We’re now three weekends into the 2014-15 World Cup season. While it’s been a slower start than I had hoped for, I am seeing small improvements every week.
Last weekend we had a 3-day mini-tour in Lillehammer. It was a tough start on day 1 when I failed to advance to the quarterfinals in the skate sprint, my first time not in the top 30 since 2009.
How I felt after a couple days of tough racing in Lillehammer.
I felt slightly better, but still not fast enough in the individual start 5km, and then moved up just a few places in the 10km classic pursuit start to finish my tour out of the points. I had to look at the racing as putting money in the bank for the future.
Bundled up but still psyched for winter!
We had amazingly beautiful sunrise ski in Sjusjoen before leaving Norway.
This past weekend in Davos I chose to opt out of Saturday’s distance race in favor of preserving energy for the skate sprint. I made some small improvements, just sneaking into the top-30 with a 28th in qualification. In my quarterfinal round I had a few small glimpses of good form and was able to feel some of my gears coming back. A small step in the right direction.
The races for this coming weekend have been moved from La Clusaz, France back here to Davos due to lack of snow and the original program has been changed to include another skate sprint. So luckily for me, I get another shot to improve further this coming weekend.
When young skiers ask me for advice on what it takes to become a top international skier, I always talk about Patience. I’ve been really fortunate over the last several years to have enjoyed a string of really strong performances. So far this season however, I am needing to follow my own advice. The biggest goals of the season still lay a couple months ahead in February. From now until then, it’s important to just focus on making small improvements every week.
Onward and upward!!
At the beginning of the week in Davos we were only able to ski on a 1.2km loop, it got a bit crowded!
Davos feels like a home away from home, here a beautiful cappuccino from the Kaffe Klatsch!
Pretty lucky to have my Hubby with me on this great adventure, he even gets to sneak away from his FIS work to ski with me sometimes 🙂
