Getting Current

Since I've been slacking so much on this blog, I decided to make a media page that everyone can easily use to view pictures, tweets, etc from me, USSA Nordic, and the NNF.  Check it out and please give me some feedback if you've got suggestions!  Your comments are always appreciated and keep me extra motivated to stay up to date with this site.

Hiking near Capitol Reef. Yes, the scenery is a little better looking than me.

Now, as usual, training is in full swing.  We started jumping two weeks ago with our new coach Marc Noelke - who is awesome!  He's a former ski jumper from Germany and has worked with both the German and Austrian ski jumping national teams.  Marc has a very established background in psychology, physiology and mechanics in addition to coaching and is bringing a wealth of new ideas into our program.  We all are psyched for his fresh, exciting perspective. 

Marc started us off on the K20 and K40 - the small hills, which is similar to what we did last year.  However, we had some sort of different "task" for almost every jump - from eyes closed in the inrun, clapping hands, jumping "old school" or playing a form of PIG with each other on the jump.  So we had no time to get bored and we established a good connection to controlling the fundamental movements.  Now, Marc's back in Germany and we're mostly focusing on endurance training, with a couple jump sessions on the K90 to stay in touch. 

Endurance training this year is a blast and we usually do a great job of keeping the scenery fresh.  Last weekend, Brett, Michael, Tyler and I put in some hours hiking, running and rollerskiing in the desert around Capitol Reef National Park.  I've also been getting back into mountain biking.  Sometimes I forget just how fun it is - especially with on the infinite trail system of the Wasatch.

Michael, Tyler and I enjoying one the least visited parks in the West.

Slot canyon-ing.

Also, concerned family members and friends will be happy to read that I'm staying busy outside of training with schoolwork.  Unfortunately the month of May was the only time I had for a "real" class down at Westminster College in Salt Lake City.  For the rest of the time, I'm sticking to online: right now, one Devry University class and one Westminster course.  I'm still a long haul away from a degree, but maybe if I have a long enough career in Nordic Combined I could have an education by the time I'm ready to retire!