Arrived in Wisconsin

We are here in Cable, Wisconsin, for the first leg of the IPC World Cups in the U.S. Team Canada made up of the National World Cup Team, Development Team and the National Group (which I am a part of) arrived at the Telemark Resort last night after a day-long journey from various parts of the country. Caroline and I flew from Ottawa at 11 a.m. and met most of the team in Toronto. We made our connection even though we were late coming in. Our skis weren't as lucky. We think they were offloaded in Toronto because there wasn't enough space on the plane. Thankfully, the USOC volunteers got them to the hotel safely late last night.

Today was an absolutely gorgeous day: sunny and somewhat mild. The trails here at Telemark start right outside our door, which is really awesome. We took the morning to get organized and some people had classification. Since I wasn't one of those people, having been classified twice already, I helped our coaches scrape some skis in the wax room.

After lunch, most of us went out skiing. We skied the 5 km loop that will be used for the 15 km race on Thursday. My guide, Brian, isn't here yet, as there was a bad storm in Thunder Bay and he is somewhere on the way. So I asked Mary,, one of our coaches, to guide me today. The course is nice and mostly rolling, but there are some bigger downhills and longer climbs. The only downhill that might present a problem is somewhere in the middle of the course. It's got lots of turns through which you keep picking up speed. Mary and I went down it not realizing what it was like. I was holding on for dear life until the very last left-hand turn, where I got carried out to the outside and wiped out followed closely by Erica, who had to fall to avoid running over me, and Caroline, who fell to avoid running over Erica's pole. Then there was Mary, who looked back at me to see what happened and almost ran into a bush and wiped out to avoid that collision. So I caused a four-girl pile-up!

It's now evening and Brian has finally arrived. Yay! So tomorrow we'll be skiing at 10 a.m. and also possibly practicing some shooting. And I'm off to bed. Still need more rest after yesterday.

Good night from Cable.