Since I sat down and wrote my previous blog I have been a very busy athlete. Between training full time in the gym for next winter and trying to catch up with friends and family, and trying to enjoy the summer it has been pretty non-stop.

Over the past few months there have been some common questions that people ask me about training and just life in general as an elite athlete. So, I thought that this would be a good time to answer some of those questions and maybe clear things up a bit about what it is we do.

For the past few months I have been training hard in the gym along with the rest of my teammates. We basically have an 8-week block between our on-snow training camps, which is used to focus solely on our fitness training.

Our trainer will write our program and it will change and progress throughout the 8 weeks. In that time I will spend some of it training at home and will also attend some training camps in Ottawa.

The western athlete's on the Alpine Women's team will meet our training in Calgary for 1-week blocks. During these camps where we meet with our trainer we will continue the same program as at home but it gives us an opportunity to come together as a group.

This naturally elevates the intensity of the training and brings us together to push one another. I have currently just finished up my third and final week of training in Ottawa and will now be spending a few weeks at home with my husband in Collingwood.

Our training is pretty regimented; we have two training session per day which includes both cardio training and weight training and then weekends are off. It is also very important for us to do a lot of core strengthening and plyometric work.

This leads me into one of the common questions I get from people and it usually goes something like this, " so do you get time off now?" The answer there is definitely no! The nice thing about summer is that I do get to spend a little more time at home but I wouldn't call it time off. In the last month and a half I have been to Ottawa three times for 1-week blocks, spent a week in Whistler training and visiting family and friends and have had 2 weeks in my home in Collingwood. My time off will come 3 days prior to leaving for our ski camp on July 29^th. We get our real "time off" in April for about 3 weeks. In those three weeks I sleep like crazy and watch movies!!

Another common question I get asked to me is, "are you on a special diet and are you allowed to drink." Well that one is pretty simple, no we don't have special diets and yes we can have drinks. Obviously though we are smart about what we eat and when we eat certain things. After really hard training sessions in the gym and on snow it is important to get the right nutrition into your body to keep your energy levels up and to help with recovery. And then I usually tell people that we are in a cold sport where gravity is our friend – so bring on the desert!!

My final common question has been related to the Olympics. With 2010 just around the corner everybody wants to know if I am on the Olympic team, or they want to know when our trials are. In Alpine skiing every race we enter is different from the last. Our Olympic criteria is based on our results in World Cup events during the season of the Olympics and the team will be decided probably only weeks prior to the games. I am hoping to make the team but I need to be on my game and racing fast in the 09/10 ski season. Right now my main focus is to train hard, stay healthy and to try and win a World Championship Gold next ski season!  

So there you have it, I hope that helps clear things up a little and now you know a little more about the life of a ski racer.

            Wow is it already May, but I have just stepped off my skis, how could it possibly be May already! Well it's very possible when you are a member of the Canadian Alpine Ski team, just the other week my teammates and I were training in Whistler, B.C. and we had 8 days of excellent on snow training conditions. But maybe you're wondering, well why would they be having a training camp right when their race season has just ended?? What about a little rest? Well I can explain a little about why we do these crazy things…

            From the end of March through to early May we had two on snow training camps, both held in Whistler, B.C. I really enjoy this because I get to stay at home with Mom and Dad and in my own bed – not too bad at all.

The first camp was important because it gave us an opportunity to train on the 2010 Olympic track. We were able to test the hill, set up timing and test our equipment in the conditions. It is really important for us to build up this type of data and for we the athletes to just get some mileage on the race hills.

The second training camp we had was at the end of April and was held higher up on Whistler Mountain on the Peak Chair. This is the second year we have done this camp and I am sure that we will continue with it in the years to come. At this camp we are able to train all four disciplines, (Giant Slalom, Slalom, Downhill and Super G), and it many different types of terrain. We are also able to train some key components of the events such as gliding for Downhill and Super G and also jumps and rolling terrain and on our starts. It's in these areas where we can find those hundredths and tenths of a second that really count when it comes to the competitive season.

It is important for us to do these two camps, even if we are quite tired from the competitive season because it allows us to really make some changes in our skiing while our "skiing legs" are still trained. I say this because after skiing for several months on end you head and body are tired but your body is actually quite "ready" to make some technical changes. From now until our next on snow camp there will be an extensive fitness-training period where we will look to build strength for the next winter season. When we return to snow at the end of July and in August our bodies may have changed slightly and it will take some time to get our "feelings" back on our skis. So in this way, by having already had a training camp back at the end of the season we can easily recall what changes were made either by thinking back to the feeling or what most of us do is write down in our training journal daily. I always look over what I did at a previous camp before entering into the next camp.

So, from now until the end of July we are in the gym throwing weights around and on our bikes training our strength and cardiovascular systems. I will be training in Collingwood, Ontario where I live with my husband, (when I'm not on the road) and then later in the summer I will be training a little bit in Whistler where my family is. As a team we will also come together for some training camps, which will be held in Ottawa and in Calgary. The eastern athletes meet in Ottawa and the Western athletes in Calgary and our trainer will travel between the two cities. This allows us to touch base with our trainer and also to train in a group atmosphere. This naturally brings up the intensity of our training and then I find when I return home to train on my own I still feel the residual intensity from the week with the group.

As you can see our summers are just as busy as the winter competitive season. It keeps us well occupied and out of trouble. But I wouldn't change it for the world because,  all of the hard work is worth it when you stand on top of the podium.