up Bromley

Great group of girls on top of Bromley

Rock Art on the AT

Little Rock pond on a beautiful day

Posing on top of the cliff jump with my cousin, Alexa

Riding down the alpine slide with Jessie and Annie (Jessie photo)

The second week I was home, I slowly started to get back into the groove with training. I was feeling pretty good, but I wanted to feel really good by the time I arrived in Norway, so this still meant cutting some workouts short, starting an interval session only to stop it early, and taking an extra off day here and there. Luckily, there were a lot of other activities going on while I was home that kept me occupied while I was resting. The annual SMS camps were happening last week, so the SMS T2 team jumped in a bunch of easier workouts with the kids, gave some talks, and enjoyed a few meals with the youngsters. I wasn't there at bedtime, but from what I could tell this was the best behaved and most motivated group I've ever seen at the SMS camps!

Some of the girls at the BKL camp showing off their growing muscles

Agility workout with the girls

Signing camp T shirts

Happy campers!

Posing with Francesca, who won one of my old jackets for winning the name game!

The most exciting event that took place while I was home was the wedding of one of my best friends, Mae Foster (now Hickory). Mae has been a friend of mine for as long as I can remember and everything came together for a beautiful wedding weekend in southern Vermont. We had a blast setting everything up for the wedding and then having so many of our best friends in one place to celebrate. Congrats Mae and Ben Hickory!

Wedding setup at the Ben and Mae barn with Anya, Mae, and Ellery

Collecting flowers the day before the wedding with Ellery

Bridesmaids selfie at the rehearsal dinner

Couple of my favorites on wedding night

Happy to see my cousin Anya

The wedding party and the beautiful bride and groom

Playing with the Foster cows (and Anya and Ellery)

My handsome wedding date

The day after the wedding, I did some last minute packing and then hopped on a plane to Norway. It was a fairly easy travel day and we jumped right back into camp mode when we arrived. We can rollerski out our doors and each day we ski by the beautiful fjords and lakes surrounding the area. I'm loving being back with some of my teammates who I haven't seen since June and I'm looking forward to a productive camp the next couple weeks. More from Norway coming soon!