Canadian Westerns - C-c-c-cold Canmore, Alberta

Holy Guacamoly. I thought Thunder Bay was the only place on Earth that got so cold you can't ski. Well, not literally but it has a reputation for being mighty cold. Apparently there was a cold snap in the West and our week leading up to Canmore was a consistent cold of -30, -33, -37. Yep, we basically didn't leave the house except to squeeze in a few little hours at the "high" of the day, which was still usually -27.

Layer count: 3 on lower body plus warm up pants; warmest wool icebreaker I own plus NorthFace Parka; 2 buffs; 1 fleece hat; 1 pair of Rudy Project Sunglasses that I couldn't wear because my breathing ventilation fogged them; 1 pair of mits; a lot of Dermatone and determination. My eye lashes defrosted by the time I took this picture. At least the sun was shining.

We traveled right from Whistler to Canmore for Canadian Westerns, the first of two mini-tours on the Canadian circuit. I had a much better weekend and felt a lot more like myself. I don't have any pictures of myself but here are a few videos of the sprints and 10km skate. They are on the SkiTrax YouTube Channel but I think they were shot by Hardwood/SOTC staffer Graham Longford because you can hear him cheering my name. Thanks!

I'm in the B-Final and on the outside. In the start I got caught up and pushed to the back, but made up a few spots into 3rd by the first downhill. All was going well until a fluke crash with another skier on the final downhill and I came in 5th, 11th overall.



The last race of a mini-tour (3 races total in a row) is a handicap start based on the results from the previous two days. I started in 13th, 1:55 from the leader and :36 seconds from 10th. I felt great and skied well but couldn't catch a pack of about 6 skiers that formed 30 seconds ahead of myself. They kept getting away on the downhills with their mass force and I could see them at the top of everyhill. Regardless it was a great race and I completed the tour in 12th overall. In this video I'm in a white jacket and pink sunglasses in the first shot. Bib number 13 in the race.


Our team had a superb day as a whole with notes of Andrea finishing 6th, Alannah 7th Junior, Michael 6th, Jack with one of the fastest Junior times and everyone moved up a bunch of spots on the overall standings. I love when we finish and intense block on a good note.  My fast teammates:

 Alannah's 1st medal of the season. 

There was a crazy cool photo of her finishing lunge that got her Silver over Bronze. Long legs will do that. 

Andrea gettin' the monies!

We are back in Thunder Bay now for a week and then head to Ottawa and Mt. Orford for more races.

Keep scrolling down because I've put up a lot of new stuff in the past week.

Enjoy!

Erin