The Start of 2019

Travel is the name of the game during the winter so it’s a good thing I enjoy it! Upon my return to Europe I spent a short week in Slovenia with Ben. We got a few days of great training on the ski jumps in Planica. In all the time I have spent in that area of Slovenia I have never seen the small town of Kranjska Gora so busy. It seemed like every family with young kids came for a holiday ski trip, it was actually kind of cool to see the town brimming with people and fully open. Typically when we are in town all of the shops and stores aren’t even open, although we had to wait a rather long time in line at the grocery store as it is quite small.

Cross Country Stadium in Planica

Ben and I about to head out on a ski

After Slovenia we drove to Munich where we met up with my teammate Jared Shumate who joined us en-route to Otepaa, Estonia. I had been to this town in Estonia two years ago but it is not a country I have spent much time in, so I was excited to go again. I kind of forgot how far north it is, I don’t think we actually saw the sun while we were there. They did have tons of snow and put on a great competition! Taylor met us when we arrived in Estonia as well, it was fun to have a four man team at a competition once again. In the competition’s in Estonia I made some positive steps forward for myself and had fun racing on a hard course. We stayed in this Villa type of hotel that actually opened just for the competition weekend. It was right on this frozen lake and a very beautiful winter scene with all the snow and Christmas lights! If you want to check results from that weekend click here, below are some photos from the event as well! 

Our team then split up a little bit, Jared and one of our wax techs traveled to Finland for competitions while the rest of us made our way to Predazzo, Italy. It took us a while to get to Italy, however on the final drive we chose to stop near the end and go for a distance ski on the beautiful Passa Lavaze. The comps in Italy did not progress the way I had hoped, something that frustrated me. However I was in a beautiful valley with incredible mountains to enjoy. The town itself actually had no natural snow which was a bit weird. They did have a long track of man-made snow going all the way up the valley, it is known as the Marcia Longa Trail. There is a 70km marathon style cross country race all down the valley later in the year. So they were working hard to snow that and had piles of man-made snow all over the place in preparation. Even though there was no natural snow we were able to go on some beautiful and fun skis up the valley, check out some photos from that below!

I am now in Chaux-Neuve, France after a long drive from Italy through the St Bernardo tunnel. The tunnel is about 5km straight through a massive mountain from Italy into Switzerland, it makes for a very scenic and cool drive to do. We have a fun competition coming up this weekend in France known as the Triple. This event is typically in Seefeld, AUT but because Seefeld is hosting World Championships this season Chaux-Neuve is the host this time around. It is a three day event, the first day is a 1 jump and 5km race in which everyone races. Then the top 50 finishers from day one do a 1 jump 10km race on day 2, and the final day is only the top 30 finishers from the day before, competing in a 2 jump 15km competition. Each days results compounds on the next day making for an interesting and fun event! If you want to check results you can click here, otherwise follow my social media or home page for more updates! Below are some photos from our ski the first day here in France!