Saturday, August 25, 2012

Summer 2012

Hello everyone,

This summer has gone by in a flash.  It seems like yesterday that  I was pulling into Canmore after driving across Canada for my five weeks of Dryland with the Canadian Ski Team.  During this time I also started a distance e. Multivariable Calculus course.  So this summer when I have not been in the gym or on the ski hill I have been solving double and triple integrals!  Our dryland in Canmore went amazingly well.  At the end I felt strong, healthy, fit and ready to get on the ski hill!  We did some very diverse training this summer including but not limited to boxing, diving, velodrome cycling, pilates, yoga, power lifting etc.  It was great to try new activities!

After Canmore we headed home for a very needed break.  This was only my second week home since last January!  As is usual when at home the time flew by seeing friends, swimming at the lake, working out and getting all appointments out of the way before I headed out of Canada for the extended part of a  year.

I left home and flew to Munich in July.  I had a whirl wind tour of Germany, Austria and Switzerland within one day as I had to go get boots fit in Austria in the morning then drive to Zurich that same day.  Amazingly it only takes about 5 hours to drive!  From Zurich the next day we took the train to Zermatt.  This is the town right below the Matterhorn.  For those who don't know the Matterhorn...its the mountain that is featured on the Toblerone Bar!  We had an epic ski camp with a ton of freeskiing and drills.  Considering how variable the weather is known to be in Zermatt the camp went by very smoothly with us only missing three days of skiing due to wind and rain.  At the end of this camp I was very happy with my GS and Slalom.  Making progress it both events.

During our stay in in Switzerland the Olympics started.  It is always interesting seeing the Olympics.  Especially when you are trying to qualify for the next ones!  It was incredible to watch the opening ceremonies and see the emotions playing across the athletes faces and think "wow, that could honestly be me in 2 years".  Makes you see the ceremonies in a different tinged light.  It was, as always, incredibly hard to tear ourselves away from the tv screen for the next two weeks.  After I arrived back in Burlington I would watch the track and field events then go do my sprint/interval workouts afterwards in the cool night air.  Even the Olympic commercials seemed inspiring!  Its kind of funny looking back at the 2010 Olympics and knowing I was in one of those commercials!

As I mentioned above after Zermatt I went back to Burlington.  I will be missing the first week and a half of school so I decided to use this time in the summer to meet with my teachers and get my textbooks before heading down to New Zealand.  My parents visited during this time and I was able to give them the full tour of my new home!  This was of course an extremely weird feeling!

I have now been in New Zealand since the 12th of August.  So far our camp has been great!  We spent the first 9 days of skiing in Mt Hutt, which is right near Christchurch.  The snow was excellent, and we had mostly sunny skies!  We stayed in the little town of Methven where there really isnt anything to do!  This turned out very well for me as it left me plenty of time to concentrate on Calculus!  Ive been burning through it!!!  We just made the move down the Queenstown to train in Coronet Peak for the remainder of our camp.  We have had two days off.  Looking at the Coronet Peak across the lake for the past two days has me excited and I cant wait to ski again tomorrow!

Hope everyone had a great summer!  I will try to keep my blog more updated in the coming months!