and so it begins. i feel like my personal ski season is just beginning (injuries), but nonetheless, the high school ski season draws to a close in two weeks, and my new commitments begin.
this year, i'm also coaching track (half time). in the past i've offered frisbee 5 days a week, and the result has been spotty attendence, and teaching the same concept over and over all week. my hope is that by only offering ultimate 3 days per week, i'll get better turnout, and therefore, better conceptual understanding and 'buy-in.'
it's the usual returning mix of freaks (and i mean that in the good way as being way too commited in the way i once was to frisbee), geeks (still in the good way, genius students who are finally trying some athletics), and... i don't have a rhyme. new players, some of great athleticism, just showing up. the 'a' team will be the freaks, and the returners, plus the odd late commer with mad athleticism. the 'b' and 'c' teams will be a mix of young 'c' team and new 'b' team. or vice versa. or a mix based on commitment/desire.
fields are an issue here. the field we will play on is still groomed for skiing. our own fields are in the middle of a multi-million rehab for sinkholes. half the team will be on the track team, which means off days will include running and throwing. i think for new young players, 5 days/week of ultimate is fine, with short practices, but we're not doing that this year. so, 5 days of throwing plus 2-3 days of ultimate... should be good.
i have a good motivated assistant, enthusiastic kids... supportive parents... should be fun.
personally, start of spring sports means 6 PM skiing. it can be a terrible time to nordic skiing as icing occurs, but i'll deal. oddly, it can also mean SUPER touring (hiking up mountains and skiing down), which has a crossover benefit.
the past 2.5 weeks since my last post have found me racing the WORST race of my life, some good training, improving foot health, and generally good cheer. i went to the boulder mountain tour and somehow had horribly slow skis. (there are reasons, i'll leave them for the comments page). suffice to say there are people i beat in a 12 k this weekend by over a minute who beat me by over 14 minutes in a basically downhill race. disastrous. c'est la vie.
i've been training OK, i feel i am in posistion to make a move in the next few weeks, i just am not having the results i want. i'm also struggling with form, and spending too much energy trying to fix minutiae, and losing time thinking when i should be hitting it.
still averaging 10 hours of skiing a week, looking to maintain that for a few weeks, and then add training hours in the form of running, swimming, biking.
that's all. except that the cracker song, the world is mine, in the commercial with tiger, federer, is sweet
2 comments:
Luke, have you ever tried an avalung when touring? I'm trying to decide whether to buy one or not. Worth it?
i'm probably the wrong person to ask. my personal theory is that if you need an avalung, you've probably made a series of judgement errors that are pretty bad. also, where i live, in the cascades, i think you'd probably just be pretty much be dead in an avalanche, given the higher moisture content. I guess anything is possible though.. there are many, MANY more qualified people to make that choice than me... but i'd start with an Avvy course (if you've not taken one), etc.
if you're in the intermountain/rockies area, It might not be unreasonable. These days, I'm mainly nordic skiing. And when I tour, I'm pretty safety concious.
Although there was the one time I poached the backcountry at Alpental, with a skier to remain nameless, and against my better instinct, and knowledge, proceeded to ski some very questionable snow.
The snow, on a large snowfield we were traversing, WHOOMPED, indicating MASSIVE settling. I then said, whoops, let's ski cautiously, ridges only, stay in trees, watch each other, etc. He said OK, and proceeded to whoop down the gully.
We were busted by ski patrol, there was in fact a slide (we weren't in it, but it was on a fairly low angle slope of the sort that sparky the attorney would have ski'd willi-nilli). We were corralled out by the explosive crew, the only 'safe' way out involved a 15 foot cliff drop (which I would never in a million years do by choice, I'm neither a young skier, nor a lifelong skier). One of the ski patrolers tore his ACL on the drop, endearing us greatly with the redcoats.
Sparky lost his season pass, I just had a day pass.
So, be safe.
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