A Summer Training Pep Talk

HEY EVERYONE. The time has come. School is out, and summer training is here in all its blood, guts, and glory.

But let's get something straight. We ALL know (but some are afraid to admit) that summer training is some of the hardest work you'll ever do. There will be blisters. There will be sore muscles and sun burn and sweat. There will be rainy days and hot days and humid days and days when you really just don't want to get out of bed because if you have to run up one more hill you might implode and you're pretty sure your running shoes are still wet from last nights practice.  There will be intervals, over-distance workouts, sprint workouts, strength workouts, and workouts you probably didn't think were logically possible (cough, "Back To Your Roots" runs, looking at you Coach Tommy Boy). There might (in my case most likely will, because I'm Paige) be tears.

The fact is, summer training is hard. It's designed to be hard. That's why we do it!

These next few months are when the work gets done. We drop the distraction of classes and racing, and hit the roads and trails. This is the time when it's acceptable and actually perfectly warranted to hurt badly during a workout, because we don't have races to worry about, and recovery is probably around the corner. This is the time when we have entire days to spend out running around in the mountains, putting in huge hourly weeks that we didn't imagine we could do. This is what helps us make huge strides come winter and race time. This is when we get tough.

So embrace it! How lucky are we that we thrive on being outside, on working hard, and on pushing our limits? How AWESOME is it to wake up early and be done with a workout by ten AM, and to have the entire day stretching before you hit the roads in the afternoon? How sweet is it to nurse our sore muscles and war wounds and be proud of what we've accomplished? We take it for granted, but our ability to carry us across trails that the normal population doesn't see is pretty darn incredible. And it makes it even better to be surrounded by teammates that are just as excited as we are.

So if you find yourself tired and exhausted and sweaty and stuck asking, "Should I do one more interval? Should I really go for that run? Should I try increase the weight that I'm lifting? Should I really get out of bed this early?"

SAY YES. 

This is the time. 

Summer training should be seen as an opportunity to push yourself to new levels. 

So use it. 

Spring Cleaning (Chronicles from the Not-So-Glamorous Side of Ski Racing)

I'd make a hard bet that just about every skier (no matter what age or level) has at one point in their life been excited to get OFF their skis when spring comes. For one precious month, goodbye are the early mornings, the pre-race breakfasts, the van rides, the never-ending exhaustion, the klister blisters, and the anxiety and excitement surrounding racing. It's (finally!!) time for a little freedom.

But WAIT.

Before we unleash the spring adventures and head out on our road bikes, mountain bikes, hikes, fishing trips, back country ski trips, paragliding (maybe?) trips, camping trips, or just straight up beach trips, etcetera... first we have to clean.

And no I don't mean clean our rooms, although most likely we'll have to do that too because the wear and tear of constant travel has probably wreaked some havoc on our poor houses. Nope, I mean the type of cleaning that we mostly always dread. It's time to clean our skis.

(Cue inward groaning.)

You might have to sort through the wax room first...
(This is a klister explosion.)

Why? By the time spring hits, our skis have possibly traveled all the way around the state, country, or world.  From freezing cold mid-winter conditions to icy, slushy, dirty spring conditions, they've really been through the ringer. The impact of being literally tossed around by airport workers (yep, watched a Fischer bag fly off the truck and onto the tarmac this year), being squeezed and squished into vans and trailers ("did I just hear something snap..? NAHHH"), being forced over rocks and sticks (maybe on accident, possibly on purpose, usually you have no choice), and being waxed and rewaxed over and over ("I'm gonna pretend I didn't burn that part..") can really quite literally hit your skis hard.

So when the snow melts away and the warm weather rolls in, it's pretty important to give those babies some love.  And although it might not be fun, and it definitely could take longer than expected, it will be worth it for your skis in the long run.  Protecting your bases from the summer heat, humidity, dust, and possibly varmints (gross) can actually help them stay faster in the winters.

So turn on your favorite Pandora station, sharpen your scrapers, and get ready to work.

It you have a lot of skis, it helps to lay them out according to the work that needs to be done. (I recommend making sure they're all actually YOURS before you proceed.) Race skis deserve the most care and attention, and if you're in a time crunch, do those first. Then comes the nicer rock skis, then what I like to call "dumpster skis" (skis you can cross pavement on without feeling one ounce of remorse).

WARNING: this process can be incredibly overwhelming, and maybe don't send your parents the pictures (hi mom!) but this also helps to narrow down what you actually need.

Yikes.

I also recommend removing all the bindings (if possible) because your skis will fit better in bags/lockers and it will be easier to pack them away for summer.

If you really really really really really hate cleaning kick wax, get this part over with first. Find some actually productive kick wax remover (the strongest stuff I've seen yet has been in the Czech Republic but we also thought maybe it was straight diesel) and REALLY scrub every inch of klister and kick wax off of those skis. Yes, that also means the sidewalls and grooves and tops of your skis, because everyone knows klister is like glitter; it ends up in the most random of places and it's a serious operation to get rid of it. (Don't try and text during this part, you'll seriously regret it and your iPhone will never be the same.)

Once the sticky stuff is over with, de-stick your hands (this is KEY), and start glide waxing. If you have skis that have been through some groomed dirt with patches of snow mixed in, you should maybe probably definitely hot wax them. Throw a layer of glide wax on, and scrape it off immediately. Watching the dirt and grime peel off with the excess wax is oddly satisfying. Also slightly repulsive.

After you've hot waxed, melt on a layer of storage wax that your skis can safely sleep in for the summer. (Seriously though, don't drop a lot of money on storage wax, all you need is a warmer wax to protect your bases. I like any of the Toko NF Line. No fluoros allowed.) Double check that your sidewalls are clean, remark your kick zones, triple check that YOUR name is on your skis, tie pairs up, and snuggle them next to one another. Aww, don't they look cute?

Shoutout to my cousin Matt Clarke for the
AMAZING wax apron!

Once your skis are all waxed up and tucked in, put them in a place where they won't fry in the heat for the summer. Does your garage hit a hundred degrees in July? Yeah don't keep them there. My personal favorite place has been under my bed, but the basement or ski locker room will probably do too.

You might think you're done, but coaches and wax techs everywhere will super duper appreciate it if you clean the wax room up after yourself. Yep. Sweep up the shavings, put a cap on the wax remover, and throw away all the paper towels full of klister.

3.5-ish hours later. You're DONE!

Get out and enjoy spring because before you know it your poles will be hitting pavement, and we all just looooooove roller skiing.

"Personal Days"

Yep, we went paragliding in France. UN-REAL.

First off, my apologies for slacking on the blog front, I got caught up in travel and racing and decided to throw my energy into enjoying it! (I also might have left my computer charger in Slovenia but that's another story.)

The Gold Team/coaches in Chamonix

As our season has come to a quickly approaching close, I've gotten the chance to look back on the year that has absolutely flown by. And although I've been racing for Sun Valley for about 5 months now, the lessons are seemingly endless. I stepped into this year thinking that skiing professionally wouldn't be too different than skiing in college. And in some aspects, it's not. You train your butt off and you travel around to race, just like at school. But the similarities end right around there.

The differences in professional skiing lie purely in the fact that skiing is now your job, not just an extracurricular. You have to want to work hard each and every single day, but when you have bad results, it's even more important to shrug them off and stay motivated, because this is it; you don't have school or a job or other extracurriculars to fall back on. You can't just expect to step out on the race course and pull off results like you did in college every weekend, because everyone you're competing against has been working for this and wanting this for years, sometimes even harder than you have.  And instead of heading back to school on Sunday nights to focus on catching up on homework, you're on the road for weeks at a time, around the same people, staying in unfamiliar places, following a routine that at sometimes seems nothing but monotonous.

Eisenerz, Austria

It's a whole different ballgame, but that doesn't mean it isn't worth it. We get to see some pretty spectacular places, and meet a whole host of wonderful, adventurous, charismatic people. We get to watch the hard work we put in on the roads and trails pay off in the races, and look forward to the chance to work even harder and get even better. This lifestyle shapes not just who we are as athletes, but also who we are as human beings: friends, family members, teammates, future employees, and more. The lessons we learn with each year of being a skier are invaluable and eternal.

The most recent lesson I've learned: the importance of recovery days.

"Seriously Paige? I've maybe been told that about a hundred thousand times." - aka what everybody reading this is probably thinking right now. And it's true, as endurance athletes, we are relentlessly reminded about the importance of valuing easy workouts, off days, and recovery between intervals. But it's so surprisingly easy to get caught up in the atmosphere of traveling and racing, especially on the road or across the sea, that soon enough you find yourself disregarding the lessons stamped in at home.

So what do we need to remember? Even skiers need to take personal days.

1. Travel days are not spa days.
The fact that you are sitting on your butt in a van or on an airplane for 8 hours does not mean you can chalk the day up as a rest day. Travel days put an incredible amount of wear on your body and mind, which is pretty contradictory to the endurance athlete "nothing-under-an-hour-is-a-workout" mindset. But surprise, lugging over 150 pounds of bags and gear through customs at an airport is surprisingly not easy (especially if that airport is in Zurich). So make sure to write "travel day" next to that big fat "0" in your training log, because it's worth the reminder.

Taking a rest day to explore and eat croissants

2. Sometimes you have to put your foot down.
Skiers visit some pretty cool places, and possibly our favorite thing to do is get out and explore new trails. But you know your body more than anyone, and if you feel tired and have upcoming races, it doesn't matter how exciting the venue is, you might have to resist the temptation and take the rest day instead. You'll feel it in the long run, trust me. So prop your feet up, grab a book and some chocolate, and treat yourself.

3. Mental rest is just as crucial as physical rest.
Racing season is exhausting because we spend so much of our time psyching ourselves up for the races, and then calming ourselves down afterward. When you've been focusing on one thing for so long, you reach a point where you don't even realize you need a break. And this is why getting out and doing cool stuff is totally justified. (Like paragliding in France, SAY WHAT?!) To quote Pat (the coach of SMS T2), "Man.. that sh** is good for the soul."

4. The off season is there for a reason!
Once the racing is done, it's time to acknowledge the good, forget the bad, and start recharging the batteries for next season. The off season is designed to let our bodies and minds take a break from focusing so hard on results and enjoy the places we're fortunate to call home! Stay away from the roller skis and go exploring. You'll have plenty of time for training in a little while.

While the season didn't end quite as I had wanted, I feel pretty fortunate to have had the opportunities that I did this year, and I'm even more psyched to start working hard for next season.
I'll be in Sun Valley full time (with the exception of some training camps and visits home to Minnesota) so if you're here and want to go hiking, give me a call!

Loved having my family come visit for the week of Spring Series :) (All photo credits to Keenan Schember)

Exhaustion =  upcoming rest days.

It was quite a snowy relay day, but I'm super proud of Ben, Mary, and Miles!

A little bit of dancing for Fast and Female in Sun Valley!

Major shoutout goes to all the volunteers, organizers, and supporters that helped out at Spring Series. You guys ROCK.