This past Sunday was my first ski race of the season. It was a Diana golden race held at Gunstock Mountain in New Hampshire. Diana Golden is a race series specifically for adaptive skiers so there were skiers from Main Adaptive, New England Healing & Skiing Association (who I ski with), and Gunstock's Lakes Region Disabled Sports program. It was great to see the Maine Adaptive crew I met at Ski Spectacular in CO and in total there were about 25 racers with a range of abilities.
Gunstock was my first race ever last season and I crashed on my first run. The course is very narrow with fencing on both sides which left very little room for error on a few gates. Bob Golub, who is a fabulous NEHSA instructor/guide volunteered to be my race guide, and during course inspection we focused on the narrow turns and the finish. Thankfully, this year the timing system allowed for Bob to ski through the gate with me instead of turning off at the last minute.
My first run was clean with strong communication between Bob and I. I managed to stay within a gate of his turns with a strong finish. I felt like we could ski the top half a little faster on the 2nd run. Unfortunately, we didn't see our time at the bottom. I came out of the gate more agreesively on the 2nd run and immediately communicated to Bob, via our two-way headset, to speed it up. There is a small roll around gate 4 and I think I turned a little late on this gate. I scrubbed a little bit of speed before the the last three gates, which were in a straight line and somewhat flat. I knew I skied the top part faster but was concerned about how much time I lost mid-run.
My first run is listed at 38 seconds. Someone mentioned that there were some timing issues during my run (I was the first racer down) so this seems to be inaccurate. My second time was 31.55. This is a full 10 seconds faster than last year's time so I am happy with the improvement. I also posted the second fastest adjusted time of all the racers. It is nice to see all of my training and gate practice starting to pay off. I am also confident that my time will improve the more Bob and I ski together. Fingers crossed we will ski together at an upcoming International Paralympic Committee race at Loon Mtn later this month.
Boston Marathon Raffle
It is time for another raffle to benefit the Massachusetts Association for the Blind & Visually Impaired and Team With a Vision. I'm going BIG with a package of wonderful restaurant gift certificates.
Row 34: $100. Just named a Beard Foundation finalist, which is the culinary equivalent of the Oscar's, as the best beer program in the country. Yes, the beer lineup is THAT good and the local oysters and seafood is not to be missed.
Parish Cafe II: $50 Wonderful, casual restaurant specializing in sandwiches made from local chefs. Lucy has been eating their mac n cheese almost monthly for 7+ years so they have some good non-sandwich options, too.
5 Horses Tavern (South End): $25 very tasty American/casual food with an excellent craft beer list. The bar and table seating offer a super cozy, n'hood atmosphere.
$15 contribution gets you one entry into the raffle and $50 gets your FOUR! You can contribute to my Team With a Vision page here. The drawing will be the week of March 14. Thanks for supporting MABVI!
Happy Running & Skiing!.
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