Oh, the Excitement!

Last night was the first practice that we were able to make it down to since the season started. Whitney was SO excited to be back on the slopes again. Things didn't go super smoothly though. The main coach hurt his knee earlier in the season. I kind of had to laugh at that one, it's mid-December and the last few years she wasn't even on the slopes yet but now we're a couple of weeks into the season so there was an "earlier in the season" for the coach to get hurt. Hope you feel better soon, Scott! Anyway, Scott's hurt, there was supposed to be a sub coach there but there were communication problems. A coach finally showed up about 20 minutes late and practice got going. Tonight she's feeling a bit under the weather. She really wanted to go but realized that she wouldn't make it through practice.

Last night we got down there early enough for a few warm up runs before practice was supposed to start, just enough for a reminder to the muscles on how they were supposed to work on snow. Once practice started, the joy began. She told me after that she was so happy to be back snowboarding again. This is one daughter I expect to move away after high school, either for college or to work, and I'll be visiting her in either New England or the West (Colorado probably). She loves the cold, the snow, winter days, snowboarding, and won't be happy living somewhere where these things are out of reach.

Now the hard work begins with the goal of an invite to Nationals again in March. Looking forward to our Colorado vacation!

Snow Even Here Now

We've had a pretty good cold spell that has included ice and snow, even here at our house. All the local ski areas opened the weekend after Thanksgiving this year, then closed for the week, opened last weekend and are going strong now. We've had enough cold that they could make a lot of snow, then we had a couple of good storms come through bring more of the natural stuff.

Practice has already started, at least on the weekends. Weeknight practices start next week so we'll be making the long drive starting then. We're planning on spending a lot of time at the ski slopes over Christmas break. There's plenty of snow now and I'm sure there's more to come since it doesn't look like we'll be getting out of this really cold snap anytime soon.

Parents Meeting/Start of the Season

Last night was the parents meeting for the ski and snowboard teams. Most of it was all stuff we'd heard before - practice schedule, volunteer commitments, etc. There were a few new things. It looks like they're reworking the snowboard team a bit and it sounds like it will be for the better. At this point, we are staying with this team for the long haul so hopefully Whitney can get out of it what she needs. Probably the best news we heard was that since we're looking at a string of really cold days coming up, they hope to open the resort on Nov. 30 for skiing! We'll see if they can actually do that, but if so they will most likely be open weekends only until mid-December. That means no weeknight practices for a while yet, but we'll definitely be gearing up soon.

Since we're getting close to the start of the season, it's time to get a few things done. Last night we were able to take care of getting the girls their season passes so now as soon as the snow starts falling, they'll be able to hit the slopes whether Whitney has practice or not. Whitney was also able to pick up her new jacket before the meeting. Now I need to get her snowboard in for a waxing and sharpening. The last one she got last season was not very good; I'll be talking to the shop about that. She also needs new board pants and a new helmet.

It was rather exciting to see some snow on the top of the mountain last night when we went down. Hopefully more will start falling soon, whether it's from the snow guns lining the slopes or from the skies above.

Snow is Starting to Fall, Just Not Around Here

Yes, it's true, snow is starting to fall in the western states and New England, but it's 75* here today. No snow! I saw on my Snow and Ski app that several resorts in Colorado have gotten snow, the pass near Loveland is closed due to snow, and Copper Mountain is doing a limited opening today. Several resorts in New England, mainly Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine have started to open. I'm sure they've only got a few runs ready to roll as well. For all of them, it's going to be full on pretty soon.

As for us, it'll probably be at least a month and a half before there's any hope of hitting the slopes around here, maybe even a bit longer. At least we know it's getting closer. We got the letter last week about the snowboard team; the parents meeting is coming up in a couple of weeks, the grill schedule is out and Bob has signed up for his days, Whitney has been looking at new board pants (hers are getting rather thin in the knees).

Looking forward to colder days!

Mid-September

So we're now into mid-late-September and it's actually starting to look a bit like winter. Not around here, of course. Copper Mountain posted some pictures yesterday of the snow they had gotten. It definitely looked like more than a dusting. They also had some comment about the second day of fall being the first day of winter. There were several mountain ranges in the west that got snow over the last few days.

A week or so ago, I saw on facebook that one of the mountains in New Hampshire was firing up their snow guns. Nothing to get excited about yet, they were having a night with cold enough temperatures to fire up the guns for a test run. I haven't seen anything about natural snow falling up north yet.

It will be quite a while before we start seeing any of the white stuff on the East Coast, at least our part of the coast. Hopefully it'll be a cold winter with lots of snow!

It's Only September

We're still months away from any snowboarding, but it's getting closer. USASA is starting to post information about this winter. Hopefully the Appalachian Series will have schedules up soon. I'd really like to know how many boarder cross competitions there will be and where they're going to be held. It would be especially useful if there's only going to be one or two and we have to go out of series for her to get in a couple more.

Whitney also has a list of things she needs to look into before the season starts. She's going to find out the requirements for becoming a snowboard instructor. It would improve her skills plus give her a good job skill. Not that we live close enough to a mountain right now for that to be a possibility but when she goes off to college, it would be good. I would guess she probably has to be 18 though. The other thing she's going to look into is the USSSA (not sure if that's too many "S"s or not) since they are the feeder organization to the Olympics, as I understand it.

For sure on our schedule is the parent meeting at Massanutten in November, practices there all winter, and hopefully another trip to Nationals at Copper Mountain in April.

Dreaming of Winter

We took a vacation to the Southwest and there was still snow on the mountain tops. We saw it in several places in the distance - Arizona, Colorado, and Utah. It made my snowboarder dream of winter and wish she was at the top of the mountains.

 All the ski resorts in the area were closed, so she had no chance of snowboarding, but she enjoyed dreaming.

Then we saw this sign at Bryce:

which just made her laugh. No way would she even think of snowboarding there!

She'll just have to keep dreaming of winter for a few more months.