I am have almost been in Europe for two weeks now and it has been quite an exciting trip so far. We arrived in Nove Mesto, Czech Republic 4 days before the first race just a couple days short of enough time to get adjusted to the time difference but I tired to make the most of it and forced my body at get adapted. This was going well until the night before the first race when I was awake all night with stomach pains feeling like I was going to puke. Despite feeling pretty terrible I decided to race because I figured that I didn't have a whole lot to loose if I placed badly and if nothing else racing while feeling like I was going to puke would just make to tougher. Not surprisingly the first race, a 10km sprint, didn't go that well. I felt pretty terrible skiing but my shooting was solid only 1 miss in prone and I cleaned my standing. The night after the race and the next morning I spent lots of time on the toilet. The next day I raced again and had an almost identical race, good shooting with only 1 miss but slow terrible feeling skiing.
After Nove Mesto we drove to Ridnaun, Italy for the second weekend of racing. It was a 10 hour drive and feeling totally sick didn't make it go by any faster. The first three days in Italy I felt sick to my stomach and spent almost all my time on the toilet. Finally the day before the first race I drove into town and got some stomach medicine which really helped a lot. With the stomach medicine fully kicked in I felt like I was pretty much able to race at 100% and placed 55th in the sprint race with clean shooting (no misses). My goal for the day was to place in the top 60 so that I would qualify for the next days pursuit race, I was really happy to have snuck in to that top 60. For the pursuit race I was feeling much better and overall had a decent race that I was happy with. I moved up to 49th place with 3 misses. Two of my misses were my last two shots of the race, I was unable to keep my focus through the final shooting stage and did not execute the shots properly which caused the misses. Even though my skiing was not super fast it was consistent and good shooting in the first three stages made for a fun race. There was a pack of several guys that I was going back and forth with for the whole race which made the skiing quite fun.
Tomorrow is the final race in Italy which will be a mixed relay with two girls and two boys. Relays are always fun races and I am looking forward to it.
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| On the drive from Munich to Nove Mesto we ran out of gas but coasted to within 300 meters of the gas station. Through the windshield you can see Vlad (our coach) running back with a gas can. |
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| Driving the drive from Nove Mesto to Ridnaun we had to go over the Brenner pass where it started snowing very hard. We were stopped on the road for about 45 minutes and had to put chains on our van to get over the pass. |
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| Wynn and I putting on the chains |
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| Wynn in the wax room with all of our skis and the wax bench |
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| The town of Ridnaun where the races are held is in the snow covered mountains in the distance. |
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| After my accident I am into seeing if the venue has a good rescue sled set up, in Ridnaun they do! |
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| The sunrising from the deck of our hotel room in Italy |
