Hopefully everyone had a great Thanksgiving yesterday, we certainly did out here. The day started out here with 6:30 to 9:00 am slalom training on Andy’s Double Gold to avoid the crowds. The athletes then had the rest of the day to enjoy their holiday. All the male athletes participated in the afternoon football game before sitting down to a late afternoon dinner of two turkeys, ham, mashed potatoes, stuffing and gravy. They finished dinner with pies handmade by Chelsea and the female athletes.

Since the last blog post, we have had very nice sunny days with incredible snow. The storm that blew in late last week added snow and created a solid grippy surface. Our days have consisted of morning sport, on-snow training in the morning, study hall after lunch and an afternoon workout. Dinner is followed by a team meeting and video session.

Under blue skis and nice weather, the Mammoth camp is halfway through the second training block. During the first block, athletes free skied slalom and GS, making progress in their skiing. We wrapped up the first block in a storm that delivered about a foot of fresh snow.

After a snowy day off, we moved into the second block focusing on GS. Now halfway through the training block, we have had sunny skies and really good snow for the past few days. Athletes have been pushing hard to make the most of training, getting up early to catch the first lift and skiing hard on GS Apex courses on Andy's Double Gold.

The entire group got through the long day and a half of travel yesterday ready to start skiing. Today we got a beautiful sunny day to welcome us to our first day on snow in Mammoth. Morning conditions were good, and everyone worked hard today, making good use of the variety of terrain available here. We are all looking forward to a weather forecasts are calling for colder weather with a possibility of snow.

Killington has been open several weeks now and with the help of mother nature, the conditions keep getting better and better.  SHhhh.  don't tell everyone though, you know how our east coast winters go.  Just enjoy it while you can.  We are!

jb

Well, just about through our second fall prep phase.  Finishing up this week before the five month crew joins us the conditioning staff decided on something fun, competitive, different, yet tough for Friday's workout.  And that's just what we did, starting with the 300m shuttle run, moving into an obstacle course circuit, tire flip for speed, wall sits and finishing with a tug or war. 
Team 3 (Trevor, James, Cam, Graeme, Spencer and Patrick) took the victory!

nice job everyone!

JB

Back from our fall camp to Austria.  It was a great but quick 10 days and we got our intended 7 days on snow with 4 GS and 3 SL.  After a low key end of last week and weekend we will be back to training as usual this week, picking the intensity back up as we look for colder temps here at Killington and anticipate the early snow here. 
Here are some pictures.

jb

Just what the doctor ordered.  Some great shots from our fall trip.  We covered it all down in South Jersey!  This weekend on the beach, next Sunday on the snow. 

Hope you enjoyed it!

Jb