End of the Ski Season

I've been MIA for far too long. Life was crazy busy with the end of ski season and the week before Spring Break. I figured this would be a good post to wrap up the ski season in.

With the weather this winter being completely crazy the last two races were moved to what seemed to be just about the only snow in New England. The Williams Carnival was moved to Craftsbury, VT and the Middlebury Carnival was held at Trapp's making it the third carnival there this year.

Williams was actually only one day of racing due to the move. We all did a 10k classic on a really fun course. There was one absolutely brutal hill, but the wax was good and it was a nice day, so it was pretty enjoyable.

Girls getting ready for the last race!

The Middlebury carnival was absolutely crazy. I ended up getting a sickness just before and had a ridiculous chest cold, which was extremely inconvenient. I raced the 5k skate on Friday and sat out the 15k classic. While we had gotten very little snow all season, winter was back with a vengeance. It was white out conditions the entire day making the race slow and painful for many.

The pack coming through the first lap.

One of the big pluses from the day was watching Chloe ski her way to a 30th place finish. It was a really fun race to watch as she moved up through the pack and even passed a Harvard girl in the last k to solidify her 30th place.

I can't believe skiing is over. The season went by so unbelievably fast. While I absolutely loved my last season and had an incredible time, I'm glad to be a regular student again. This school year is going far too fast. I'm not ready at all to graduate and skiing ending was just one more thing to check off the list. I just want this year to never end!

UVM/Dartmouth Carnivals

Some may call it laziness. I call it visually pleasing. Here are the last two weekends in pictures.

UVM:

Silke, Kat, me, Balls, Emery

Baller picture I took of Isaiah

So many fans!

Parents busy being fabulous and making us food!
(Special thanks to the Sitzers and Vargos! mmm...grilled cheese!)

Ski friends!
Brian, me, Mama Lauren, Joshy, Claire Babe, Balls, Silke

Brian, Bear, Lauren, Kat, me 

me and my daddy

Dartmouth:

Bear in the 10k skate 

Catching rays on the gorgeous day

Just after the mass start...everyone running to the next spot

The pack heads up the first hill

UNH Carnival

I feel kind of stupid writing a post about last week's carnival the night before the second race of this week's, but I figured I'd go for it anyway.

So last weekend we were in Jackson, NH for the classic sprints and 15/20k skate races. It was the first weekend that Rizzle and Mama Rizz got to cheer us on as the course literally passes their house. SO GOOD to have them there. Rizz will hopefully be there from now on, but Mama Rizzle was a special treat!

The first day of sprinting was really interesting. To start things off, I'm not necessarily a sprinter. And by "not necessarily" I mean not even a little bit. It was also raining/slushing/snowing the entire day. It was a soggy mess, but the course was ridiculously fun. I didn't do well at all, but I had a great time. It's not often I say that...

Women's mass start (pics by Colin)

Kat and I coming around for our last lap

Saturday was the 15/20k mass start. The start was pretty crazy. The first k bottlenecked right off and there were a few seconds where almost everyone was standing completely still. After that it was a solid race. I went back and forth with both Kat and Chloe a couple of times each. We also saw Emery out there in the mix. On the last k or so Kat and I were skiing side by side staring at Chloes back about 10 seconds in front of us. Chloe, Kat, and I crossed the line one right after the other.

I'm really pleased with how I skied. Going into the third lap I had a few seconds where my body just wanted to slow down, but I kept my head in it and hopped back onto Kat who had dropped me a little. I skied hard for the entire 15k. As someone who has real issues with my mental race it was nice to feel like I held things together. I didn't look at the results and I never plan to. I'd rather be happy then look and end up disappointed with how I actually placed.

Chloe in front, me on the left, Kat on the right
Less than a k from the finish

Cheering for the boys...there was a gap in the action and a
beautiful background! (Chloe, me, Em, Kat, Balls)

That's actually my new strategy for the year. Unless my parents see that I did ridiculously well and tell me to look I will never see the girls results for the races this year. I'd rather be happy with myself and how hard I pushed. In the end, I know where I'm at after four years. It's not even in the ballpark of where I wanted to be. At this point there's really not much else I can do. As long as I'm happy with the effort I put into this last season I'm going to be able to call it a success.

On the guys side of things, we had a few that were incredibly close to qualifying for the heats, which is encouraging. The mass start wasn't as successful as it could have been, but they seem to be improving every weekend. A shout out to Adam for his 16th place finish on Saturday. Giving feeds on top of the hill I was so excited to see him come by with the top guys lap after lap. My mom was freaking out as well. She even said, "The way I was cheering you would have thought he was my own son." I can only imagine what that must have looked like...

Mama, Lar, and I
Fam shot. Can you tell Cathy loves pictures?

Lary Writes a Blog Post

Mi padre is a fabulous man. He is also one of my coaches. Not everyone realizes this probably because I call him Lary more often than I call him dad. People have mixed reactions when I share this information. Sometimes I get, "Oh that's great you get to spend so much time with him!" Other times it's more like, "Doesn't that kind of suck to see your parents 24/7 while you're in college?" The correct answer is more the the first remark. My dear old dad and I are more alike than either of us would like to admit, which makes it easy to spend so much time together.

He also likes to blog. Kind of. Every so often I get an email containing a post that I then have to edit and put on the team blog. I really enjoyed the latest one, so unbeknownst to him he is going to be a guest blogger on my ever popular bloggity that is probably read by the same people that read the team blog anyway. (This isn't laziness. I swear I will get a UNH carnival post up here later.)

So here he is, the great Lary Martell:

We're rolling into February in a snow challanged winter! The walk across campus has been easy. Warm days and a lack of the huge snow banks to crawl over has made it simple for the team to get to the ski room and into the vans.  The talk at the early Eastern Cup races and carnivals is all about the difficult snow year.... 

But not so fast! The SMC gang, it seems, has had no problem finding the white stuff.  From long over-distance days on the rolling terrain at Craftsbury to mid-winter conditions at Trapps to interval training at The Range, the Purple Gang has not missed a beat.  It seems that it is good to be a nordic skier in Northern Vermont. 

The season is well underway and the Big Purple is getting fit and looking foward to another great weekend of skiing at Trapps in the UVM Carnaval and Eastern Cup races.  We'll see you there!

-Lary

Last minute decision to join the race!
Big Purple was PUMPED!

Off he goes! Just look at that form!

Nice work, Lar!

Bates Carnival

One down and five to go. Driving back from Rumford, ME we couldn't believe we had just finished our first carnival weekend. They go by so fast.

Isaiah in the 10k

Friday's race was an individual start 5k skate (10k for the guys.) The course was pretty fast even after the few inches of snow that fell the night before. My usual struggle has been with my skate technique and, while I've been working on it a lot and am feeling better about it, the usual problems occurred. No glide in my V1, just short and choppy. Head bobbing side to side. Ugly. The race was not what I wanted, but there are five more weeks to make improvement. At least I know what to focus on in practice every day.

Me and my dad (in his cute coach's bib) watching the 10k

Photo credit: Connor Hunt

Saturday's mass start 10k classic was a little better. I feel like I lacked the confidence I needed to move up to where I should have been, but once I settled in farther back I raced fairly well with the help of my dad running around the course shouting at me to go hard over the top or put in a few fast strides on the next section. Being in the group ahead of me would have made me feel better about the race, but I passed, held off, and eventually dropped a group of three girls in the course of the 10k, so I'm pleased about that outcome.

The lead pack coming up the hill in the 10k classic

It was really nice to be back in the swing of things. The team is getting along really well and we have a lot of fun. I've happily taken it upon myself to be sure we look good with our hair ribbons and sparkly stickers for each race. The girls are really close this year and we have a lot of fun with our ridiculous nicknames, inside jokes, and constant singing. It's nice that even when I have a bad race I know I won't be in a bad mood once every thing's over and I'm back in the van with the team.

Emery, Balls, and I

It's only Monday, but I already feel like the week is flying by. I have so much to do before we leave for Jackson, NH on Thursday. Wish us luck as we take on classic sprints and a 15k skate!

Ski Team Endeavors in the First Week of Class

I may or may not have just posted this on the Nordic Ski Team Blog, but I figured I'd throw it up here since it includes a story from my week. Plus, it could be a good lesson. Sometimes things don't go according to plan and your intervals get completely messed up and end up non-existent. Even when this happens you can at least look at is as semi-entertaining. Optimism?

Anyway, enough late night rambling...here's the post:

We have a Facebook page! This is going to be short and sweet because it is late and we leave for Rumford tomorrow, but I wanted to make sure it got on the blog before the weekend. This is a new thing for the team and I'm going to see if maybe when I have service/wifi at carnivals I can post results and whatnot to the page before they're online (although the EISA is usually pretty speedy.)

The boys (and Gabby) give the van a little push

An exciting adventure the team had this week was when we attempted to get in some intervals on Tuesday. We went up the the Range in Jericho only to find that the road leading up to the biathlon range was a little icy. And by a little icy I mean a complete ice rink that was nearly impossible to even try to walk on. We got part way up the hill in the van only to have my dad maneuver us carefully into a driveway. After getting slightly stuck for just a minute we unpacked our skis and began to walk up the ice covered hill. On the walk up we encountered a school bus in a snowbank, a woman in a Subaru that gave my dad the keys and let him do the driving, a fishtailing, skidding van, and, finally, a dirt truck that came to everyone's rescue. (I'm clearly not an English major, so those of you who are into that kind of thing...you know...literacy...please don't judge me for the hardcore overkill of commas in that last sentence.)

High fives for getting the van out of the snowbank

Pumped for the arrival of the dirt truck

We made it to the top and the skiing was still good, but unfortunately just before we really got rolling the National Guard decided to call it quits and shut down the operation. While our workout was less than desirable we got to ski the Range and test out potential interval loops for the following weeks.

Big Purple leaves tomorrow at noon for the Bates Carnival at Black Mountain! I made the girls purple and yellow hair ribbons earlier in the evening so we're officially ready for the race season to begin!

Make sure to check out and like our Facebook page and wish us luck!

Nordic Ski Team Winter Camp

I'm alive, I swear! I haven't posted in far too long. After Christmas I got incredibly sick and after spending far too many hours on the couch watching chick flicks and drinking orange juice I was back at it with skiing. There was next to no snow in Vermont, but I was able to find it here or there.

All packed up...for two days.
We may have overpacked...

A week and a half ago my dad and I packed up my car and headed to Rumford, Maine for Nationals to watch my brother and various others. While there was little snow elsewhere Black Mountain did a really good job keeping the course well covered and well groomed.

Last Thursday I made it back to campus where I've been staying with the ski team since then. Our schedule hasn't been all too complicated. It looks a little something like this:

8:15 - Drag myself out of bed, go downstairs and decide what to wear from my floor closet where I put everything out to dry the night before, and eat breakfast
9:00 - Head to Trapps
10:00 - First ski of the day. Sometimes intervals depending on the day.
12:00 - Lunch. PB&J. Every. Single. Day.
1:30 - Second ski.
3:00 - Back in the van, back to school
4:15 - Big man nap, waxing skis
6:15ish - Dinner with the team at Bear's house
10:00 - Bed time

Emery and Colin playing Checkers in the lodge.

We've been having a great time skiing and there has been more and more snow as the week goes on, but I'm EXHAUSTED. I basically spend all of my free time zoning out in front of the TV or sleeping. Plus, my house is an absolute disaster. My roommates come home this weekend and they're going to KILL me! While the other three girls of 309 coming home means I have to clean, I am excited for the spring semester to start up and to have everyone back on campus!

Things are about to get really crazy with skiing. When classes start we have six weeks straight of carnival racing. I'll keep the blog updated and, maybe, write about other things like life at SMC. But for the next six weeks I won't really have one of those so get ready for some skiing posts. It's my last season and I'm going to be making the best of it!

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like...April?

We were so close to not having a white Christmas here in Vermont. Thank goodness it snowed a few days before. It's still not much, but it's better than what we had which was...nothing. It was warm and kind of rainy. I think Vermont forgot it was December.

Because of the lack of snow for days upon days there really wasn't much as far as the whole skiing game goes. This lead to my multiple hour-hour and a half drives to Craftsbury to ski around a 1.5k loop. When all was said and done I skied for five hours in three days on that sucker. It got so old it's unreal.

Now that it's snowed we've got a few more options. Trapp's has around 15k, Sleepy has about 5k, Craftsbury has 10+k. There's talk of a storm coming (maybe? cross your fingers) tomorrow so perhaps this will be just what we need!

But enough of this ski talk! Based on my Twitter feed many of my classmates had wonderful Christmases, but are now ready to head back to our lovely SMC! I am one of many. I go back shortly after New Years for winter camp with Big Purple, so I'm a little luckier than most.

The Martell-Crawford/(Lary) Martell cousins on Christmas Eve
Eli, Evan (my brother), Cylas, Phoebe, me

That is my short and sweet life update. Life at home can be pretty boring. Mine especially since it's been consumed with driving to ski, which when going so far away can take pretty much your entire day. Once we hit New Years life will be going non-stop with skiing and I'll have no lack of Big Purple racing posts and pictures during the carnival season.

I hope everyone had the happiest of holidays and enjoys a fabulous New Year!

Phoebe, Uncle Pat, Aunt Becky, and I

Race Day

Gorgeous tracks on Saturday

This weekend was the first race weekend of the season. We haven't started the carnival season yet, but the  first Eastern Cup (the races put on by NENSA, the New England Nordic Ski Association) was this weekend. While there is absolutely no snow anywhere in the east, Craftsbury managed to pull together an phenomenal 1.4k race loop.

The first day consisted of a 1.4k classic sprint and a 3k classic prologue. Can't say I'm much of a sprinter, but it felt good to be in a solid set of tracks for the first time all season. The course was hard and fast and my lungs were absolutely burning. I didn't do as well as I hoped, but we've been doing a lot of long intervals, which isn't exactly too helpful for short distances. It's still early and it was good to get some starts in.

The fam after the classic races

My brother during the skate race today

The second day, today, was a ~5k skate race for women, ~10k for men. Again, it was hard, fast, and brutal. I worked hard and accomplished what I had hoped to, which was to ski more smoothly up the hills.

It's still very early in the season and I'm looking forward to a good winter break of training. Hopefully we'll get snow soon ANYWHERE in New England. I'm ready and willing to drive to snow wherever it falls. At the very least let's hope for a white Christmas!

Gabby and I being in love

First Snow of the Season

Wednesday morning of Thanksgiving break I woke up to a solid amount of snow outside. I had expected a dusting, but actual coverage was really nice to see. I had two of my teammates, Sam and Gabby, with the fam for the week since they live too far to go home for just a few days and they were equally as excited.

Craftsbury Thanksgiving morning

Thursday, Friday, and Saturday were spent at Craftsbury Nordic Center on actual snow. Thursday was almost as good as real, middle of the season skiing. They had a solid number of k's open so that we really didn't use the same trails twice. Friday morning brought some warmer temperatures and slightly less snow, but we were able to get solid intervals in during the morning and a good ski in during the afternoon. Members of the team trickled in one by one and we were back on campus Friday night.

Saturday afternoon

Saturday was a little more iffy as far as the conditions were concerned. We still managed to get two skis in but things were a liiiiiittle dicy by Saturday afternoon. It took some trudging through a little grass and water to get from certain trails to others. Anything for early season snow.

By the end of the weekend the snow was pretty much gone and a good portion of the team was back on campus. Six of us did a great 2 1/2 hour classic rollerski wearing t-shirts...in NOVEMBER. The weather is definitely unpredictable.

At this point it's 63 degrees on campus and overcast. It's not looking like the temps are dropping much below 40 degrees (if at all) for the next couple of days. The couple of days we had on snow only made us want more. Hopefully Vermont can figure itself out pretty soon and we'll get some snow that'll stick for a while.

Busy Busy Busy

This post is going to be just a quick little update. Things have been pretty busy, but it's the same old same old with classes and skiing and life in general.

This Friday was the Senior Pub Crawl in downtown Burlington. A lot of my friends played rugby and were pretty much dead to the world until the season ended last weekend. It was nice to be with all of my friends in one place at one time. It was also fun to be out with the entire senior class.

My ridiculous friends.

It was also the first time we got to take a house picture!

309.
me, Juliette, Maria, and Coligny

Yesterday (Sunday) morning we had a good ski workout bright and early. We drove out to the bottom of the Bolton Ski Resort access road and were dropped off. From there we rollerskied straight to the top. It was harder than I remember it being, but my time was also faster than it's ever been (as far as I can remember) so I'm pretty pleased.

With Thanksgiving coming up a lot of people are excited to head home. Considering I make it home fairly often I'm not quite as pumped, but two of my friends from the team who live too far away to make it home are joining the crazy Martell's for our Thanksgiving, which will definitely be a lot of fun. Break starts Tuesday and the ski team will be back on Friday to have a good weekend of training together.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

A Week of Ben & Jerry's in Burlington

First of all, sorry for the weird layout of this post. I was really struggs with the pictures. Anyway...last week was absolutely fabulous. For the first time EVER at SMC I had no homework all week. Incredible. In addition to doing absolutely nothing every night I had some fun activities to keep me busy. In hindsight I now realize that they all involved Ben & Jerry's ice cream in some way. Yikes. I'll write this blog post and then do some crunches to counteract all of the delicious fatty ice cream I've eaten in the last week.

Fun Activity 1: Free Cone Day

Every year B&J have a Free Cone Day across the world where you literally just walk into the shop, ask them for any flavor, and leave with free ice cream. If you've never heard of this you are truly missing out. This year FCD was last Tuesday. Dachelle and i made our way into Burlington, stood in a ridiculously long line, came out of B&J two very happy girls with one Chocolate Therapy and one Clusterfluff. We then made our way down to the Waterfront, sat on a swing, and stared out at the water on a beautiful spring day. Glorious.

Incredible day on the Waterfront.

Fun Activity 2: Big Purple in B-Town

Happiness.

Since ski season has ended it's been quite sad not to see my Big Purple girls every single day. For this reason we planned a Friday afternoon adventure to Burlington. We bee-lined for B&J where I then got yet another Chocolate Therapy ice cream and was quite happy with life. We then wandered Church Street and ran into the lovely Leanna from the XC team who took a fabulous group pic.

Love.

Fun Activity 3: Earth Day

Every year there's an Earth Week on Campus. Events include Meatless Monday, a Green Career Fair, and a Local Food Night in Alliot. Sunday was the kick off in Ross. We had Barefoot Truth back playing, which was good once again. In addition we had free Ben & Jerry's ice cream (seeing the trend yet?), delicious burgers (meat and veggie) from a local farm, and bike powered smoothies, among many other things. It was a great way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

Barefoot Truth
Picture by Andi Nelson, my fabulous XC teammate

It was a wonderful week full of delicious ice cream. I should probably take a step back and rethink my diet choices while I'm not really running at all, but it was COMPLETELY worth it.

Big Purple Cereal Off

So here we are on the first of April and it's snowing. Just the worst. We were attempting to April Fools our roommate Lauren last night by taping Saran Wrap to the outside of her door, but the attack was postponed to the morning and eventually called off due to Lauren's random schedule. Definitely a good thing since we had a fire alarm somewhere around 4 a.m. this morning. That would have been quite a situation. The day is just beginning, so there's still hope for more attacks.

On Tuesday Big Purple had our annual Cereal Off. The goal is to eat as much cereal as possible. Sounds like a good idea until you're like five bowls in and ready to die.

The rules are as follows:
1. Alliot has a row of eight cereals. You must eat them in order.
2. One bowl of cereal consists of an Alliot cup to the line at the top with cereal and half a cup of liquid.
3. Eat until you can't eat any more.
4. No excuses, play like a champion.

Last year I ate eight bowls, which was the whole line. This year I only did six. The kicker was the granola. Last year it was the first bowl and we all just powered through it. This year it was number four and it was brutal.

We started the event at 6 p.m. and stayed until Alliot closed at 8. We had quite a few participants and a few observers. Overall, while afterward you feel like someone's punching you in the stomach over and over, it's a lot of fun. I swear. Though I'm not 100% sure I'll do it next year. Two years miiiiight be enough for me.

Josh and Rizzle. Excitement early in the challenge.

Not everyone is as happy as Rizzle.

Gab is giving up.

CHAMPION. Silke took the win.