Date: 10th of January 2008

Hi All,

Firstly I must apologise for the delay in getting yesterday’s update online. We had a problem with our server for the past 24 hours and we’ve only been able to upload info to the site sporadically and last night would not even allow us to upload the full update….don’t have any explanation except that all seemed fine this morning. Now back to yesterday’s update.

The snowboarders headed out to play in the 10cms of fresh that had fallen overnight and they began their morning with a run over to Attridge. Their run choice was not great as it wasn’t as deep as expected so they decided to head back to the village to session the creekside flat handrail. After a quick run up Silver Queen lift the guys found a drop they had hit a few weeks ago between two houses in the village was loaded with snow and even had a pillow line off to the side of it. They stopped to session it for a bit, Kane had two attempts at the pillow line nailing his second attempt perfectly. Jay, Jamie and Jack all did perfect frontside 180s off the drop while Oli and Nath did some nice straight airs. After spending most of the morning hitting urban features the group decided the park crew had ample time to dig out the features so they headed over to the park to get some new tricks before lunch.

In the afternoon the group got a little creative on their favourite drop and had one of the group holding their board so the rest of the guys could slide it as they launched over the drop and Matesy and Kane both got some nice shots. Then it was on to the park again where Dave was working on his presses, Emma hit the battleship box for the first time, while Kane nailed a frontside boardslide pretzel out. Jamie was riding really strong with perfect 5050s on the down bar. Oli was also seen doing some nice boardslides and the Skullcandy daily award today goes to Nath for consistently getting a variety of grabs off the drop plus having a great attitude out on the hill today.
 
The alpine/snowboardcross group headed out with less riders than usual. Ash was still not feeling well and today her roommate Julia was also off colour so they took the day off to try and recuperate for Saturday race. So Chrisy and Greg trained gates in the morning on Big Dipper. The overnight snow did not seem to bother them too much and they both trained well and worked on their balance. Phil mentioned they both learnt a couple of key lessons today when riding in soft conditions especially regarding be patient and gentle when carving as opposed to get maximum speed.After some good technical run in the course they came in for lunch.  In the afternoon session they headed out towards the freeride part of the mountain to make some powder turns. Greg had a few good crashes and Chrisy worked on keeping vision up in order to avoid hazards etc. The powder has really taken it’s toll on the group and they are pretty weary so tomorrows half day will give them a chance to rest a little.

It was D-day today for the moguls crew with competition training starting at 9am on the summit course. Jack, Alex C, Alex W, Alex E, Bryn and Brodie assembled down at the NATC to register. Once receiving their bibs the group headed for the course inspection where there were around 40 to 50 other competitors from everywhere in B.C. A large amount of snow had left the course in tough conditions with all competitors needing to step around 10cm of fresh pow off the course. The day began with all competitors skiing pow bumps with face shots a plenty. As the course hardened up the skiing got better and better. A number of competitors began throwing off axis 720’s. One Silver Star kid even trying his hand at some corked 1080’s. Ridley’s crew were looking tired as the skied the first few runs of the  demanding 200 metre long course in sections and  after 3 to 4 runs each they started doing top to bottom consistently which seemed to perk them all up.  It was essential that the guys put down top to bottoms in order to get the most realistic training for the competition. Alex W and Brodie landed some great 720’s on the bottom jump and are certainly in contention for some good positions tomorrow. Bryn, Alex C, Alex E and Jack were also skiing well and jumping relatively consistently. The crew had the afternoon off to rest their tired bodies. They will not have a chance for much time off snow this weekend with 3 competitions running simultaneously. Good luck to all the crew competition. Bring us home some medals.

The freeriders headed straight down to the six pack and they did a quick warm up before heading to the backside via the secret cliff area they hit the day before.  The aim was to capture the cliffs on video.  They were  the first there for the day so the conditions were soft and deep.  Hamish and Conrad lead the charge with Conrad hitting the big option and went right off the middle while  Hamish took a two tier pillow line.  The rest of the group hit the chutes on both sides of the cliff getting some great face shots.  The group then hit Three Wise Men next which was hardly skied and all the group slashed and explored all the lines in the bowl shaped run.  At the bottom was a bit of a log ride to drop which Conrad hit nicely.   It was Amy and Lauren last day of skiing and they just had to show Marnie the very yummy cinnamon buns in the paradise camp.  The rest of the group hit up another few runs before picking them up on the way through and heading in for lunch. 

In the afternoon Chris took Conrad for the big air training which was on at the Air Site.  Conrad was working on the his 7’s to get them dialed for the big air comp on B.C. provincial big air comp on Saturday.  The rest of the group had an afternoon of freeskiing were they took advantage of all the fallen snow.  It’s still snowing hard as guys came in so looks like another powder day tomorrow.

Today the racers headed over to the backside with Sam from Vernon Ski Club. They spent the morning doing some technical free runs and skiing the powder on Cowabunga. After a solid morning of powder riding they got down to work in the afternoon and trained Slalom for the remainder of the day. They group did a mix of stubbies and Slalom gates focusing on their line.

Tonight's activity involved a movie night at the hostel. Tonight's movie was Friday and mighty ducks. Everyone enjoyed themselves by bringing in their doonas and munching on popcorn while having a laugh at the same time.

Today's Pinky goes to Jay Ghattas who when doing his laundry put it in a garbage bag - as many of the athletes do. But today - last night, Jay put his laundry next to the daily rubbish about to be thrown into the dumpster. As it happens it had. And when he woke up in the morning it took him a little while to realise that his clothes went out with the rubbish. Don’t worry Mum, we managed to retrieve the bag.
 
We say goodbye to Sammy K who head home tomorrow after a month here with us. We have a few other heading home over the next few days including Amy and Lauren tomorrow and Kane on Saturday.

Until Tomorrow

Stowie