1.16.16 Reflections on a Big Win
Hey there MYSL skiers!
Since I last wrote to you, some very exciting things have happened! I finished the Tour de Ski in 10th place, and 6 of my teammates also completed every stage race and finished the Tour. Sophie Caldwell and I both won stages of the tour; Sophie won a classic sprint, and I won an individual start 5km skate race. It was such an exciting tour for our team. I’m going to walk you through the day and what it felt like to be the first American woman to win a modern day distance World Cup!
1.5.16 Tour de Ski
12.28.15 Happy Holidays
12.17.15 Relay Magic
11.27.15 Watch me carefully!
Hi there MYSL skiers!
I hope you are all ready for snow, because I sure am excited to start the ski season! I’m writing to you about our training camp in Gällivare, which is in Sweden. It’s 100 kilometers North of the Arctic Circle, and there is no easy way to get there, especially from Minnesota! My travel day looked like this: I flew from Minneapolis to Amsterdam (Holland) from Amsterdam to Helsinki (Finland), and from Helsinki to Rovaniemi (also Finland), which is the official airport of Santa Claus! There’s a bunch of Holiday decorations in the airport and it’s a pretty big vacation destination for Finnish families. From the Rovaniemi airport we drove 3 hours to Gällivare, where we stayed in little houses on top of a mountain.
2.4.15 Hello from Switzerland
Hi MYSL skiers!
This time I’m writing to you from Davos, Switzerland! After the World Cup races in Norway, we traveled to Davos, and because there was no snow in most places in Europe, the World Cup races stayed in Davos for two weekends in a row. I can’t remember the last time that happened, but it’s getting harder to find snow every year it seems! It was challenging for the race organizers to make enough snow to cover the 5km race trail, so the army helped out. We saw hundreds of army guys in uniform running the snow guns, moving snow onto the trails and spreading it out. They were also in charge of security during the race and helped with parking. I guess since Switzerland doesn’t like to fight anybody the army gets to help out with ski races instead!
1.13.15 My Winter so Far
Hi MYSL kids!
I’m writing to you from Italy, where I am in a training camp after racing in the Tour de Ski. I want to share with you what I’ve been up to and the places I’ve been in the first part of the World Cup racing season, back in November! After packing up my duffel bag and ski bag for the winter, I hugged my family goodbye and left Minnesota. I won’t be back home until March, so I had to pack a bag for 5 months…the whole winter! Can you imagine being on the road for a whole winter? What would you bring with you? Of course I bring my skis, boots, poles and boots…but I also like to bring some books, some of my favorite snacks like peanut butter (they don’t have good peanut butter in Europe!) and some cards.
My first stop in Europe was way up north, in Muonio, Finland. I rejoined my US Ski Teammates, and we lived in little cabins in a tiny ski town. Muonio is above the Arctic Circle, so it was dark most of the day, but we got to see the Northern Lights one night! We stayed in Muonio for a week to train and get used to the different time zone, then we traveled to Ruka (also called Kuusamo), which is also in Finland for the first World Cup races of the year.
11.1.14 Snow Camp!
Happy November, MYSL skiers!
I’m writing to you from Canmore, Alberta, where we just finished up a camp on snow! I was up in Canada with the US Ski Team and my club team for 10 days to practice skiing on real snow instead of roller skiing before the racing season starts. Canmore has a huge ski area, and two winters ago I was there with the World Cup racers to compete on their super hilly and rocky trails.
10.15.14 Altitude
Hey MYSL skiers!
I’m living up at 8,000 feet above sea level in Park City, Utah right now with my US Ski Team teammates. So you know how high that is, the highest point in Minnesota is 2,301 feet. So coming to Park City and living up in the mountains is a big change - 4 times higher than I usually live at! The air is drier here, so I have to drink a ton of water and we always get dusty when we go running. And when I first got up here it was hard to breathe just walking up the stairs! That’s what always happens to me during my first week of high altitude. It’s important for us to live up here and practice training and racing at higher altitude because some of the World Cups in Europe are also in the mountains, and we need to be ready. It’s also a fun training camp because so many ski clubs from all over the US come to Utah to train. This is our last big training camp together before winter starts up, and it’s a good chance to work on last-minute technique changes and go on some fun runs through the mountains before it gets too cold out!
4.17.14 Season Wrap Up
What’s the deal with all this cold weather in April, huh? It makes me think that ski season never ended, after all! Speaking of the end of ski season, I want to tell you about what happened after the Olympics. The Olympics in Russia were definitely the highlight of the year; I had been looking forward to them for months and years, but the season didn’t stop after Closing Ceremonies! We still had World Cup race weekends left in Lahti (Finland), Oslo and Drammen (Norway) and Falun (Sweden). I was super excited to continue racing and although the Olympics had left me a little worn out, I also left Sochi very pumped up for more skiing!