France: Day 8 - Skate sprints

Today we had skate sprint races. I was really nervous in the morning. There was a lot riding on this race. Without getting into too many details, there are 12 spots on the Paralympic team, there are 13 of us competing for those 12 spots at these World Cups. And the way we secure our spot is by being close to the winner's time in any race. By virtue of being very short, sprints are usually the easiest type of race to get closer to the winner's time. So that's why today's race was very important to everyone.

In the prologue, I started just behind Anna-Mette, a B-1 (totally blind) skier, and just ahead of my teammate Courtney, who is also competing for one of those 12 spots. I caught Anna-Mette on the second uphill just as it was curving left and levelling out. My guide, Robert, told me to scoot by her on the right, but at that moment she also decided to move over to the right and blocked Robert, who was ahead of me. I saw the opening on the left and just went for it. As a result, I ended up going down the hill in front of Robert untill he caught up to me. He was very happy that I took initiative there though. We ended up 12th out of 17 and advanced to the quarter-finals. I was last in my quarter-final though, and ended up being 13th overall. I got World Cup points though, and according to my dad, I should be about 80% of the winner's time. I'm happy with that. Colette and Mark got bronze today, Everyone got points except Mary and Charles.

If you're interested, results as well as more information about this World Cup can be found here.

Tomorrow is a day off and biathlon training for the long biathlon race the day after. So we're all going to take it easy. Beacuse it's a day off, the organizers were throwing some kind of a "soiree" and "rock concert." We were going to go to it, that is, untill the guys somehow misunderstood our plan and drove off without us. So now, all us girls are stuck here, and that's why I have time to update my blog. We even had a free drink ticket each! That's ok, we figure tomorrow the guys are going to get the silent treatment in the morning. We won't talk to them at breakfast, though something tells me they probably won't notice.

Well, that's probably enough for today's entry. Here's a little photo of the day for you before I go. I took it just after the race this afternoon. You can see the clouds right over the valley.