Wisp

Wisp was interesting. It's in a really pretty part of Maryland and I'd love to go back, either in the winter or summer. The day we were there it was REALLY cold, 5* when we got to the resort and windy. Not sure it made it much above 20* that day. Check in was easy this time, we waited around in the lodge a bit, then drove around to the top of the mountain, which was much closer to where the race was being held.

Again, there weren't too many racers so if things went smoothly, we should have been done in good time even though there were two races. Things did not go smoothly however. Whitney said that the course was hard (a good hard - challenging but not too hard), it was also longer than ones she's been on in the past. It had a couple of jumps, a hip turn, a banana turn, and some other things. On one of the practice runs, a boy fell going over the first jump. While he was swinging his arm all around, complaining that it hurt, the ski patrol was on it's way. Found out later that he broke his arm. That was a long delay while they took care of him. Finally the races started about 10:30. Later there was a delay in the afternoon race when a girl in the 14-15 group fell on the same jump (bruised tailbone and looked like she did something to her elbow).

Whitney was the only one in her age group. Usually when that happens, the racer can either go down by themselves or be grouped with a higher or lower age group that has fewer than four racers. This time was a bit different and they had to get the ok from the race judges. There was a guy in the same age group as her plus an older female racer and an older male racer that were also the only ones in their age groups and they decided to race together. This worked out really well; it was good to have the competition even though they weren't racing against each other. It was kind of funny, they were the mixed age/sex group, the odd-balls.

So being the only one in her age group meant that Whitney came in first and got a couple more snowflakes to add to her collection, this time with blue ribbons. She also picked up the medal from Wintergreen that we missed getting last week. All this raises an interesting question - is she going to get an invitation to Nationals? We think so, but we're not really sure. She will be the Series champ for her age group but does that get her an invite or does she need to be the regional champ? Is she the regional champ? With 2 first place finishes and a second, I don't know. I just know she's got a lot of points. Nationals is the last week of March at Copper Mountain in Colorado. I sure wouldn't mind a trip to Colorado! I guess we'll have to keep checking the website and see what happens but for now, the race season is over.

Heading to Wisp

It's been a crazy week weather wise; first it was cold early, in the 70*s Wednesday and now it's back below freezing and windy. There was no practice on Wednesday night, the ski area closed at 4:30; we were getting lots of rain on top of the really warm temperatures. Practice last night was cold! It was windy and they were blowing snow like crazy. There were also some passing snow flurries/showers happening as well.

Tonight we're heading out to Wisp resort in Maryland. This is the makeup BX from last month. It looks like they've got plenty of snow out there and more snow coming this weekend. It's going to be COLD though, high of 21* tomorrow. There's two races tomorrow then this will probably be it for racing this season unless we head north.

One down, two to go!

Although it's 70* as I write this, winter has returned! We had a long cold snap of five or so days where it never got above freezing so the ski areas were making lots of snow. Whitney has been to several practices and it appears to be a small team this year. The good thing about a small group is the nights where it's just her and one other so they can focus on boarder cross skills, which they were able to do last week.

Sunday she went to her first competition of the season down at Wintergreen. It's a rather spread out resort and you start at the top of the mountain and ski down. The resort itself was pretty nice and the course was pretty good. There were only 30 or so people registered and most of them were in the younger age groups. There was only one other girl in Whitney's age group, five or six boys in the next younger age group, three in the 21-24 age group, and the rest were probably 10 and under (maybe 12, but pretty young).

They start with the warm up runs and unfortunately Whitney was only able to get in two runs. I think she would have done better with a couple more. The race is run youngest to oldest age groups, snowboarders first, so she had to wait through all the young kids. She did pretty well for her first time out this season and felt she did better than she did last year.

There's two races this weekend at Wisp. We'll be heading out Friday night since they start early on Saturday morning. Winter is coming back tomorrow and it'll be in the low 40s Friday and Saturday so that should make for some good snowboarding. Good luck, Whitney!

Wacky Weather!

We've been having some pretty non-winter like weather around here. It's been pretty warm and rainy. Much of the snow down at Massanutten has melted. I'm surprised that they can stay open right now. They're just skiing during the day and have cut their night hours. Of course that means that there's no team practice. Hopefully by this weekend things will be better. We're supposed to get about 5 inches of snow tonight and by the weekend it's going to start getting a lot colder. Next week it's going to be in the 30s all week and much colder at night. Sounds like they'll be able to make snow around the clock soon. It's a good thing since I was seeing lots of grass and thin spots on the web cams this morning.

SLOW Start to the Season

It's been a really slow start to the season, more so than last year. Whitney finally made it to a couple of practices this week. Between being out of town and not feeling well, she didn't make it until Wednesday. The slopes were rather sloppy due to the warm weather and not everything is open yet. She went back down for Thursday's practice; they both went well, just not too pretty.

She had been looking forward to the boarder cross competition this weekend at Wisp, MD. She was signed up and we had the hotel reservation set, then when we got to Massanutten for practice on Thursday, I had a facebook message from the Appalachian Series that they had to cancel the BX due to lack of snow. They didn't have enough snow to carve the course for the BX; the slopestyle competition today is still going on. Guess they had enough snow in the park, just not on the hills. So we cancelled our hotel reservation, changed our plans for the weekend, and will wait to see if they're able to reschedule.

She decided to skip today's practice. Saturday ones are good to go to since they're three hours, but between the warm weather the last few days, rain yesterday, fog this morning, the slopes were going to be REALLY messy. Not really worth the drive down. It's supposed to cool down in a few days and the overnight temps are going to be cold so hopefully they'll be able to make some snow and what there is will firm up so practice on Wednesday and Thursday coming up will be a lot better.

Think COLD and SNOW!!

New Hampshire

We just got back from a week in New Hampshire. Love it there!! Besides going to enjoy the beauty of NH, we also went so the family could ski/snowboard. We got 5" of snow one night and flurries a couple of other days. They managed to hit three different ski areas and had a good time at each.

First up was King Pine. Bob and Whitney went there for night skiing. Bad choice of nights since it was the night it was snowing. The roads were rather harrowing apparently. It was a rather tame ski area for NH but a good place to warm up since it was their first time out for the season. Fortunately, they made it home safely after a fun evening.

On New Year's Eve, Bob and Whitney headed to Cranmore and Sarah joined them later. A couple days later the three of them went to Attitash, then it was back to Cranmore for Bob and Whitney. The last two days were really cold; the wind chill was bitter at Attitash and Cranmore was just plain cold.

The biggest problem we ran into was one of Whitney's new boots broke. We have now returned it to the store and are waiting to hear from Burton about it. She's got a rental to get her through until she can get new boots.

Overall we had a great time in New Hampshire. Now it's time to get ready for the snowboard season here in Virginia, the mountain is open and she's ready to go.

Maybe this week!

It's been another slow start to the season. It was very cold at Thanksgiving, the ski area made snow, but it has long since mostly melted. Thankfully we're in another cold snap and they've been making snow like crazy. It looks like they're going to open for skiing on Monday (12/24) and should have practice on Wednesday. If there's no practice, Bob and Whitney will be heading further afield to find skiing for the day. Hopefully she can get in some practice time with the coaches since she'll have a competition pretty quick in January.