European Tour 2011

Coffee with my brother in Den Haag
The Church, Windmills and canal around the corner from my aunts place

So since leaving Courcheval we went to Flauchau where I had a good but disappointing World Cup. Basically I skied well but straddled a gate! Its nice to know that my splits before I DNF'd were fast enought to be competitive to make the top 30 again. I am really starting to feel like Im getting into my stride in Slalom! After Flauchau we had a four day break before christmas which I took full advantage of by visiting my cousins in Holland that I haven't seen since I was 16! I come to Europe 2-4 times a year for the past 5 or so years and have not been able to make it up to see them so this was a VERY nice change! I toured around Den Haag (The Hague) and Schevengingen with my brother and my cousins. After eating a ton of yummy black licorice and drinking coffee I flew back to Saal Felden Austria and rejoined the Canadian Team for christmas. We did a "white elephant" gift exchange and I picked out a Rubix Cube (a four by four one which is harder than the 3x3-which I already have) so I have been spending my time trying to solve it! I am so close every time before I screw up...I know Ill solve it in a day or two! We did two good days of training in Hinterreit which is right near Saal Felden before driving today to Lienz...the location of our next World Cup. I will race the day after tomorrow (The girls race GS tomorrow). Really looking forward to racing again!

Cheers, Merry Christmas and a VERY Happy New Year!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NOmc_tuuJks&list=UU74kgl2AndmuwrSMWO-MAnA&index=1&feature=plcp

This is the link to the freeskiing video I made from yesterday!

Enjoy!

World CUPS!

I have been incredibly busy lately and I cannot believe I actually made it through intact! Since my last post much has happened. I qualified for the Aspen World Cup which I competed in and straddled a gate first run. It was very disappointing to not finish when I felt so ready to compete! I knew I could make top 30. The next two days we had NorAm races in Loveland Colorado. Almost the entire World CUp field stayed for these races. I had two good days ending up 7th and 9th in a very stacked field. During these NorAms I was also studying because directly afterward I had final exams at school! When I went home I completed three midterms then did two final exams. I also saw an awesome band friday night before I left called Good Old War. It was a great note to end my stay in Burlington on. On Saturday I headed to Panorama BC for some NorAm Races. On the road I found out that I would have the opportunity to race the next two World Cup races in Europe. So on monday I booked a flight for thursday to head to Europe. The NorAm series was a bit of a rough go for me...I didnt hit my stride until the second day in the races despite feeling really good in warm up both days. While I was in Panorama I also completed the last two of my 4 final exams. It was interesting coming off hill and going directly into an exam. It was not very relaxing. However I am now finished my first semester of Civil Engineering which I am very proud of! I cannot believe that I managed to pull off this semester with all the skiing I did. I am also LOVING school and feel I am in the right program which is also a great feeling to have. So after a pleasant upgraded flight over to Europe we travelled to Courchevel...which has recieved over a metre of snow in the past week. They tried to run the race yesterday but it was cancelled thankfully. Instead we had an amazing powder day which we filmed a little of on Marie-Michele Gagnon's GoPro. There is nothing like freeskiing in powder through trees when you can cover a HUGE amount of vertical. So today they were able to hold the race. The weather improved drastically today. We even had sunshine! With bib 47 I knew it was going to be a fight down the course. I watched my team mate Erin Mielzynski slay her run starting 33. After watching her myself and Anna Goodman, who was starting ahead of me knew it was possible to still have a good run. The course ended up being in way better condition than I was expecting and I charged the whole way down. When I crossed the finish line I was tied for 26th place! I was pretty happy with that but thought that it wouldnt hold. I did move back to 27th but happily QUALIFIED FOR SECOND RUN! This was a pretty big deal! First of all, for me it means that I will now be racing the World Cups in Lienz and Zagreb. Secondly, it means that if I finished I would score my first world cup points and thirdly if I finished I would open up another spot for Canada in Slalom (meaning one more Canadian Girl can have the opportunity to compete). I tried not to think about any of this before my second run. I focused on the immediate future. Skiing well. I felt I had a good inspection and managed the stress of the situation well. The awe of World Cup is definitely wearing off now so it felt like I was prepping for a normal race which was nice. My second run went well though not without a few baubles here and there. I ended up 23rd overall. I scored 8 World Cup points and opened up another spot for Canada! I am extremely happy with today. Sometimes it is nice to know you can achieve your goals! I am also very excited to return to Flauchau...which is where I had my first World Cup start last year. I will keep everyone updated and thanks for reading! Hope everyone has a great christmas!

Elli