On Wednesday afternoon we made our way from Bend to Pacific City on the Oregon coast. We’ve been heading out here for our last few days of ‘Bend’ camp over the years. We come to Pacific City because our PT and team mascot Andy Fecteau has a place out here that he lets us crash at. He also has a garage that looks like a surf shop with every length of board, dune board, cruiser bikes, pretty much everything. So far the surf hasn’t been so great but I heard form the coaches that the well moved in a little bit this morning so we’re going to head out this evening and tomorrow morning before we take off for the airport. So I don’t have any surf pics yet. But we did get a few good shots from our level 4 running intervals on cascade head yesterday. that place in incredible. the workout starts with a 25 min run though some of the densest green forest I’ve ever been in before it opens up onto the meadows and cliffs where we do the intervals. check the pics. 

                           beach house

                                    trail to cascade head

                           Taz, Garrot, Liz, Me, and Morgan. the girls aren’t that short… just looks like that.

Every year at bend camp Justin takes us out on a crust ski and it has become one of my favorite workouts. Some people call it crust ‘cruising’ but i prefer crust skiing. ‘cruising’ sounds like something you do on fruit boots. Either way… it fun. and this year we went out on a 3 hour death march up to broken top. Jason was able to get some unbelievable shots. check em out. 

                                           destination broken top. just as we get out of the tree line

                                                      Big crew, good crust 

                              we made it all the way up to the center bowl

                                                                               a long way up.

                                 wide open spaces

                               Brayton and I checking out a peak 

                                   mikey going for it 

we are off to the Oregon coast tomorrow for a few more days of training. Running intervals a surfing!

Today was our first, and I think our only off day here at Bend camp. I started off the day hitting up the local skate park with Pat and then heading over to the ’stand’ to meet up with Cook and Chambo. For anyone who’s ever spent much time in Bend I’m sure you know how sweet the Taco Stand is… awesome, cheap mexican food attached to a laundromat and a skate shop. I don’t think the place has changed at all in the past 30 years, they still have powdered soap in the bathrooms. It’s become a little bit of a Bend camp tradition to have a golf tournament so yesterday was our chance for that too. Local skier/bad ass golfer Jason Adams got us an incredible hook up at Pronghorn Golf club which was insane. If your into golf…. google it. It’s reedank. It’s a private golf course that has one Nicklaus designed course and anther designed by some legendary golf dude, and is one of the best golf destinations in the country. Jason sunk a hole in one there a few years ago (he’s got the car to prove it) and since then has had connections there, so we were lucky enough to take advantage. lot’s of pics from the day:

                             The stand

                               Mo and Hoff

                    the crew at hole 1

                  Matt on the first tee. Pretty sure he went yard.

                        Me getting my put on. We had sick weather. 

                    Liz replacing a divot of probably some of the nicest grass in the world. sorry Pronghorn

                      we are not good a golf……… but Jason is. 

                           Checking out the short game 

                                                    I hope the hole is REALLY far away

It’s day two of the US Ski Team’s first training camp of the year here in Bend OR. The training plan for the next week or so will consist of a lot of on snow easy distance training up at the Mt. Bachelor cross-country ski trails. The team has been coming to bend in May for   training camps for years using this time to get the whole team together early in the training season and to have some fun training in the usually sweet sunny weather. Over the next few days we will be skiing on snow in the mornings and running, rollerskiing, skateboarding, and playing some golf in the afternoons. Along with the US team there are a ton of skiers around to train with including XC Oregon and Sun valley crews. check out the pics from this morning. 

                                                               7:00 Am waxing. Liz getting her Klister on 

                                                                Still plenty of snow at Mt. Bachelor

                                                 Classic skiing this morning 

Andrew Newell

                                                                 warm out

I’m back home after a two day trip to Boston. Gus and I headed down on Friday to meet up with Jess, who had just flown in, and Ryan foster, who is living down in the area finishing up architecture school. It’s about a 2.5 hour drive to get from my house to B-town, so It’s not a bad trip and we try to make it over a a few times a year for a Sox game. We’ve been on a pretty good winning record with our trips, getting to see Lester’s no hitter last spring and then Friday’s win against Tampa Bay. Friday’s game was kind of a mellow game until the 6th when the Sox came from 3 down to 3 ahead. pretty sick rally. 
Even though we were down in the ‘city’ we didn’t have to put up with the crowds too long since Ryan lives a little bit out of town so we got a chance to kick it at his lake house for a while on Friday. Since the Boston trip Jess, Gus, and I have returned home to VT and started back into the training. It was good to have another skier around to hammer out some intervals with me this morning.
The next few days of training are going to be basic, with some easy distance and some more intervals and strength on Tuesday. Then it’s time to head west on Wednesday for Bend Camp. I’m going to do a quick stop in LA on Thursday and Friday to do an Olympic NBC thing. These things are pretty funny… we did one before the 06 games. We get to spend a day with the USOC filming some ridiculous stuff for different TV shows that they will probably never use once the Olympics are here. I’m getting fired up for Bend though, It’s going to be awesome to get on snow again!                            Fenway 

                         Me, Ryan, Gus 

                          real fans sit in the bleachers 

                                                   Jess and I 

                                    The crew at Ryan’s lake house

We are almost through with out first official training week of the year and it feels good to finally  be on a decent workout schedule. This past week in Vermont has been sick. We hit 90 degrees the other day…. but it really didn’t feel that hot. This is the time of year when I’m starting to get into a little bit more rollerskiing and because of that I start scouting out new roads in the area. In general Vermont has some of the best roller skiing roads anywhere. But there are also a lot of back roads that are dirt or pavement that turns to dirt so you can’t just look at a map and decide where to go. You have to get out there and do some research. 
My house is about 10 minutes away from the New York state line. Which is some ways is a little bit closer than I want to be to Yankee’s fans, but it makes for some incredible rollerskiing in some places. So over the past few years my spring time road scouting trips have been taking me in that direction to look for new spots. I usually go training out on my roadbike to explore  or take the motorcycle out for a cruise. Sometimes I come across old cracked pavement that is useless and other times I hit the jackpot. Yesterday on a road bike cruise just 20 minutes away from my house I hit the rollerskiing jackpot. I snapped a few shots with my phone:            Found a new road with smooth pavement and rolling hills. A new 1.5 to 2 hour loop. average one car every 15 to 20 minutes. The best kinds of back roads you can find in NY are the ones that have no lines painted on them. It’s usually the best pavement and has the least amount of traffic. 

       you do get the smell of cow shit every once and a while though. It’s a trade off for the sweet views. 

I’ve got some thresholds intervals scheduled for this weekend (4×5 minutes) and then continuing on with some more volume and distance training early next week. Gus is going to come home to VT next weekend and we’re going to hit up a sox game with some friends on Friday night. should be a rowdy night in B-town.