Wintertime’s a’Comin

After completing our training camp last week, I was sure of one thing; summertime is definitely over. The whole week we woke up to temperatures hovering around zero. No more shorts and tank tops, we wore spandex and long sleeves almost everyday. For skiers this is an exciting time of year. We start to realize that all the roller skiing and running workouts start to come to an end, and we know that winter time is just around the corner. Suddenly the thought of racing jumps into everyone’s head, and you get that little bit of extra energy for training.

The first half of the week, we put in some good hard days up in the Highwood Pass area. Lots of roller skiing, which included one day of roller ski sprint races with the Foothills Nordic Ski Club. We had qualifiers, heats and everything. It was a little sketchy racing full speed on pavement rather then on snow, but luckily there were no big falls throughout the day.

The second half of the week we headed up to winter wonderland at the Haig Glacier. Yup, you guessed it, there was a TON of snow. The run in was a little miserable as it was POURING rain, and the temperature only got colder the further we climbed. But once we were all-warm and dry up in the huts, things started to look up. The next day greeted us with two feet of fresh powder! Skiing conditions were perfect. We were using hard wax and everything!

It was yet another week of great training. We have one more hard training camp in October and then its smooth sailing from then on into the racing season.

I can’t wait!

Me, completing my qualifier for the roller ski sprints

The Mens final

The daily hike up to the Haig Glacier

Kate Brennan about to start her ski.