Final Day in Lake Placid

(9:00pm) Finally arrived at home today around 3:45ish. It was a long drive home through various weather conditions and some late traffic, but overall not a bad trip.  We spent the final afternoon of our trip touring through the town of Lake Placid, Olympic museums and the Ski Jumps, which were the coolest!

I have some awesome pictures to post of the ski jumps, although the photos don’t even quite convey the enormity of the slopes and the 120m jump.  We also got to watch some of the freestyle skiers practice jumping off ski jumps and pulling tricks before landing in the water. It was SO cool. Again, I have videos and pictures, but I’ll post those tomorrow.

Now it’s back to the daily grind of hitting the gym for workouts and sprinting and back to work. I should be up in a month to retest and make sure this time that I’m a funded athlete! Keep checking back to the blog for my progress and I’ll let you know how things pan out!

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BETTER UPDATE

First of all, here’s two videos from the push track today. The first is learning to hit the sled and my first run. The second video is of my final run, which was apparently very good. 🙂

While we were at the push track, Don Hass spoke to each one of us as to our next step. He thinks I’ll get a phone call to come to Push Championships and re-Combine there. So again, he wants me to train for the next month and get called back for that.

Second, he was adamant about me potentially switching to skeleton and so that’s on the backburner for now. If I switch to skeleton, I would come up in November sometime for a sliding camp.  Apparently the skeleton field is wide open and there aren’t a whole lot of girls, so I would have a really good chance there.

Anyway, that’s my update and again it’s REALLY GOOD NEWS. Check back later for some vids of the track walk.

Sunshine Finally

(8:45am) It’s a beautiful morning here in Lake Placid which is refreshing after 2 days of rain. I just caught breakfast and now I’m hanging around until we go to the Push Track at 10am.  Until then I think I’ll roam around and catch some photos to post later.

I’m excited for the push track because Mr. Hass (Development Coordinator at Lake Placid) said he’ll make sure to watch and give me some pointers for both bobsled and skeleton which will be nice since I know have some decisions to make. Overall it’ll be cool just to finally get in/on a sled.

After Push Track training we’ll go to Mt. Van Hoevenberg to do a track walk which will be AWESOME, especially since the day is so nice. I’ll definitely catch some photos there.

Stay tuned and again THANK YOU for all the support. You don’t know how much it means to me!

Okay, so here’s the deal…

593.

That’s my combine score (which should technically be 597 but that’s a longish story I’m not going to explain).

What does this mean?

Well, technically it means I didn’t qualify for Push Championships BUT just this ISN’T bad news. There’s more.

So I needed 600+ points to qualify, but the coach asked to speak to me after they went over the results with everyone. Upon doing so, he asked that I continue to work out and train because I will most likely get a call during season asking me to come up and race/push/compete since I literally JUST missed it and they liked what they saw. So good news on that front.

Second, after speaking with Elana Meyers and Jazmine Fenlator, they are trying to host a sort-of “last minute” combine right before Push Championships toward the end of September. If all the logistics work out for this, they want me to come back and re-test because you do much better on your second combine than your first. This would definitely put me over 600 points and then I would be a funded athlete and be allowed to stay and compete in Push Championships.

Third, if this does not work out or I decide not to do it, I was told by one of the development coordinators at Lake Placid that I am welcome to tryout for the skeleton team because my testing would more than over-qualify me for it and apparently I’m the right build for it.

Overall while it seems like I didn’t “make” the team, what this really means is that I don’t right now get the chance to tryout with the National team but it does mean that I not only have options, but do have the chance to re-qualify if they can put together another combine test.

So this is good news people! I’m slightly disappointed with the outcome but I have plenty of options right now, so it’s definitely NOT over. Not if I have anything to say with it. 🙂

Combine Complete

…and thank goodness for that!

Just finished the lifting portion of the combine. I cleaned 60 kg (roughly 135 lbs) which isn’t bad, I’m just ticked because I cleaned 65 kg perfectly but got ambitious and tried to do 70 kg for my final attempt and missed so I got stuck down at 60 kg since I skipped a weight.

I back squatted 105 kg (roughly 231 lbs) which was pretty good and is more than I’ve ever done before, so I was really pleased.  Tonight we have a meeting at 7pm and we’ll get our combine scores back and they’ll tell us what’s going on from here. So basically 7pm is do or die time!

Well, I’m off to shower and stretch now. Stay tuned around 8pm (ish) for my results!

Phase One, Check

So Part 1 of the Combine Test is officially complete.  I feel like the sprint went well but I can’t remember my times so I don’t know where I’m at on the scale. Broad Jump I did 2.42 m which gets me around 70 points. The shot toss didn’t go as well as I had hoped (I used to kill the shot toss in college…but we threw it behind vs. in front) but I threw around 10.8 m which will get me around 73 points.  So overall, not a bad start.

Part two of the Combine will start at 3:15pm and consists of a lifting test, which is the part I’m most anxious about. I must do a 3 rep max back squat and 1 rep max clean. I know what I can do on a good day so I hope that today is such.  I think I’m the most nervous about this part because I feel like this is one of the most important tests for the combine and naturally, I do not want to fail.

Anyway, for now, I’m just hanging out in my room trying to relax before the lift. I already caught lunch and I’ll get a stretch in before I settle down.

Here’s a quick video of the ski jumps I spoke about earlier. It’s not the greatest angle, but it’s what I have for now. The scariest part (which isn’t shown) is the landing. It’s literally straight down and looks as though they would overshoot it and land in the road!

The Final Countdown

(8:40am)  Just finished up breakfast and now I’m back in my room with my roommates contemplating the day’s upcoming events.  I’m in Group 4, meaning that I’ll start the first part of the combine test at the Lake Placid High School track at 11:15am.  The first part consists of a sprint test, broad jump and shot put toss.  It’s fairly chilly this morning but at least the rain has stopped for now.

At this point it’s just sitting (well, pacing) and waiting for it to be our turn. The first group is starting at 9am today so until they finish up, I have to find time to occupy myself, which as an anxious person isn’t easy. I keep glancing at the clock hoping simultaneously that the dial will speed up so that it’s my turn, yet slow down because once it starts, that’s it. 2 hrs and 18 minutes…

Unfortunately, my dear teammate Katie Turner is NOT in my group for testing. She was the last name called for Group 3 which was really heart-breaking. She’s been a great source of support and we were both really bummed that we couldn’t be together but we’re trying to think about it as an opportunity to scope out the competition.

So anyway, keep your fingers crossed! I’ll update after my session is over and I’ve had some lunch. 🙂

Lake Placid, here we are!

(4:00pm)  After a long, rainy and traffic ridden trip, Katie and I finally made it to the Olympic Training Center in Lake Placid, New York.  On the way up we passed by the jumps where the Ski Jumpers perform…all I can say is that I DEFINITELY have a new appreciation for their sport. I’m an adrenaline junkie, but no amount of adrenaline could ever persuade me to give that sport a try. I’ll see if I can post a picture of why I say that later.

So far we’ve checked-in, filled out paperwork and moved into our rooms, a sort-of mesh between a dorm room and a hotel room (unfortunately we are not roommates).  Tonight we’ll meet at 9:00pm with the coaches to discuss the itinerary for the camp.  Combine testing starts tomorrow at 9am!