For the past week I have been in Jindabyne training and making the most of the spring snow.
We started off the week with two days of extensive fitness testing with OWI trainer John Marsden at Sport and Rec in Jindabyne. Along with my teammates Scott, Sami and Anton, we spent two full days testing strength, power, aerobic fitness, anaerobic fitness, lactate thresholds, flexibility, agility etc…. the list goes on!
(The VO2 max test... everyone's favourite!)
Staring Monday I had 5 days of solid training at Perisher. We did early mornings (up at 5:15am, on snow by 7am), training GS stubbies and some head-to-head action. We then practised starts (as always!) and jumping in the Perisher terrain park.
On Wednesday I managed to psyche myself up and hit the 70ft table jump at Perisher park. The jump was bigger than anything I’ve hit before in a terrain park, and was really intimidating skiing into it. With the boys gone, I had no one to follow in to get the speed right, so I just had to balls up and go for it. My mind went blank and before I knew it I was sailing off this enormous jump, with the snow at least 3-4m below me. Thankfully all went well and I landed smoothly. Once was enough though!
(70ft jump at Perisher)
(I'm going to go ahead and say that it's much bigger than it looks....)
After a long week training, I spend Friday night up at Thredbo with the “One Hit Wonder” crew. This is the second time the competition has been held, and has attracted some renowned international skiers. If I thought 70ft was big, they’re hitting an enormous 90ft + jump at the top of Thredbo. And not only that, they’re throwing triple spins off it. I sound like a total woos compared to what they’re doing!
In the afternoons, my spare time was spent catching up on the uni work I was missing out on...
Multiple hours went into the making of my model for Architecture Design Studio....
Yesterday I drove back to Melbourne. Once again, the 7-hour solo drive was long and arduous! Now I’m in Melbourne for only two weeks (dryland training and studying my bum off to catch up on uni) before I leave for Europe for a two-week training camp in Stubai Glacier, Austria. I’m really excited to go back over to Europe for some good skiing, long runs, and of course….kaiserschmarrn (for those who have never had it, you’re truly missing out!)
