Thanksgiving Camp and Fall Semester Wrap

Thanksgiving Camp 2023 was a bit different.  And when I say "different," I mean filled with rocks, grass, dirt.  But - we had a great camp anyway!  And we somehow managed to ski every day with no rollerskiing.  Here's how it happened:

- Instead of leaving campus on Tuesday afternoon, we left early on Wednesday morning.  On our way across Vermont we stopped at Craftsbury for a long ski on their lovely little ribbon of snow.  The folks at Craftsbury do an amazing job with snowmaking/farming, and they'd put together a great loop with a remarkable variety of terrain.  It was a perfect way to break up the drive and get a nice workout to start the camp.

- We spent the next three days in Lake Placid searching for every scrap of snow we could find and skiing on it.  That's not an exaggeration - we literally skied on anything that looked white and frozen.  On Thanksgiving, Leslie discovered a frosted golf course and we skied along the edges where the snow had collected - surprisingly good skiing!  Next, Aggie and Will discovered an unplowed road and hiking trail with just enough coverage, and we pieced together an intensity workout of sorts (we came out of this one with some new rock skis).  People also explored the trails around Mt. Van Hovenberg, skiing back and forth on little patches of snow and piecing them together to make a decent workout.  By Saturday we were ready for some groomed trails, and most of the crew went down to Rikert, where they'd made enough snow to groom their stadium area - about 400 meters if you skied it in a loop.  It was a beautiful day, and our people had a fun time racking up laps and working on technique - some of them managed to ski 50k by the end.  While we were spinning laps, a small group back in Placid drove up to the Whiteface toll road, where a tiny dusting of snow had fallen on the icy asphalt - again, surprisingly good skiing!

- Throughout all this excitement, there was some quality team cooking as usual.  Thanksgiving dinner was a gigantic chaotic mess that somehow coalesced into an amazing meal - turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, mushroom gravy, pumpkin rolls, roasted veggies, sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, green beans wrapped in bacon, many pies, and probably lots of other good stuff I'm forgetting.  As always, our team has so much to be thankful for, and this meal together was the latest example.  We also had a couple of great team dinners as part of our cooking competition: chili and grilled cheese with brownies, and tortilla soup with guacamole and molassas cookies.  So lucky to have a team of capable chefs!

- We ended camp the way we started, with a stop at Craftsbury on our way home.  This time, we were able to jump into a time trial with several other college and club teams - a really nice opportunity to challenge ourselves against great competition and get the rust off.  The rust was definitely there, but this was a really fun and productive day for us - the team looked strong and technically solid, and we've definitely got a good foundation to build on.  Huge thanks to Ollie Burruss and the Craftsbury staff for putting together great early season skiing and hosting this event!

After recovering with some lower key dryland days, we started chasing snow again, with three good days at Quarry Road culminating in the Quarry Road Opener - another mini-carnival with great competition.  With a couple more days of skiing under our belts, we were a bit sharper for this one.  Emma made the 3rd step of the podium, and the women packed the top 10 - Jori 4th, Morgan 6th, Aggie 7th, Ingrid 8th, and Kira 9th.  Sawyer led the men in 4th - an amazing performance by one of the youngest skiers on our team!  We followed this up the next weekend with a pair of team time trials - a carnival rehearsal consisting of a 20k classic and a skate sprint.  This was quite an exhausting weekend, especially coming just before exams, but also a great chance to get in a couple race-like efforts and go through the motions of race day.  Zach and Morgan took the wins in the 20k, and Carson and Jori won the sprint.  It was such a gift to do several workouts and races on snow in December - like Craftsbury, Quarry Road does so much for New England skiing, and we're so grateful for all of their hard work.

After exams wound down, the crew took off for break, and several people were able to jump into races all over the country - Vermont, Wisconsin, Alaska, and right back at Quarry Road for the Roy Varney Memorial Eastern Cup.  The big highlight of this weekend was Jori's second place finish in the Eastern Cup classic sprint against an outstanding field of college skiers and top juniors.  All of this was a great way to build momentum going into the break.  We'll be back in just a couple weeks for Jan Camp, but for now everyone's enjoying some quality time with friends and family.  Happy holidays everyone!

 

October 2023

 Happy Halloween!  We've been rolling along for the past few weeks, and despite some obstacles we've had a really good October.  Here are a few highlights:

- Due to a last-minute NCAA rule change, we had to push back our first practice date.  Fortunately, our skiers had already been training hard all summer and fall, and a few more days on their own didn't derail them.

- Despite the delay, we were still able to pull off Fall Camp (minus one head coach who was down with covid).  Once again, the team headed up to Brooksville for a few days of dryland in an amazing training environment.  Day 1 was a rainy run in the Camden Hills, followed by a short afternoon roll.  Day 2 was a fun and challenging rollerski interval session and an easy trail run.  Day 3 was an OD hike/run - the traditional crown jewel of Fall Camp.  The skiers started at the base of Gorham Mountain on the east side of Acadia National Park and hiked/ran across most or all of the peaks on Mt. Desert Island - a fantastic adventure at one of the most beautiful spots in the country.  By Day 4, everyone was pretty tired out - after a nice easy rollerski, the crew headed home happy.  For the third year in a row, we were hosted by the Eysenbach and Hamill families, who provided incredibly hospitality and delicious meals.  We can't thank these two families enough - this camp would not be possible without their support.  Shoutout also to Leslie, who led this camp solo for the second time in three years - not an easy task!  The team had four days of great training as well as some important conversations and a lot of quality bonding time - just a really successful camp and a great experience for everyone.

- After a quick post-camp reset, it was time for fitness testing, which had been delayed by our late start.  This year, we tried something new, trading in the classic Morse Mountain time trial for a standard 3k on the track.  It was a bit sad to give up our quirky little run and the traditional post-test beach celebration, but the 3k is logistically much easier, and it's nice to have something a little more standardized.  Morgan scorched the track to lead the women in 10:09, just a few seconds off the Bowdoin track & field record - not bad for a ski racer!  Sophomore newcomer Lars Sorom led the men with a time of 9:31.  Later that afternoon, we were back at it with our 2000m erg test.  Once again, we saw a brilliant performance, with Mia setting a team record with a time of 7:53.8.  I would never say that a record is unbreakable, because all records get broken eventually, but unless Mia or Morgan breaks this in the next few weeks, I think it's going to stand for a long time.  James led the men in 6:52.1, with Zach and Silas also under 7 minutes and first-year Sawyer Chapin just missing by a couple tenths.  Overall, the erg times were the most impressive I've ever seen from our team - this group is showing really great upper body power right now, and it'll only get better with a couple months of specific strength work.

- A small but enthusiastic group headed up to Rumford for the Maine Event, a rollerski skills competition hosted by NENSA and Black Mountain.  It was a fun change to do this at a new venue with some ups and downs instead of a fully flat loop.  The weather was rough - cold rain and high winds - but our skiers did an amazing job of keeping their spirits high and staying positive.  Emma and Jori qualified in 2nd and 5th, respectively, and went on to dominate the heats - they both advanced to the final, where Emma narrowly edge Jori for the win.  First-year Eli Shifrin won the qualifier by a good margin and was looking unbeatable in the heats until a crash on a wet ramp in the semifinal knocked him out - still an impressive showing.  Carson and first-year Mirra Payson each qualified in 6th and were both edged out in the first heat by tough competition.  Overall, a great showing by our team, and a surprisingly fun day.  I'm incredibly proud of how well our group handled the mental game on this messy weather day - happy people ski faster!

- Along the way, we've done all the usual grind (lifting, rollerboard, spenst, etc) along with several other fun workouts.  We tried grass skiing hill sprints for the first time ever - it was a rousing success.  We followed these up with a great batch of intervals on perfect pavement by the creamery at Pineland.  And last weekend we did the traditional Bradbury to Pineland trail run with minimal getting lost thanks to great navigation by James and Mia.  Overall, a fun and productive month despite some small setbacks.  We've got some momentum now, and November is shaping up to be a good one - more updates coming soon!

Graduation and Reunion 2023

 Graduation 2023 was a beautiful sunny day - perfect for sending a group of amazing students out into the world.  Luke was our lone graduate this year - it's been such a pleasure having him on the team these past four years.  From his first day with Bowdoin Nordic, Luke has been a team-first guy, always ready to help out others and take on the little tasks that help keep the program running.  He's also been a remarkably hard worker - Luke earned his spot on the team as a walk-on, and kept scrapping to get a little better every year.  In addition to a degree from Bowdoin, Luke ended his college career with an even more prestigious honor - membership in the Bowdoin Nordic Van Driver Hall of Fame, a well-earned reward for all of his hard work on behalf of the team.  Congratulations Luke, and thanks for everything you've given to our team these last four years!

 The following week, we were lucky enough to welcome back several Bowdoin Nordic alumni for Reunion 2023.  It's so fun to reconnect with our former skiers and see what kind of cool stuff they're doing - PhD programs (in the sciences, of course), outdoor leadership, education, software development, pro skiing, and all kinds of other interesting pursuits.  Thanks to all of our alumni for continuing to support our program, and apologies to those I missed at Reunion - hope to cross paths soon!

Spring Happenings

As always, spring has been a nice time around campus.  In addition to studying hard, our skiers are doing all kinds of fun stuff - contra dancing, volunteering, hanging out on the quad, running up and down the Tower stairs for some reason, and more.  Here are a few of our more notable happenings:

- We had a lovely end-of-season dinner at Thorne to officially close the book on the 2022-23 season, highlighted by a hilarious slide show courtesy of Ingrid and Aggie.  Lots of good memories to look back on - such a fun year.  Carson and Jori were named winners of the Marty Hall Award for the most outstanding skiers on the team.  So nice to get everyone together one last time!

- Along with several other Bowdoin athletes, the team participated in Green Athletics Eco-Service Day - they worked in the organic gardens to restore an old bed and plant hundreds of potato plants.

- For our first ever Go U Bears Athletic Fun Challenge, Bowdoin Nordic alumni, family members, and friends rallied to raise over $11,000 for our team!  Absolutely amazing.  These gifts will allow us to keep athlete costs for Thanksgiving Camp low, and to travel more athletes to mid-season carnivals.  It means a lot to know that we have such a dedicated community of supporters, and we're so grateful.  Thanks so much to all of our supporters!  This program wouldn't be possible without you.

- At Bowdoin's annual All-Sports Award Night, Jori won the Outstanding First-Year Female Athlete Award!  So nice to see her recognized for her fantastic season - congratulations Jori!

Almost home - just a few days of exams left!  Next up is Graduation 2023, where we'll send off our lone amazing senior Luke Bartol!

Junior Nationals 2023

As we were wrapping up NCAAs, Grace M and Emma were headed out to Fairbanks, AK, for Junior Nationals.  Not surprisingly, it was super cold, but the temps cooperated just enough for the organizers to pull off the races after some schedule adjustments.  Sounds like it was a fine week of racing - good snow, great course, and stellar competition.  The U20 category was very competitive this year - several good college skiers in attendance along with the usual assortment of fast juniors.  Grace was steady throughout the week - 16th in the 7.5k classic, 24th in the skate sprint, and 21st in the 15k skate.  Emma rebounded from a tough classic to finish 10th in the sprint and 5th in the 15k, earning All-American honors in both events.  Good showing from both of them, and a nice way to wrap up the season.  Congratulations Grace and Emma!

NCAA Chanpionships 2023

 Back to Lake Placid one more time for the NCAA Championships!  Placid has been a hot destination for us this winter - first Thanksgiving Camp, then an Eastern Cup for a few folks, then Regionals, and finally the big finish.  Our small but brave crew - Jori, Aggie, and coaches - left campus last Monday after classes for the long drive.  Next morning we awoke to new snow and great conditions across the entire trail network at Mt Van Hoevenberg.  Over the next couple days, we did a lot of wax testing and just enough skiing to stay sharp.  On Wednesday evening we continued our new tradition (started last year at Soldier Hollow) of a "banquet" - a nice dinner out to replace the championship banquet that was a casualty of the pandemic.  By the morning of the skate race, we were ready to go.  Conditions were perfect - mid 20s and snow that was not too fast and not too slow.  Jori had the honor of starting the race as bib 1 - everyone's favorite place to be!  She started out aggressively and was able to hold off a hard-chasing MSU skier to cross the line first - a nice personal victory.  A few bibs back, Aggie got off to a smooth start and hung on as the climbs took their toll.  In the end, we were a bit overmatched, and we had to settle for 38th (Jori) and 39th (Aggie).  Not the results we were looking for, but also not a shock since these two came in as the two lowest-ranked skiers in the field.  They both skied hard and gave what they had - not much else we could ask for!  We spent the next day resting and testing.  Aggie helped Jori study for her art history exam, which she then crushed (we think) - a true team effort.  Saturday morning started off cold, with perfect firm tracks and nice hard wax conditions.  Things got a bit tricky as it warmed, with the sun coming out intermittently to keep us on our toes.  The new NCAA fluoro testing procedure also made things interesting, since we had to deliver skis to the equipment control area well before the race, which limited our ability to make last-minute adjustments.  Fortunately, the skiers were pretty content with their skis after a couple rounds of testing, so we were able to finish our applications with minimal drama.  With that, it was time for history to be made - the first-ever women's 20k race at the NCAA Championships!  The race started out hot, as per usual for a college women's mass start, and the pack strung out fairly quickly.  Jori settled into a small group in the 30s - she was determined to hang on to some of the Eastern skiers she'd been competing with all season, and she did.  She stayed in the tracks on the climbs, took extra strokes going into the descents, and worked every transition to gain seconds wherever possible.  As the race wore on, she stayed strong and gained a few places, even threatening to break into the top 30 for a while.  In the end, she finished 33rd - a fantastic effort and an outstanding finish by the youngest skier in the field!  Meanwhile, Aggie was focused on skiing her own race and staying as smooth and efficient as possible.  She started at the back and tailed another skier for the first half before the gap gradually grew too big to allow her to maintain contact.  Even so, she kept competing hard - she did a beautiful job of staying in the tracks and working the wax, even when most of the skiers ahead of her were slipping and sometimes walking up the hills.  Most importantly in my mind, she kept pushing hard over the tops of the hills and working the downhills.  In the end, she wasn't able to catch the skiers she was chasing and ended up 40th, but this was a tremendous effort.  Aggie hasn't been on form for several weeks now, and we came into these championships knowing that she might not be at her best, so the big win for us on this day was to ski technically well, push hard the whole way, and never stop competing.  That's really hard to do when you're skiing all alone and you know you don't have your best stuff - it's easy to convince yourself that the little things don't matter and just shut it down and cruise to the end (or not finish at all).  Aggie never let this happen - she skied hard the whole way, and I'm incredibly proud of her for this - a huge win for her mental game even if the result wasn't what we wanted.  Overall, this was a great day of racing for us and a really fun way to close out the season.  I learned a lot at these championships, as always, and I'm super excited to talk things over with the team this spring and make plans for next year.  It's been a successful season, but I know we can be so much better.  Looking forward to getting started - but not just yet.  For now, it's time for all of us to enjoy Spring Break and get some rest!

Chummy Cup 2023

 This year's Chummy Broomhall Cup continued the recent tradition of weather-related chaos.  Like last year, we did a last minute relocation due to a big snowstorm, moving the race to Quarry Road.  Unlike last year, we moved the race one day earlier instead of later, holding it on Friday night.  As usual, Quarry Road delivered with a nice 2.5k loop under the lights - first time in my memory we've ever had a college race at night!  The snow was fast and the course was fun, with some challenging turns and a couple of big bumps, terrain park style.  The women's race got off to a hot start, with a group of six quickly breaking away.  Emma, Aggie, and Jori were in this pack, and they jockeyed back and forth with three Colby skiers right up until the end.  Jori sprinted it out with Gretta Scholz of Colby for the win - it was too close to call, so we declared it a tie.  Emma and Aggie were right behind in 3rd and 4th, and Morgan (7th), Grace M (8th), and Ingrid (9th) earned All-State honors as well.  This gave us a slight lead heading into the men's race.  The guys started out a bit slower, with a big lead pack and a lot of back and forth.  The race came down to the wire, but sadly the Colby guys proved too tactically clever for us - they slipped their top 3 in front of ours, and we had to settle for 4th (Zach), 5th (Carson), and 6th (James).  Adam, who had challenged for the lead before being thwarted by a broken pole, skied remarkably well to stay close to the leaders and finished 7th.  Although our crew skied well and honestly looked great, we couldn't overcome the podium sweep, losing the cup to Colby by a narrow margin.  Not the glorious finish we wanted, but a super fun event nonetheless, and a great learning experience for our skiers - some good things for us to work on this off-season!  It was so great to get together with Bates and Colby one last time - fitting that we'd end a long, hard carnival season with the same friends who joined us for all of our pre-season races.  So nice to have Maine college skiing going strong - looking forward to getting back after it next year!

That's the end for most of our skiers, but championship season rolls on with NCAAs this week and JNs next week.  Aggie and Jori have qualified for NCAAs in Lake Placid, and Emma and Grace M will be representing New England at JNs in Fairbanks.  Stay tuned!