YUM YUM YUM

Our end of the season potluck is on for Tuesday March 2nd at 5pm. You are welcome to partake in pre-potluck skiing on your own, but there will not be an organized practice as I will be inside prepping and hopefully doing whatever needs to be done so that our meal goes smoothly. There has been good response for RSVPs so far and it looks like we'll have a good group. Please continue to let me know if you will be attending or not and what you plan on bringing if you haven't already.

Lots of snow out there --- a bit heavy and somewhat challenging for the skinny skis to plow through, but, hey we take what we can get here in VT, right?! Great to see the few skiers who have been able to make it out during vacation week. I love the enthusiasm and have had a blast with this group.

Amazing! And...MARK YOUR CALENDAR!

Today was great --- our skiers were so impressive. After seeing off our girls at the start, I didn't stick around for the boys and headed backwards out on the course. I stopped to cheer our skiers on at a pretty steep hill and was just blown away by the skill that these guys have. When it matters, they are all putting it down. Even if some of the other skiers may have been faster on the course overall, our skiers got up the hill a lot more smoothly and quickly than the rest of the field. Where everyone else seemed to be using herringbone up the hill, it was great to see Sleepy Hollow skiers standing up, gliding, and using their diagonal stride. I was so impressed! It was the start of school vacation and everyone had many other commitments preventing them from lingering around at the race, but the skiing that I saw was absolutely amazing and I want everyone to know it! What an awesome way to finish out our racing together -- and we were even joined by a couple skiers who hadn't raced yet this season and they looked incredible out there!!!

Also -- mark your calendars for a team potluck to conclude our season on March 2nd. That is a Tuesday and it will be at Sleepy Hollow. We will need people to sign up for an area of food that they will be bringing. I am going to check with Molly if we can use Sleepy Hollow dishes to reduce waste (I'll wash 'em with the fancy dishwasher when we are done -- I actually used to be the night innkeeper there, so it'll be just like old times!). Please send me an e-mail with what you would be willing to provide:
-drinks
-main dish
-salad/appetizer
-dessert
-other
Also - put in votes for the time for this thing -- I want to try to accommodate as many families as possible and I know it is town meeting day and then back to school in the morning, so we won't go too late, but if you have a preference for time let me know. 5pm?

Thanks for all the support from parents and families this season. I have really enjoyed having everyone in the program and sharing the sport of skiing with you guys!!

Don't forget - Tuesday and Friday this week will be our last two sessions. Skiers can pick skate or classic and we will meet at the usual time starting at 3:45pm.

Friday!

It's almost school vacation for all our skiers! How exciting! Tomorrow we'll be classic skiing and will go from 3:45-4:45pm. Skiers who wish to wax their skis for Saturday's race may do so after practice - I don't know how long that will take so just a warning. The mention of going to CVU to wax has been complicated by the fact that CVU has a half day so we won't have anyone going to CVU and we will wax AT SLEEPY HOLLOW after practice if skiers want to.

Then, next week is our last week! Time flies!

Speed Skiers and Race Info!

We had some speed skiing around a lovely oval of orange cones today --- we did a few relays inspired by all the speed skating we've been watching in the Olympics! We did a straight up "freeskate" relay (no poles) and then one that involved slalom, too! There were some messy handoffs in the tag zone, but I suppose with long skis on the feet that could be expected. All in all a good day -- nice snow and no injuries!

We'll be classic skiing on Friday in preparation for the race on Saturday. If there is interest - I can take a group to CVU to wax skis after practice and to check out their wax rooms -- fancy stuff!

We will meet at 9am at the range in Jericho for the race which starts at 10am. It is a 3km race. There will be heat and bathrooms available inside at the Walker Building and lots of times they have chili and stuff in there, too, but I am not sure about that this race.

Sounds like there will be many skiers missing during vacation week, but skiers can pick either skate or classic - whatever their hearts desire - on those days and we'll do some fun stuff.

As our season nears the end...

...we've got lots of fun still to be had!!

We had a great day for our exciting mass start race at Sleepy Hollow this morning. While we didn't up our average skier attendance at this race (so sad! But, hey, more valentine's day chocolate for me since we had soooo much left over!), we had some great skiing and good team spirit. For all of our skiers who have not been racing with us, please know your presence is greatly desired - while on our cool down ski today, one of our racers said "Man, we really need to get more of our teammates to race with us!" I agree that it is very lonely out there for the few skiers that are attending races.

The race course was well tracked thanks to wonderful grooming by Eli and Dave Enman and the BKL race happened before the regular Ichabod's race so our skiers got FRESH tracks! As mentioned above there was a mass start with all BKL skiers but different grades cut off on different trails to complete their course. We had one skier who did the 5/6th grade course (Liberty Meadow to Lower Saddle) and then 4 who did the 7/8th grade course (Liberty Meadow, Lower Saddle, Sap Run, Eli's Escape to Upper Saddle) and although there were some challenges (as there always are, sometimes big, sometimes small) I think we had a successful day. The Valentine's chocolate that we all shared at the end probably helped the cause!

THE NEXT TWO WEEKS: So looking ahead our season is really nearing the end. It has gone by so quickly! We have our last scheduled race on Saturday at the Ethan Allen Firing Range in Jericho. This is a classic race at an excellent facility and everyone is expected to participate in this race as this finale is mandatory for our race program. Practice this week will consist of skating on Tuesday and classic on Friday in preparation for our race. We will race on Saturday and then the next week (our last week) we will allow for a choice of classic or skating both on Tuesday and Friday. Please let me know if your skier will be absent so I know what numbers to expect for practices - I know it is school break.

OTHER RACES: The BKL festival is in Maine that last weekend in February, but I have not heard of any interest for our group so we did not register. If there is a desire to do the Stowe Derby short course at a discounted rate, I need to know by tomorrow so that we can get info to the CVU coach in time (she is who will be able to register you at the discounted rate).

TEAM DINNER: If anyone would be interested in hosting a celebration team dinner, I am willing to arrange a date and time when we can use the inn and do a good old spaghetti dinner or some sort of pot luck to conclude our season as a group and to share a meal together. I would need probably two parent organizers to help with this so please let me know if you would like to volunteer.

Just in case you're up late...

...and thinking about the race.

There has been a course change! See updated webpage here. 7th/8th graders are still at the 5k distance, but different trails, 5th/6th course is 2.5km and different trails as well. Check it out if you are having a sleepless night.

http://www.skisleepyhollow.com/skiing/ski-races/20-races

No waxing tonight

In an effort to prevent our practice from going late into the night, I have decided that we will not wax tonight. I am hoping that we will have the whole team participating in the race on Sunday so that would just be too many people to wax and get home before midnight! I don't see waxing as a high priority for Sunday anyway since we are just racing for fun. We will do kick wax for those who need it on Sunday morning before the race.

See you all tonight! Practice will end at 5:30pm.

Let's get ready to race!

Sounds like all went well yesterday and, for the most part, everyone has skied their respective race course for Sunday's Ichabod's Revenge! The race will be a classic race so we'll be classic skiing on Friday and have Elissa Rehm joining us to help us with technique and to chat about race prep and having a pre-race routine, etc. That'll be great with our entire team racing on Sunday!

Practice will begin at 3:45 as usual and we will probably ski til 5pm then go inside for some snacks/waxing/chat.

We'll try to make Sunday a great day for everyone with lots of encouragement, team spirit (if anyone wants to bring any eccentric accessories they are more than welcome!), maybe some posters/signs/pom poms if any of our parent support staff feel inclined, and some good eats as a post race treat. If anyone is willing to provide any of this for Sunday, please send me an email so I can know how much to expect and then what I should fill in with! Thanks so much for the wonderful continuous support from our ski families -- this program couldn't do it without you! Maybe we'll even have some parent racers on Sunday that WE can cheer on instead!

Trapps weekend and the week ahead...

We had a great day at Trapps with our BKL race following some pretty impressive skiing by the collegiate skiers and Eastern Cup racers. Sleepy Hollow's own Eli Enman totally smoked the classic course and was chilling out eating triscuits after his race like the whole thing was no big deal. I guess after so many years of racing and so much success you get used to it!

A small turnout of 5 dedicated Sleepy Hollow Junior Racers toed the start line for a 2.5km skate race on the well groomed trails at Trapps. We had some strong skiing with our racers practicing their V2 and showing us some great tempo on the uphills. The mass starts proved to be a little tricky and some of our boys got blocked in behind the bunch for a while - they were being so polite!

After the race, older Colin and I met up at the Lake Champlain Chocolates store in Waterbury and just so happened to run into several of our racers -- we should have had a post race get together there!!! I guess smart minds think alike -- nothing better than some Vermont chocolate (and apparently some Vermont cheese for a couple of our racers) after being out on the snow.

This week:

Tuesday - Skate skiing!

Friday - Classic skiing! We will go til 5:30 - so 3:45-5:30pm for Friday's practice. We are hoping to get in some more technique work on our classic skis and we have Elissa Rehm coming as our special guest. Those skiers who want to wax their skis for Sunday will be able to do so as well (we will try to incorporate this within the 5:30 time frame for those skiers).

Sunday - Classic race at Sleepy Hollow! ALL OF OUR SKIERS ARE ENCOURAGED TO PARTICIPATE! We haven't had the participation that I was hoping for at our races so far this season and it would be great to have the rest of the team join our regulars for this race. This is a great race for you to get out there and try racing -- these are your home trails and the more people we have there, the more fun it will be. It's a totally low pressure race situation, it's not far to travel, and it's amongst all your BKL friends so I am expecting that the majority of our team members will make an effort to race. If you only do one race, make it this one! You've been putting in lots of time on your skis this year and it's time to see it all come together! You are on a Junior High Race team afterall :o)

Back on snow!

Yesterday was actually a great practice back on the skis even with the icy surface beneath some pretty good grooming. We started off with a very popular game of limbo on skis - so popular that it was difficult to stop people from limboing so we could get on with the rest of our activities. We split into two groups. Luckily older Colin was there to help out and we had some parent assistance as well. One group went and did ridge road to bear claw with Colin and parents while another group went out with me for a liberty meadow and lower saddle ski. Many skiers were able to work with Colin on their V2 and V2 alternate techniques and others chose to play a game and try some one-ski balance activities. All in all, it was good to be back on the snow with everyone and we're looking forward to Friday.

The plan for Friday is to have some CVU skiers come lead some activities for us on skis. We'll be in groups and on our classic skis. If there are skiers who wish to skate ski in order to work on their V2/V2 alternate and technique stuff in preparation for the race this weekend, they may do so.

As far as the race. The race is a freestyle race at Trapps in Stowe. It's a big weekend there with an Eastern Cup race so there will be lots of fast skiers to watch. Definitely a good environment to check out technique and get some hints. Registration for the BKL race is from 1pm-2:15pm and there are age category wave starts beginning at 2:30pm. I would like for us to meet there at 1:30pm. Race distance is said to be about 2km. I will be wearing my green headband and hope that everyone who is racing will bring their head/armband as well so we can keep track of each other. Unfortunately, I haven't found the time to handsew the Sleepy Hollow Worms spandex suits that were enthusiastically requested at previous races...yet :o)

Waxing will be available on Friday after practice with tools, wax, and guidance provided so keep that in mind as far as pick up time if your skier will be racing and wants to wax at Sleepy Hollow. PLEASE E-MAIL ME ASAP IF YOUR SKIER WILL BE RACING AT TRAPPS ON SATURDAY AFTERNOON. I currently have three skiers interested - CS, CW, and BL - so you don't need to further notify me about that.