Although I only spent a little over a week in Northern Scandinavia this year, I was still incredibly excited to leave and get back to the sun and daylight in Central Europe. On Monday morning we departed from Kuusamo and spent most of the day traveling to get to Davos, Switzerland. Our flight was delayed in Helsinki due to heavy snow and we had to sit on the runway for an extra hour before taking off. So the travel took much longer than anticipated. Highlights of the day included my first experience chatting with the Japanese girls and finishing the book, The Greatest, a biography about Haile Gebrselassie. Upon arriving in Zurich we piled into a rented van and station wagon and drove the two hours to Davos. I finally crawled into bed at 11pm, very tired, and had a deep night of sleep.

On Tuesday morning I was surprised to awake to heavy snowfall. After a good breakfast, I headed out to ski with Chandra Crawford and Sarah Renner of the Canadian team. With no other US girls over here for this period, it’s great to be able to train with some girls instead of skiing alone. The ski trails had already been groomed and we had a wonderful ski in the snow. The rest of the day was spent settling in at the Hotel Kulm which is starting to feel like a European home base. Our team spent two weeks at the Kulm last season and it was great to get reacquainted with the friendly staff and comfortable surroundings.



Wednesday truly felt like a day in paradise. The snow clouds had given way to the sun, the ski trails were perfectly groomed with fast snow, and the air temperature was just right at about –4 C (25 F). Chandra and I did some race prep accelerations alongside the US guys. Having Chandra to ski with, side by side, was a great opportunity to fine tune speed and tactics and we both agreed we should try to get together for workouts more often!

After a great workout, we headed back to the Kulm for a hearty lunch and some down time. I ate lunch at the Canadian team table, even though my US teammates gave me a hard time for sitting with the rival team. Sarah Renner, who is back on the World Cup after having a baby last winter, joined us as well, with her daughter Aria and her entourage of caretakers. Post-lunch I got in a huge nap, 2 hrs, completely dead to the world. I woke up just in time to catch the bus with Chandra down into town for an afternoon coffee and then jog. On our run back to the hotel, the sky was vibrant with pink and orange. I wish I would have had my camera!

Before dinner I got a massage, highlighted by a full-body buff. This meant literally, a buffer used for waxing cars, being guided up and down my back, shoulders and legs. It was a totally new experience for me, one I can say that thoroughly enjoyed. After that, a nice dinner, sitting at the US table this time, and then a team meeting. I finished off the evening by chatting on Skype to my fiancé. A great day in Paradise!

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 6th, 2007 at 6:05 am and is filed under Random Thoughts, Training. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.