I’m sitting on the plane to from Amsterdam to Oslo now.  Last races of the season coming up in Oslo, and so much to reflect on.  It has been a real whirlwind of a week since the Games ended. Lots of media stuff, requests for the future, and a quick trip back to Saranac Lake for a home coming parade for all the local Olympians.

It has always been tough for me to write about myself during the season, and although I try not to have any rituals about luck I do believe in keeping my mind focused on the task at hand and not revealing too much (mostly to myself).  I have this fear that in trying to put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) I will bring out issues I’d rather leave alone (in my own mind).  Besides, at the end of the day it is about performance on skis and that is most certainly a mental task.

All that being said, the last week of my life, as hectic as it has been, has been underscored by a feeling of deep satisfaction.  Winning medals at the games was an important goal, but more so it was a reward for all the hard work we’ve done.  It brought back memories of all the mistakes, failures, successes, close calls, decisions, and lessons learned.  It is an incredible feeling to know that all of those things in the long run paid their dividends these past weeks.

In this first cameo back on FS I just want to take a minute to thank everyone along the way who has helped me and my team achieve these results.  And I want to point out that while we might be the ones who get to take the medals home, I know that we are merely the medium which channeled all the effort and vision of coaches, volunteers,  and athletes from the US for such a long time.

On the way to the Holmenkollen

Well, it certainly has been awhile since I updated.  To be honest it is pretty hard for me to write about myself during the racing season but I aim to do better.  In any case Topher asked me to restart the blog and I am excited to do it and will try to do a better job.

This summer has been going well.  I had an extremely busy spring but am now falling into a good training rhythm  and for the past two weeks have been enjoying a great training camp in Europe.  The camp started in Ramsau, Austria with some good jumping there and in nearby Bischofshofen.  We also did our first visit to Atomic for the year to pick up some new Jumping boards and get squared away with our needs for the coming season.  As always Roman and crew were very helpful and suffice it to say I think Atomic will be coming out with some really exciting XC weapons this winter for Vancouver!

After Ramsau we booked it to Courchevel, France and for the past ten days have been jumping with the French skiers and riding in the afternoons.  With the tour coming nearby we took the opportunity to bring our bikes on this trip and for several of the days we were able to ride out onto the course and watch the circus go through.  Over the past few years we have ridden more and more during the summer and a bit to our surprise discovered that riding seems to complement on the hill training nicely.  I think it has to do with the quick recovery and low impact inherent of cycling.  With this in mind we have put in some pretty big miles and taken quite a few jumps.  Here are a few pictures from our trip:

Johnny approaches the head-wall on Col du MadeleineJohnny, Todd and I near the finish of stage 16

Brett and Dj cheer on The God of Thunder near the summit of Col de Saisies

The Ski Jumps in Courchevel

Everything was going great until Todd got into a bad accident on the descent from Le Saisies…

Todd wins battle againist Renault

In an unreal stroke of luck Todd managed to walk away from this merely banged up and a bit bruised!  His bike was a bit less fortunate.

Todd is back home but doing great and will no doubt rejoin us in superior form again soon.

Finally we had our own race yesterday up Alpe d’Huez.  When I used to compare climbs from the tour vs climbs in the US it seemed like no big deal. Big Cottonwood is like Galibier, Rabbit ears is Roselend, Little Cottonwood is Alpe d’Huez… at least on paper.   But when you square up to these serpentine behemoths and switchback after unrelenting switchback you sit and spin your 26 you realize that these are in fact a different animal!  And having ridden Alpe d’Huez at about 175bpm and seemingly pacing it quite well finding out that my 49 min effort was about 12 min slower than Pantani and Lance’s record was a bit disappointing.  Oh well, I still have my day job.

Top of Alpe d'Huez

Hey Sports Illustrated for Kids is having its annual SI Kid of the year competition and Lake Placid local Nina Lussi is among the top finalists! She is a really talented ski jumper and a great advocate of the sport. Help her win one for the Nordic Community by voting at http://www.sikids.com/sportskid/index.ht…
Thanks,
Billy D

Nina Lussi with NYSEF coach Matt Cook

After a short rest week where I put my bike away and dusted off my rollerskis, the US Combined team headed to Lillehammer, Norway. This camp was planned to bring together the US, Norwegian, and French teams for some training and some friendly comps to “check the level.”

It was a huge success from the start since we were able to bring some additional athletes and coaches to bring our total to 22 people and 16 athletes! This included the 10 members of the US Nordic Combined squad, comeback kid Todd Lodwick, and a promising group of junior skiers from across the US. France brought a four member A-team squad and Norway brought their entire NC nation with around 65 athletes! For the camp we stayed together with the Norwegians up in the mountains at Sjusjoen. Although a drive to the ski jumps, it was near the new roller ski loop that offers nearly 5km of challenging courses. Sjusjoen also has some great trails across the high open alpine hills and bogs for some fun workouts as well.