The first snowfall of the year has come and gone and with that the anticipation that the race season will soon be upon us. In just under a month we will start racing in Canmore which doesn’t seem that far away especially considering I was skiing on the Haig glacier just last month.
August brought lots of forest fire smoke to the Bow Valley but lucky my team and I were able to escape part of it by getting above the smoke. The past two years I have traveled down to the southern hemisphere to get on snow during the summer. This year one of my summer goals was to travel less so I made my first trip up to the Haig glacier in three years. The couple year hiatus brought renewed excitement for glacier skiing. I got in lots of on snow time and reminded myself what skiing is supposed to feel like before coming back down to Canmore to finish the final two weeks of our three week summer volume block.
In attempt to escape the smoky west I flew east at the end of August for a week to visiting my sister, grandparents and uncle in Ottawa. A short but sweet visit, a final dose of summer before the fall training blocks began.
After a more local summer I have been hopping around the country a lot this past month. Right after my trip to Ottawa the team headed west to Revelstoke to do our second intensity block of the season. A bit more rainy than in the summer, Revelstoke still offered awesome lower altitude intensity options. Intensity focused camps are always rewarding and exhausting at the same time. After a good week of hard efforts I was happy to come back to Canmore and sleep in my own bed for the last couple hard days of the block. My time back in Canmore was short. At the end of the week I was back at the airport this time headed north to Whitehorse for some time at home with my family.
My time in Whitehorse was focused on easy training, rest and recovery in preparation for our high altitude volume block in California that just started. While in Whitehorse I took advantage of the beautiful sunny fall weather to get out paddling, horseback riding, mountain biking, cranberry picking and on lots of dog walks. My time in Whitehorse was highlight by the unveiling of my Olympic trail sign at the Whitehorse Cross Country Ski Club. I want to say a huge thank you to the Whitehorse Cross Country Ski Club for presenting me this sign and to the Whitehorse community for coming out to the presentation.
It was great to be able to touch base with some of my local sponsors and supporters. Over the summer I have been working with a Whitehorse based company Proskida, helping them test their innovative force measuring pole grips. I am very excited to be testing this amazing product and am excited to see the results the data will have. I will be continuing to work with Proskida as they refine their product and prepare it for market hopefully sometime next year. Proskida is one of the many resources that are helping me find those extra seconds.
First ski of the year on October 2nd in Canmore!
Now the focus is shifting to the winter, the summer training is complete and now we just have one last camp before we are back on snowing and starting the new race season. We are now in Mammoth California for a few weeks for our national team fall training camp. After a very positive summer of training I can’t wait to get on snow and transfer all this training into racing. Our first races will be at the end of October so not long now, but first a couple weeks in the desert.
Wishing everyone a happy thanksgiving and an early snow year.
Dahria
