TRACKSIDE 2010

NOoooo....it's over: we're all in Olympic 'withdrawal'...

2010-03-21T18:26:00.000-07:00

I find my self wearing a piece of my smurf outfit ever day... not all at the same time...cause this I had to do for four weeks straight. But just one piece at a time... my hat for my spring ski out in the Gatineau Park, my vest when sitting at my desk and yes my lovely blue rainjacket with the Olympic rings registered on the back walking to the grocery store...cause I'm so proud to have been a Volunteer at the Olympics !

And you would be amazed how many people notice and say hey, 'what was your volunteer job ?' and... 'I too was there' - or ' You guys worked so hard' - or ' I was glued to the TV set for two weeks straight and am now in Olympic withdrawls'... and I say "me too!"

I can't believe it's over.

The Paralympics were my Olympic addiction slow return to normal life...my daily chats with Dirk who was still out-west grooming helped immensely. Now he too is coming home after a very long two months of continuous work. Dirk just called me from one of Vancouver2010's legacy's...the 'Sky-train'. He took it from Richmond after having returned his VANOC truck and was heading to the airport for the red-eye flight home. Tomorrow will be our first time together as a family in two months...Katrina is also home from down-under where she was training for her whitewater kayak sport. Stefani held the fort here on First Av - and I must say did a fine job that of course included 'watering' my plants, snow removal, garbage out on the curb on Tuesdays and with the recyling tossed many items I never had the heart to 'throw-out' - cause she could !

Skiing in the Gatineau Park last weekend, I met up with fellow Banana Ski teammate of my youth - aka southern Ontario skiing nickname of the time... Dan Mallet, whom I had heard had a key role with Olympic medals. He too was in major Olympic withdrawals. And after hearing his story, now I know why. Dan headed up the mint's medal creation team for the past 2 years, and was physically at the end of the 7 hour line-up in downtown Vancouver where the public was not only able to see the medals upfront, but have their photo taken wearing one...and able to ask Dan and his team how they were made, designed and the inspiration behind these beautiful pieces of hardware. Dan told me that he personally spoke to over 40,000 people. He also mentioned that the mint made 690 medals for the Olympics and 300 for the Paralympics. Wow ! The Mint here in Ottawa still has these beauties emblazoned on it's outer walls with line-ups heading in this past weekend...I hope I too get to see a copy in weeks to come. Perhaps a personal tour from Dan, to help him get over his post-Olympic-blues ! That is...if he reads my blog :)

This just arrived in my inbox from Susan Denny ...our energetic leader from Comox Valley aka Mt Washington, BC ski terrain - fast and female Marshal 1 :

WHAT a TEAM !

I believe I have thanked most of our team members personally on your great efforts “on course” but as I missed a few of the gatherings at the end of the Paralympics I would like to take the time to share some thoughts and thank everyone once again .

I have c.c.’d the chiefs and others as the Olympics and Paralympics as we know becomes a huge team effort .

Our course marshal teams certainly appreciated the good spirits and help from the other areas.

I think Mike Edwards, had a few smiles on some days when he saw how well his 5 areas ( transportation, forerunners, course marshals , course marking and grooming ) came “in sink” and worked as “a course team” . Maybe some days we interpreted some commands upside down and backwards but in the end we pulled off what we needed to J Thank you from our whole team to Course 1 and Course 2’s ( Mike, Jonas and Shawn)

A Big thank you to Nicola, John and Audra.

A Big Thank you to Christine , Lo , Claudia and Harriet ( Marshal #2 ‘s) – for starting our teams off on the early days and finishing with spunk , enthusiasm and energy to the end.

For the rest of you , wow; you were all great !

Everyone’s journey to these events and during was different ; some learned lots ; some of you contributed a great deal to the team . What a legacy we have created for B.C. and Canada.

The best was arriving each morning a seeing smiles at 7:00 am raring to go out onto the FOP to create a safe environment for the amazing and inspiring athletes.

Continue to share your stories and photos everyone.

All the best,

Susan Denny

Course Marshal #1

We had quite a group from the Ottawa Region working at Cross Country... too busy to get us all together, but we did manage one photo of the Nakkertok contingent at our final Feb 28th celebration.

I'll close today with a shot that really summarizes my amazing job: front row seats - TRACKSIDE2010 !

Hope you too continue to wear you're prized red mittens - something that will keep us all remembering this incredible event put on by Canadians in Canada !

IF keen to learn more and relive the Paralympics, here is a superb U-tube site: http://player27.narrowstep.tv/nsp.aspx?player=ParalympicSportTV#ns_dummy_link

Final Weekend at WOP

2010-03-21T18:25:00.000-07:00

Saturday was Relay Day for Cross Country - Women did 3 x 2.5kms and the Men 1 4km + 2 x 5km course. Russia dominated the Gold, Ukraine the Silver and Norway hit bronze in the Men, with Belarus in the Women.

The final night of grooming started at 1am. That was because it was supposed to snow. Snow never came - instead rain all night and all day...making for a dreary long last day at WOP. And of course the courses needed loads of salting this morning to harden the tracks for the final day - Sprint races. Sit skiers skied an 800m course. Standing skiers skied the 1.2km course (the Women's Sprint course from 2009). The turn-around corner was a bit sketchy, so Dirk and a second machine worked for over 2 hours to build up a 2m high wall to severely bank the corner.

Lo Lanning - head marshal # 2 has been great in keeping us up-to-date on marshal TRACKSIDE for the Paralympics. Here's her story from today: "The Russians owned the podium, that's for sure. The Mckeever fellas were rather spectacular as well.....doubled poled the whole thing practically and rumour has it he wore skate skis!...passed his brother early on right after leaving the stadium and charged right through ahead of Robin to the finish. They had 30 seconds to make up on the first starter, and made quick work of that, in the lead before the turn around, I believe! Our marshal team ran like clockwork today...smooth as butta! eventhough the weather could have been betta...it was a long day....Start at 10 quarterfinals lasted right til noon,...then semis ...then finals and THEN MEDAL ceremony...ao...ao...ao....ao....ao....times 6....Finally got to wrap up at 3pm! Phew! And did I mention rain ! "

And medal, the Canadian brother team did. The Vancouver Sun reported the following:

McKeever made a calculated gamble in the final of the sprint event. Racing in rain and sticky snow conditions, they decided not to wax their skis and instead used pure strength to power their way to victory.

"The tracks were slowing down because they were getting wet," Brian McKeever said. "That was part of what made the decision. "We had a good strategy. We had to make the decision and believe in it 100 per cent."

McKeever came into the Paralympics with an objective to win three gold.

Mission accomplished.

"That was the goal coming in," said the 30-year-old. "It was not one we wanted to put out to people. You can never predict what the other competitors would do. "We had to put down our best races to do it. We tried to play to our strengths."

McKeever's victory Sunday at Whistler Olympic park, which he secured alongside his guide, brother Robin, marks Canada's 10th gold medal of the 2010 Games and is McKeever's ninth career Paralympic medal.

Great conditions for Paraolympics

2010-03-19T19:57:00.000-07:00

Minus 6 at night and plus temperatures during the day have the groomers starting at 4pm - the transition time - when the sun leaves the tracks and start to freeze up.

Different game plan each day, Dirk meets with the Jury and TD's right after the day's races to initiate the next days course planning. Normally 6 pages of notes are recorded during their ski around the race course. These notes are then transferred to his grooming team - often first discussed in Trailer 2 as to the best way to execute the plan. His team is a diverse group with un believable expertise. Mt Washington on the island groomers Mark Lister and Tom Kennedy have the most experience with para-nordic track setting...and similar snow conditions, thus their input is highly valued. Groomed with the large Pisten Bully 400 machines, then reviewed by skiing the entire race course with fine scrutiny. Tracks for standing visually impaired skiers need to be continuous, no breaks - which means manual grooming in erratic corners. Sit ski tracks need to be level - which means quite a bit of raking and then adding in a manually created track...a track pan pulled by hand.
And of course salting will come to play in the plus degree conditions still facing the skiers at Whistler Olympic Park.

While in Toronto not having the opportunity to tune in to athletics...cause I was hamming it up in front of CP24(the new 24 hour news channel) in a raft at the Sportsman Show as well as doing the brochure distribution rounds for our summer businesses... decorated Paralympian Colette Bourgonje added a second medal to her 2010 collection on Thursday, earning bronze in the women's 5km sitting cross-country ski race. The 48 year old athlete is an inspiration to women world-wide, sending the message that age is not a barrier - passion and hard work can achieve goals that are realistic not only for able bodied athletes...but for those that have unique challenges. It takes creativity, will power and support to reach goals. The benefit is not only an individual gain, but shared by all that surround you. Congrats Colette and thank you for paving a path - one that opens up opportunities, closes barriers that traditionally may have halted us. You have shown us that this can be a temporary speed bump, a derailment...or change of tracks.... one that brings new joy into a sport for life ! Thank you !

Brian McKeever is becoming a successful gold miner...adding to his collection a second first place podium finish on Thursday in the 10km classic competition with brother Robin as his guide. To finish 1 and a half minutes ahead of the field must be a very rewarding feeling to "Own the Podium".

Whistler Olympic Park from a different perspective

2010-03-16T05:10:00.000-07:00

McKeever wins Gold !

2010-03-15T19:07:00.000-07:00

Brian McKeever finished over 44 seconds ahead of his rival from Russia, Nikoly Polukhin to clinche the GOLD medal - Canada's first of these Paraolympic Games and the first ever on Canadian soil.

"That was a lot of fun. It meant a lot. That was the one we were waiting to win and that's the one we really wanted," Brian McKeever said today after finishing the four laps of the red 5km course for a total of 20kms.

Not a large crowd, but a loud crowd overwhelmed Brian so much so, he couldn't hear brother Robin's directions in the final 100m's. They were here to witness history as the duo crossed the finish line in the top time of the day. The weather was gorgeous - sunny - enough to need those trade-mark shades over long side-burns: "McKeever look"... started off at zero, rising to +5 at the end of the race.

Men's 20 km Free, Visually Impaired

Cross-Country Skiing Medallists

Rank	Start Order	Country	Name	Time
1 0019007	7	Canada	McKEEVER Brian	51:14.7
2 0029011	11	Russian Federation	POLUKHIN Nikolay	51:55.6
3 0039014	14	Belarus	SHAPTSIABOI Vasili	52:22.5

Canada had two entries in the Men's Visually Impaired category with Ottawa's Alexei Novikov finishing in 13th place just over 17 minutes behind McKeever. Jody Barber came in 6th in the Standing category, Robbi Weldon in 5th and Margarita Gorbounova 7th in the Women's Visually Impaired races.

A rest day at WOP tomorrow...no wonder Dirk said he was heading up the mountain. It is meant to rain tomorrow, but this won't be the case above 1000m's - beautiful fresh powder skiing. Dirk mentioned to me that the Village was quite busy, even busier than during the Olympics. March Break is on in Ontario, thus most likely across North America and ski fans are finally flying west to see for them selves what all the excitement is about.

March 17th will see Biathlon long distance racing at WOP. In long-distance biathlon, competitors ski the loop five times and stop four times at the shooting range. Missing a target plate can be costly: for every miss, a competitor receives a one minute time penalty that is added to their overall skiing time.

I'm off to Toronto for the annual Sportsman Show, so won't be able to update my blog until I return Friday...cheers, Claudia

Canada's first Paralympic medal at Cross Country !

2010-03-14T13:34:00.000-07:00

Canadian Colette Bourgonje won the silver medal in today's women's sitting 10km cross country ski race, the first medal for Canada at the Vancouver 2010 Paralympic Games, in a time of 31 minutes, 49.8 seconds.
Catch it live on CTV: http://www.ctvolympics.ca/paralympics/sports/cross-country-skiing/newsid=55284.html#bourgonje+wins+canadas+first+paralympic+medal

Brian McKeever's moment comes tomorrow !

2010-03-14T12:51:00.000-07:00

Monday is the long-distance cross country event for the 2010 Paralympics. And it'll be Brian McKeever's time to shine. Guided by his brother Robin, who himself competed at the '98 Olympics in Nagano can still lay down some top ten Canadian results - important as not to slow his brother down in reaching a podium result:

"Guiding my brother Brian for the past seven years has led to some great times, some great races and some hilarious stories, but it has never been easy. " exclaims Robin.

The role of a guide seems rather simple — get the athlete to the finish line as fast as possible! Simple enough, however, this is dependent on the level of vision of the athlete you are guiding, which presents very different challenges. For a B1 classified skier (that is, totally blind), the guide — through verbal direction and without touching the athlete — has to keep the athlete on an undulating race course and away from competitors, trees, people, fences and television cameras along the course. Greatness is only achieved through an amazing bond of confidence between guide and athlete.

"Thankfully, trust is not an obstacle for me and Brian, who is a B3 classified skier and has around 8 per cent vision on a reading chart. It doesn’t seem like he has much vision, but he can make his way around a course without a guide pretty darn fast, and at times he has left me begging for mercy and dry heaving. He has asked me to go faster than my body would physically allow. Ah yes, my guiding challenge is simple!"

Standing Paralympics will be competing on the same red course as the Olympics. Grooming will start at midnight, as the snow continues to fall in Whistler. The 5km red course will be groomed for Free Technique with one classic track for the entire 5kms... the track is crucial for the Polish male skier who will double pole the entire 5km lap - four times for the 20km mens competition. He needs the track for support as both his legs are prosthetic. When I asked Dirk how he is able to double pole up the first steep incline out of the stadium he said "very well, and fast...his upper body is extremely strong, while his lower limbs are so light he doesn't have the same weight to push". Amazing - I plan to watch this event live at 10am for the Men and 12:25pm for the Women's 15km - 3 laps of the 5km red course.

Temperatures are dropping to -2 degrees C overnight bringing dry snow...but as Dirk said it isn't the same snow we are used to in the east...it's still 'heavy'...tons of humidity. "You can still make a good snowball."

Cross Country long distance starts with Sit Ski's

2010-03-13T21:39:00.000-08:00

Cross Country long distance events are divided over two days: Sunday for Sit Skiers, Monday for Standing Paralympians. Interval starts every 30 seconds, will see the Women race 10km - the 3.3km course 3 times, and the Men 15kms - 3.75kms x 4 laps.

The courses have changed significantly since the Olympics, in that the sit-ski course leaves the north end of the stadium (where the spectator area was) and connects in the blue course heading down to Way Out, then up until the bottom of Downhillers Dream, where it crosses over to the Biathlon area, reconnects into the cross country terrain through the Biathlon Warm-up loop and back through the Cross Country stadium. Less vertical making the course work well for the sit skiers.

Canadians competing tomorrow are:

Colette Bourgonje; As an able-bodied athlete, Colette Bourgonje of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, rose to the national level in cross-country running. She became an athlete with a disability in 1980 after an accident. She then took up wheelchair racing and later cross-country skiing in the sit-ski class. This elementary physical education teacher has competed in five Paralympic Winter Games: Tignes-Albertville 1992, Lillehammer 1994, Nagano 1998, Salt Lake City 2002 and Torino 2006. She has also competed in three Paralympic Summer Games, including Barcelona 1992, Atlanta 1996 and Sydney 2000. A member of the Saskatoon Sports Hall of Fame, she has a career total of eight medals — four from the Summer Games and four from the Winter Games.As an able-bodied athlete, Colette Bourgonje of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, rose to the national level in cross-country running. She became an athlete with a disability in 1980 after an accident. She then took up wheelchair racing and later cross-country skiing in the sit-ski class. This elementary physical education teacher has competed in five Paralympic Winter Games: Tignes-Albertville 1992, Lillehammer 1994, Nagano 1998, Salt Lake City 2002 and Torino 2006. She has also competed in three Paralympic Summer Games, including Barcelona 1992, Atlanta 1996 and Sydney 2000. A member of the Saskatoon Sports Hall of Fame, she has a career total of eight medals — four from the Summer Games and four from the Winter Games.

Men Sit-Ski:
Sebastien Fortier
Lou Gibson

When Dirk called this afternoon, he had just finished another 15 hour shift, and it was still snowing. No problem for Cross Country skiing - but alpine visibility had events postponed until the heavy fog lifts. The beauty of the mountains - continuous surprise weather !

Grooming for the Para Olympics is actually quite a bit trickier than regular demands, in that the tracks must be on even ground for the sit-skiers at all times - which means a lot of raking and hand grooming for perfection.

Para Olympics start with Biathlon tomorrow !

2010-03-12T12:16:00.000-08:00

IPC begins tomorrow !

It's snowing a lot in Whistler....so much that official practice was closed yesterday as 40cms came down - groomers working around the clock !
Dirk just called me from the cross country stadium, where all Para Olympic events will be running out of - NO Ski Jumping in these Olympics, and Biathlon has amalgamated into the Cross Country Venue - saying it was still snowing with 20-25cms predicted before it'll end by midnight.

Good thing, as the competitions begin tomorrow morning: Biathlon Pursuit:

March 13, 2010
10:00 - Biathlon - Men's 2.4km Pursuit Qualification, Sitting
10:11 - Biathlon - Women's 2.4km Pursuit Qualification, Sitting
10:30 - Biathlon - Men's 3km Pursuit Qualification, Standing
10:42 - Biathlon - Women's 3km Pursuit Qualification, Standing
11:15 - Biathlon - Men's 3km Pursuit Qualification, Visually Impaired
11:22 - Biathlon - Women's 3km Pursuit Qualification, Visually Impaired
Finals start at 12:20pm Canadian Mark Arendz, is a strong contender in the Mens Standing How It Works Biathlon combines cross-country skiing and rifle shooting similar to the Olympic biathlon competitions. Paralympic athletes, however, always shoot in a prone position. In the short distance biathlon, skiers race a 2.5-kilometre loop three times stopping twice at the shooting range where they take five shots at a metal target 10 metres away. Each target has five plates, fixed in a straight row, which the athlete must hit the middle (bull’s eye) of. The bull’s eye is 15 mm in diameter and if a competitor misses a plate, they must ski a 150 m penalty loop for each missed shot. Visually impaired skiers use an acoustic system for shooting that uses differing tones as the rifle is aimed toward the bull’s eye. Biathlon races comprise an interval start format with skiers starting every 30 seconds. The International Paralympic Committee utilizes a Nordic Percentage System in order to equalize the disability time handicap for skiers within each category. The percentage is applied to each skier’s final time and the skier with the lowest calculated time is the winner.

TEAM CANADA !

2010-03-04T20:38:00.000-08:00

My favourite shot at XC....athletes in suits, support crew in red !

What a team !

Men's 50km - finale at Whistler Olympic Park

2010-03-01T08:36:00.000-08:00

,

My emotions got the better of me up on the red course where I was marshaling today... when coach Eric De Nys ran past me on his way down from the red to the blue final 5km lap of this 50km - he said "we're sitting in fourth" . I knew he meant Devon Kershaw !

Watching the four Canadians ski by me and zoom down the icy 'elevator-straight' five times, I was very aware how the 50km race was unfolding. Did you know that the 50km classic race climbs 1750m, which is more than the height of Whistler/Blackcomb mountain. All four Canucks stuck with the huge lead pack for 3 of 5 laps. Then wax and an intense pace seemed to hinder both Alex and Ivan on lap 3. Next time around the lead pack had shrunk by half, with Devon and George hanging on to the end of it. You could see how hard they were working to close this gap and bingo, they did on lap # 5 - Devon near the front, with George at the end of the 20some skiers. Devon especially looked relaxed, focused and flaw-less as he skied by the feed zone on the top of the blue entering his final 5km.
Alex must have changed skis as he was kicking stronger with his trade mark classic technique that seems to perfect the weight shift. Skiers are allowed for the first time in the Olympics - to change their skis three times in the stadium. This was explained to me by the Swedish wax tech "Lasse", that three top skis per athlete will be chosen by their wax tech. The skier starts with the top pair, and exchanges to second-best on lap 2 or 3, as the glide wax slows down and grip diminishes. Then ideally the top pair gets re-waxed and returned to the skier on lap 3/4. Depending on the changing conditions, a 3rd pair can be used or not.

Ivan's perseverance was heartbreaking to watch as he gave everything he had in him...the determination in his whole body was evident in the power exerted on every kick, and the exhaustion on his face. He managed to move up positions, catching Alex and they skied into a foto-finish for a 32/33 result.

After all the skiers passed my position I too ran down to just catch a glimpse of the lead pack cross the top blue/red above the stadium. Devon was in the lead pack of six. The crowds roared and flags were waving down below in the pit...or stadium as the skiers were caught gliding across the top. Never in Canadian ski history have we managed to be in a medal contention after skiing full out for more than 2 hours in this grueling 50km race. Devon Kershaw changed this today - giving it all, entering the stadium the gap did not increase as the six-strong skiers rounded the final corner. All six skiers wanted the podium as much as Devon. Sprinting too early is Dario Cologna's explanation for the tangle with Johan Olsson, which had Dario fall at the end of the stadium finish corner. This left five skiers sprinting for the medals. Norwegian, Petter Northug was able to change the final order, gliding past Germany's Axel Teichmann for a foto-finish Gold, with bronze being split by a micro second. Sweden's Johan Olsson's attack got the bronze, and a foto-finish fourth to Tobias Angerer and fifth place going to Canada's Devon Kershaw.

You have all seen Devon's heaving body as he bent over in tears at the finish line and his post-race interview where he couldn't hold back the emotion of being so close - only .6 of a second - to a medal...for himself and a first for Canada. Yet in our hearts he is the CHAMPION !

As are all four Canadian skiers who worked so hard to put our country on top of the world in men's cross country skiing. Pierre Harvey pointed this out at the end of the day when he spoke with Dirk, "As a group, Canada has one of the world's strongest men's teams ! "

CBC online summarized Canada's xc skiing performance at these Games best:
http://www.cbc.ca/olympics/crosscountryskiing/story/2010/02/28/sp-xc-ski-rdp.html

Here is CTV's summary and interview with Devon: http://www.ctvolympics.ca/cross-country-skiing/results-and-schedules/event=ccm750000/phase=ccm750101/highlights.html

Waxing was not easy during these Olympic Games. The salting of the tracks added a layer of complication. With the tracks harder, a more elasticized klister is needed - one that doesn't slide off the back of the grip zone. Sometimes more than one brand is used, mixed to create the 'perfect' combination. In the Team Canada trailer, wax guru - Ives Bilodeau had it dialed. Here an exhausted man, he shares the success at the end of the day.

Forerunner, Stefan Lloyd shows off his bib covered in names he has collected from the greats....which includes many Canadians. Inspired, Stefan is part of the future Canadian xc skiers that brings home memories that will be the fuel of summer training sessions.

Father Wil Kershaw is proud of the whole team, and feels for his son whom he said " knocked on the world's door to cross country skiing...this door will open wide for Canada !".

The Grooming team celebrated at Nita Lake Lodge, in the late hours of Saturday night after grooming for the 50km red/blue combined course. Only three hours later back to work to salt the snow.

Dirk gets two days off...before the second shift - the Para-Olympics, that start next week here in Whistler. And evening with the Jury and chiefs of Cross Country allows Dirk and I a chance at a Bente Skari photo op. Not only grace on skis, this celebrated xc skier from Norway exudes passion, professionalism and positive action for the future of nordic sports. She will be the chief of competition at the next World championships in Oslo, Norway.

Cheers to a great journey.
Dirk and I are skiing back up to Callaghan Backcountry Lodge for a much needed recharging of batteries with wonderful moments to share together.

Thank you for reading our journey and I hope it has helped you connect to xc skiing during these games in Canada !

Claudia and Dirk

Men's 50km Classic on the final day of the 2010 Olympics

2010-02-27T21:15:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow the final competition at the Cross Country venue: the Mens 50km classic.

This event is scheduled to finish just before the start of the Gold medal Hockey game.

For Cross Country skiers the 50km mens classic is the grand daddy of the sport. A list taken off Wikepedia provides you with the past Olympians reaching the podium:

50 km

Games	Gold	Silver	Bronze
1924 Chamonix details	Thorleif Haug (NOR)	Thoralf Strømstad (NOR)	Johan Grøttumsbråten (NOR)
1928 St. Moritz details	Per Erik Hedlund (SWE)	Gustaf Jonsson (SWE)	Volger Andersson (SWE)
1932 Lake Placid details	Veli Saarinen (FIN)	Väinö Liikkanen (FIN)	Arne Rustadstuen (NOR)
1936 Garmisch-Partenkirchen details	Elis Wiklund (SWE)	Axel Wikström (SWE)	Nils-Joel Englund (SWE)
1948 St. Moritz details	Nils Karlsson (SWE)	Harald Eriksson (SWE)	Benjamin Vanninen (FIN)
1952 Oslo details	Veikko Hakulinen (FIN)	Eero Kolehmainen (FIN)	Magnar Estenstad (NOR)
1956 Cortina d'Ampezzo details	Sixten Jernberg (SWE)	Veikko Hakulinen (FIN)	Fyodor Terentyev (URS)
1960 Squaw Valley details	Kalevi Hämäläinen (FIN)	Veikko Hakulinen (FIN)	Rolf Rämgård (SWE)
1964 Innsbruck details	Sixten Jernberg (SWE)	Assar Rönnlund (SWE)	Arto Tiainen (FIN)
1968 Grenoble details	Ole Ellefsæter (NOR)	Vyacheslav Vedenin (URS)	Josef Haas (SUI)
1972 Sapporo details	Pål Tyldum (NOR)	Magne Myrmo (NOR)	Vyacheslav Vedenin (URS)
1976 Innsbruck details	Ivar Formo (NOR)	Gert-Dietmar Klause (GDR)	Benny Södergren (SWE)
1980 Lake Placid details	Nikolay Zimyatov (URS)	Juha Mieto (FIN)	Alexander Zavyalov (URS)
1984 Sarajevo details	Thomas Wassberg (SWE)	Gunde Svan (SWE)	Aki Karvonen (FIN)
1988 Calgary details	Gunde Svan (SWE)	Maurilio De Zolt (ITA)	Andy Grünenfelder (SUI)
1992 Albertville details	Bjørn Dæhlie (NOR)	Maurilio De Zolt (ITA)	Giorgio Vanzetta (ITA)
1994 Lillehammer details	Vladimir Smirnov (KAZ)	Mika Myllylä (FIN)	Sture Sivertsen (NOR)
1998 Nagano details	Bjørn Dæhlie (NOR)	Niklas Jonsson (SWE)	Christian Hoffmann (AUT)
2002 Salt Lake City details	Mikhail Ivanov (RUS)	Andrus Veerpalu (EST)	Odd-Bjørn Hjelmeset (NOR)
2006 Turin details	Giorgio Di Centa (ITA)	Yevgeny Dementyev (RUS)	Mikhail Botvinov (AUT)

Canada, is not on this list and there is no expectation yet to be there...but Canadian Men have never been as strong as our present National Team, so it can't be totally ruled out of possibility. A top 10, or even two top 10 is definitely a possibility with the current group of four men that have set Canadian records through out these Games. Thus a gut wrenching decision for our National Team head coaches, Inge Bråten and David Wood to replace one of the four performers to allow Brian McKeever, Canada's fifth team member for the 50km classic.

By now you have built your own opinion on whether their choice was the right one, but I do think it is important to first understand a bit of the back ground. Tom Holland, CCC's High Performance Director, explained the difficult decision to me "trackside" during the Women's competition today. "Historically one of our skiers has by now been worn down, or become ill, a common occurrence nearing the end of the Games be it Worlds or Olympics. We have then filled the fourth position with our alternate. This has not been the case this year. In fact all four men have become stronger, and are all capable of skiing a personal best tomorrow. Brian was named to the team based on his 50km selection race in Canmore, but as the 5th team member. He knew this from the beginning, as did the coaches. What we were not prepared for was to have to make this difficult decision - something we have not yet had the 'luxury of ' in the history of Canadian skiing - to not utilize our alternate."

I understand Brian's anger and sadness, as we got to hear his aspirations in person back in November in Silverstar over dinner when making the Canadian Olympic Team was still a dream. He did make it, and this will not ever be taken away. He still is and will remain the first ever Olympian to make both the Olympic and Para-Olympic team in the same Games. Brian, you are not only amazing - you're are a shining star for us all.

While marshaling on the far end of the blue course today - called "Way out", I had the fortune to watch the men in preparation for tomorrows big race. Long-slow distance was the theme, chatting amongst each other. Ivan Babicov skied by on his own, but sent me a huge smile that made my day. Then came the gaggle of Canadian lads....almost like a group of teenagers. Alex, Devon and George were chatting, and laughing and egging each other on. When asked if I could take a shot of our 'sexy' Canadians...they loved the idea and posed with sincere happiness.

Warmed me up to see them so relaxed and happy - can only imagine how much fun this is for them !

Good luck boys - and ski your guts out !

Women's 30km Classic

2010-02-27T19:58:00.001-08:00

Mass start with 55 competitors, 23 nations, of which two entries were from Canada: Sara Renner and Madelaine Williams.

This was to be Sara's final international competition. She did not participate in the Team Relay to rest up for this event.

The Mass start stuck together as a group for most of the first lap of the upper red course (5kms). Sara sat comfortably in around 15th spot - mid-way in this pack. Madelaine had a latter start number and looked to be skiing very strongly at the back of this long line-up of skiers.

Grip did not seem to be an issue on the uphills. Canadian skiers technique looked equal to the best of them - powerful and great extension. Skis looked to be gliding better than in the Team Relay - good to see for these wet slushy conditions. A good comparison was to watch the forerunners - Canada's top Junior and U23 ski racers, who had both grip and glide issues - but of course not the background wax support our elite athletes had.

The pace set by the leaders soon showed itself too strong for the pack to stay together. Multiple packs emerged and eventually strung out to be a continuous line of skiers. Sara sat in about 13-17th position. She looked great. As did all the women. Madelaine skied the majority of the race in a pair with bib # 45 from Belarus. Her power and technique looked to me as strong as the top women. Obviously not as strong...as the top women pulled away. Two thirds into the race, the lead group broaden their domination to a one minute lead over Sara's position and three to Madelaine's.

In the end it became a race for GOLD between rivals Marit Bjoergen, 29 of Norway and Poland's Justyna Kowalczyk, 27. Third place was for grabs within a group of six: Finland, Sweden, Italy, Germany, France, Norway and Japan. In the final leg it was Finland who gained it's second medal in xc and third of these Olympic Games with a bronze from 31 year old Aino-Kaisa Saarinen. Back on the race course we could only hear the crowd go crazy as we knew the leaders, Marit and Justyna battled it out for first. Only knew the result when a white and red clad coach sprinted by me yelling "we won, we won"...did we know Poland's Justyna edged out 3x Gold medalist at these Games, Marit Bjoergen.

A joy to watch Sara Renner ski with perfection past me six times today and into 16th spot in her final competition on Canada's National Team. Her love of skiing and rise to excellence has inspired thousands of young women across this country, and I have no doubt this will continue for decades to come. She and husband alpine great, Thomas Grandy have already stepped into her parents footsteps, that of running the special back country experience of Asinaboine Lodge positioned just east of Canmore up from Canada's summer training ground, the Haig Glacier.

Tonight a farewell celebration is being organized for Sara in Vancouver, which many have left Whistler for already. I am sure you will see her face at the Closing Ceremony tomorrow.

Sara came in well under four minutes off the winning time, and after an hour and a half of ski racing, Madelaine's time was just twelve minutes off the GOLD medalist. I felt priveledged to have been allowed to be in the middle of this action today.

WET Snow and lots of rain for the Women's 30km classic

2010-02-27T16:56:00.000-08:00

Driving up the 10km long road access to WOP from Hwy 99, Dirk connects to Jody on their special VANOC-Bell cell phones. Jody had spent the night at WOP sleeping on the overnight cot in the maintenance shed getting up occasionally to check if the rain was turning to snow. If snow, then the grooming team would get a phone call to arrive asap to groom the fresh stuff. That call never came and Dirk was now assured that it was still raining at the top - at 850m above sea level.

This began to change as we arrived. Occasional snow flakes amongst the rain turned to full-on wet snow by 8am. No longer needing to salt, as salting does not work to harden the tracks with new falling snow. The base had set up well, and the tracks just needed to be skied in. Official practice open earlier at 8:30am to help ski in the course while the snow built up.

This allowed the morning shift extra time to complete the volunteer Nordic-Nerd contest. A combo questionnaire with the first part being questions, like: at what Olympic Games did skate ski racing get introduced, and who won the first skate medal, what is Becky Scott's son's name, who is the most medal-ed xc athlete, what TV station is Pierre Harvey commentating for......
And the second part had us collect items to bring in: A country pin that is not Cdn, a WOP lunch ticket, picture of you with a spectator in front of the Olympic rings, ......

We put our heads together and presented our findings to Audra Aubuckle in the Race management office. Our award - an Olympic XC Ski Race Bib of our very own ! Something I plan to get signed by as many superstars tomorrow and then post it up in our Ski clubs chalet at Nakkertok.

Now it was time to get out on the course as a marshal. First time to build up the waterproofing. We all dawned gorgeous clear plastic ponchos to keep us marginally dry. At first it was the wet snow, and then by race start - 11:15 am the snow changed back to rain.

The forerunners were very important today to keep the classic tracks open by skiing as they lap after lap before and during the race.

Soon be back to post race info/photos/results....a nap is needed first - thanks :)

16:00 grooming once again...

2010-02-27T00:27:00.000-08:00

Dirk picked up his crew in one of two VANOC trucks that the 12 person grooming team this afternoon at 3pm. Why again this early... well if it doesn't freeze, I'm told it is best to groom early to allow the overnight darkness and time to set up the tracks. Another record for these Olympics... 2 grooming shifts in the same day !

Tomorrow is a big day for XC. The long-distance 30kms for the Women - classic.

All went well, Dirk said upon his return at 10pm. Now in bed, he will rise for a 7am start to 'salt the tracks' and Jury directed fine tuning.

Cheers to the 2nd last day of the Olympic Games and to a good race for our two Canadian Women - Sara Renner and Madelaine Williams !

go CANADA go

Women's Team Relay (4x5km)

2010-02-26T13:46:00.000-08:00

The snow conditions have returned to the early days of these Games - slushy and difficult waxing. The only difference is that new snow is mixed in with the old, giving it more structure.

I learned a bit about snow structure from Tom Kennedy, Vancouver Island's Mt Washington head groomer that the snow temperature is always at zero degrees at ground level. And if air temperature is also at zero, then even with metres of snow built up all season long, the structure falls apart. It becomes "bottom-less" - which we can all understand with spring ski conditions...sinking through to the bottom when trying to walk on it.

This is again the situation up at WOP. It is a slightly better situation now than at the beginning of the Olympics, as we received new snow in between. Thus 'salting' is working far better than at the beginning races. Salting attracts water, which allows the surrounding snow to freeze even at + temperatures. It does create a difficult waxing surface, as it becomes extremely hard in the tracks and inconsistent across the groomed track surface as the pellets can't reach every square inch evenly as it is spread.

Yesterday during the lead up to the Women's Team Relay, I was marshaling up on the red classic course. I witnessed Jody Cairns driving the snow machine with Dave Woodfine on the back spreading "urea" a common fertilizer over the tracks. They called in support when noticing that the outer track at the top of the red "elevator" turn had collapsed. Like a sink hole...the track had dropped a full foot below the rest of the surface. We shoveled snow to build it up, raked 'er and then Jody and Dave returned with a manual track setter they pulled by hand to re-create a perfect classic track. To finish it off 'urea' was again spread over the surface.

Watching the wax experts ski up the consistent gradient testing the grip wax watch quite alarming. No-one seemed to have good consistent grip over the full area. Perhaps good on the initial climb, then slipping on the steeper portions, and slow on the gradual sections.

Glide wax too seemed a huge challenge.

In watching the skiers come into the stadium it was painful to see how hard they double poled and really not reach a fast result.

Sara Renner opted out of the Relay Team to rest for tomorrows 30km classic competition. Our Canadian team consisted of Dasha and Peri in classic, then Chandra and Madelaine skiing the skate legs. It was a tough battle and the conditions today didn't make it easy for Team Canada.

A rest day for xc skiers Friday, then the final weekend for the 2010 Olympic Games.
Met up with Nakkertok's Ian Austin on the shuttle bus up to the inukshuk. He is a Sports writer for the NY Times and was also up for writing a grooming article for an automotive magazine.

West chats with East - groomers Bill Pfifer, Sovereign Lake and Michel Power of Mt Ste Anne review the night shift details.

Thunder Bay skier Luke V chats to Sean Crooks' uncle Peter Crooks about the crazy snow conditions here in BC.

video replays are available on this CTV site: http://www.ctvolympics.ca/cross-country-skiing/results-and-schedules/index.html

Night of connections in Whistler...

2010-02-26T12:37:00.000-08:00

Never wanted anything to do with Facebook the 'suck-you-in' kinda computer distraction techno-pit I really don't have time for...but 6 months ago Katrina set me up with my own profile and let me figure it out. Well thanks to Facebook I connected with two special people all on the same night here in Whistler...the first is my Kindergarten buddy, Jane Chittick who married her Jr High sweetheart Greg Leeds, has lived in all corners of the World now in Seattle, WA came up for the night just to have dinner with me !
The second is Shane Philip who in the early '80's got into ww kayaking at MKC, starting in as our dishwasher. There is a 'hole' up on Staircase that carries his namesake...one I warn our instructors about at 50cms +. Well Shane moved west and we lost touch...to follow his dream of making the xc ski national team. He raced successfully for years, then settled into being a HS phy ed teacher here in BC. 6 years ago he turned another steep corner and became a professional musician. A very gutsy choice, but I'd say a good decision... Shane is a music phenomena here on the west coast - he has a following that I was lucky enough to witness last night. Have you ever heard of Xavier Rudd ? Well in Shane's own words - his one-man musical performance is Xavier Rudd in high gear ! Unbelievable and awesome music - I was so proud to see him in person. Please enjoy this segment and look forward to Shane coming to Ontario in March - playing at the Rainbow in Ottawa, March 13th. His website is Shanephilip.com. He was so pleased to see Dirk and I, that he's already agreed to perform at MKC/OWL's 40th /30th anniversary rendezvous - August 13/14, 2011.

Jane and I had a blast catching up, and sharing the excitement of Whistler Olympic fever together. Dirk joined us for dinner at KAZE, a japanese restaurant within the Weston, then headed to bed at 6pm as the groomer team was up at midnight to prep the trails for the Ladies Team Relay (4 x 5km).
We met up with another chief of grooming: Stan Kelly, grooming manager for all of Whistler / Blackcomb who shared more GOLD medal excitement at the GLC. First we enjoyed a glass of wine on their patio watching the Fire and Ice show, and later inside meeting the newly crowned Queens of ice: Kaillie Humphreys and Heather Mayse who hours earlier had won the Gold in Women's 2-person Bobsled. The red & white Canada crowd loved it to the MAX !

Men's 4 x 10km Relay in fresh snow !

2010-02-25T05:16:00.000-08:00

Today's conditions were what wax teams have been prep'g for in the lead-up to these Olympic Games in the Callaghan Valley. Today's fresh wet snow still falling during the classic portion of the relay was compared to thenightmare of waxing during the Nagano, Japan Olympic Games. Technology has advanced significantly since with the simplest of ideas being "Hairies" (the grip zone of the ski roughed up with sandpaper to produce a hairy fibre surface).

Own the Podium has provided funding to create a special "callaghan base" specific for these conditions. The Soloman ski was used for this purpose and according to Phil Villeneuve it was looking like the fastest choice in pre-race testing.

It made the venue look magical...but kept the wax'ies runing furiously, calling back and forth to their trailers and making big decisions.

As the first two skiers of each team skied the red classic tracks, the blue skate outer loops were kept open for practice right up until ten minutes before the exchange. This was on the north end of the stadium, and the wax area and athletes compound on the south side - made it impossible to run the results over - instead communicating over radios. I was marshaling at this last-minute- test zone, which made for interesting communications in all sorts of languages. Overheard the German's referring to today's conditions as "naser Kaese" (wet cheese) !

Canada was a big hope for a medal in the Men's Relay. A strong team lead by Devon Kershaw, then Alex Harvey in classic. These two men had had only one rest day between their powerful Team Sprint race on Monday. The first two laps were a manageable pace keeping the pack together. But lap three of the red 3km proved too fast a pace for Devon who came into the exchange in the newly created third pack. Alex kept it there. Ivan's first leg of skate pulled the Canadians closer to the lead pack. As did George Grey in his first of three laps. But the strong lead of Sweden, France, and Czech Republic was too much for anyone to catch....except the superstar Norwegian, Petter Northug. He gained 10 sec's per lap and caught the French and Czech skiers right in front of my eyes. Was as if he was pulled by some magnetic force at the base of the final red/blue climb. I could only hear the crowd loose it as the three countries entered the stadium. Sweden had built up a convincing lead to secure GOLD. But the race for silver was intensely exciting as Petter skied by the other two for a personal victory and silver for Norway. Czech Republic got the bronze.
Canada was the victor of pack three finishing a well earned 7th place out of fourteen teams.

The Grooming Team changed up the start time to midnight, which they did again last night for the Ladies Team Relay today. And course marking proudly standing by their straight V-boards - measured for accuracy and visual enjoyment to the 'world feed' broadcast cameras.

Always the positive man, it makes my day as I know many skiers across Canada to see the effervescent Les Parsons - here smiling wearing his trade-mark 'Becky Scott' tuque.

Sprint Relay

2010-02-23T21:50:00.000-08:00

What a day for XC Skiing and for Canadians.

Have you ever seen a full spread in the Globe & Mail on X-C Skiing ??? Not I ! But, it sure is time. The hard work, talent and expertise of our countries xc skiers started a long time ago. The Firth Sisters gave us hope. Pierre Harvey showed it was possible. And Becky Scott broke the barrier for all Canadians to actually believe 'we can perform equal to the World ', as long as the World is clean. That part I don't know very much about, but little has been whispered about doping here at the Olympics - which I take as a good sign.

Today (or yesterday - as I was too exhausted to sit down and write my blog yesterday) was an amazing day to be at a Cross Country ski race. So far, I had only witnessed Sprint Relays on TV. Pretty captivating there. But to actually see these powerful athletes ski by you, and hear them breathe as well as the crowds cheer is second to none.

I was able to capture a few great moments on the final laps on my simple camera. What I missed though were the wipe outs in the first and second heats amongst the Women at the Red corner. It became obvious that those that slid the initial portion of the turn, then skated had great control. Those that skied hard into the turn, lost control. Light must have been an issue, as they all wiped out leaving the shade and entering the softer snow in the sun. Evi Stachenbacher of Germany twice nearly did a full 360 - skiers around her were a bit more nimble to ski past her, but she almost didn't qualify her country. This changed drastically in the Finals, where the German ladies had no trouble on the same corner (softer snow ) and won GOLD.

Daria Gaiazova and Sara Renner were paired for 3 laps each of the 1.4km Sprint course. The placed 4th in their heat. Top 3 finishers automatically move up to the Final. Then four fastest timed heat finishers including Canada, also moved to the Finals for a total of 10 countries.

Dasha was the first leg. Skied super strong and stayed with the pack. Her downhill corners were no issue. Sara Renner brought Canada tighter to the front. At one point they were in medal contention...but this was a tough field. In sixth for most of the laps, Sara Renner was still in the lead up the final uphill, but it seemed to me that Kikkan Randall's skis were slightly faster...and she just nicked by Sara for 6th. Canada place 7th !

The men were even stronger. Devon lead off. Easily staying with the pack, both Alex and Devon seemed to coast with the group until the final lap. Most impressive was their inside choice on the return uphill, staying away from the congestion. In his third lap, Devon gave'r. Here's a video of his amazing lead over Axel Teichmann of Germany. Alex took over for the final lap in 2nd place. He held it half-way up the first incline, then couldn't keep the Russian and Norwegian skier back. An impressive ski, you can see from this video how he's held the fourth position. What is amazing is how far ahead the German skier was, to eventually be passed by Petter Northug in the reach for the finish. The crowd went wild not only to for this incredible feat of Norway, but to see Canadians ski ahead of the Finn's, the Swed's, the Italien's and most of the rest of the world :)

congrats!

We all knew this was to be the final day of gorgeous sunshine. Can you believe primroses survive in Whistler in February...

Tom McCarthy's out here making sure the photog's get prime spots along the course. Media rules at the Olympic Games, and we love making sure they get loads of great shots. Looks like I need to put on more sunscreen - yikes.

The forerunner teams have now changed up. A new crop of talented Canadians are here. See if you can recognize an athlete from your club.

Fun to chat with spectators. On the bus up to WOP this morning the gentle man behind me asked some questions with a very strong Austrian accent. After a couple of words we both realized we had best friends from Lienz in common (Kurti Pock and Veit Krosslhuber, MKC kayak instructors) and had to take the group shot of red & white.

Nordic Combined Team competition

2010-02-23T21:06:00.000-08:00

No stars this morning at 5am, when I took the bus to my early shift. Dirk was able to get a longer nights sleep, as grooming finished early last night....but tonight with the weather change, so will their schedule. His/their plan is to start grooming at midnight and through the morning with the predicted 5-10 cms of snow.

As you can see from the Nordic Combined photos, the blue sky is no longer. Great conditions though...not icy, but still fast out on the trails.

The Team Relay for Nordic Combined was fun to watch. First on the jumps, where the USA performed superbly. The accumulated jumping scores of all four teammates (Canada only has 1 NC athlete, thus no team today), dictated their start position and interval time off the leading country in the 4 x 5km xc ski relay.
One of the special components of being a marshal is to interact with the spectators. For many this is the first time watching a Nordic competition, thus it helps the crowd appreciate the racing if they understand what is going on. Today I met a family of four on the red/blue up that seemed to know more than I did about who's who and what's going on. When I asked the young lad - around ten if he was a skier, his dad proudly turned him around to show off his crest on the back of his jacket..." Calgary Nordic Combined Team". This is the Legacy that the Olympics brings to our country. Not sure if you've heard, but the Ski Jumps are now here to stay. Originally they were slated to be torn down after the Olympics, but enthusiasm from the Squamish / Whistler Nordics has convinced VANOC to keep 'em.
Thus, like the USA - watch out SOCHI...I bet Canada too will have a strong Nordic Combined Team in 2014.

thought I'd try this jumping out too ....

Always prep'ing one day ahead, today's courses were set up for the Nordic Combined races and the Team Relays tomorrow. The Team Relays are quite complicated to set up as two skiers ski the red classic course, and then two ski the blue skate course. Mass start, and transition zones as well as good space for the finish lane around the perimeter of the stadium makes for a lot of planning, marking, advice, and good 'ole hard work. Here's Burt drilling in hemlock branches to mark the start of classic tracks after a sharp down hill corner.

A ski after 'work' on Norwegian Woods is a great way to re-energize. And way too special to be skiing amongst the World's best. Most athletes, wax techs and coaches are out stretching their legs on these 'not-so-steep' inclines. Many were transitioning from yesterday's skate ski to classic as Magda Genuin, Italy here. Thought I'd share a part of it with you...with a video tape of my descent ... up until I was passed by no other than Canada's xc ski voice...Jack Sasseville :)
Jack has also been keeping a blog, one that has great insights into the athletes...do check it out:

http://www.hardwoodhills.ca/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=125&Itemid=274An early walk home, Dirk and I chose to use the spectator walk-way (instead of the shuttle bus). Along the way the path crosses Madelay Creek and 'carvers corner', where a Haida totem pole is being carved as well as a snow sculpture...

Waxing team dream

2010-02-22T07:46:00.000-08:00

Conditions have been so regular here in Whistler: -4 at night, plus 9-13 during the day...the wax techs love it.

A great article in the Vancouver Sun explains the magic behind the scenes in Camp Canada : www.vancouversun/Canadian+skiers +hoping+about+medal/

The easy road will all change with the disturbances arriving tomorrow. So enjoy today's events in full glorious spring ski conditions.

And cheer ON the Canadian teams:

Dasha and Sara

Devon and Alex

Even the office moved outside: Nicola Kilroy and Audra Arbucle

Team Canada photo shoot !

2010-02-21T18:47:00.000-08:00

Official Training for tomorrow's Sprint Relay.

I was marshal supervisor today, arriving early to gather the radio's and organize the briefing. We worked in pairs ensuring the Field of Play (the race courses and stadium) at key access points were controlled. By now everyone has settled into a routine, and there really were few issues as to 'sneaking on to the course'.

The hightlight was the arrival of TEAM CANADA for an official photo shoot.

Hope you enjoy these photos of our brilliant team.

Official Team photo infront of the rings....the front red jackets are the support crew: coaches and wax techs.

Madelaine, Peri, Dasha, and Chandra.

Women's Team Sprinters for tomorrow: Dasha & Sara

Ottawa Valley favourite: Peri

Youngest superstar: Alex Harvey

Pierre Harvey with Mont Ste Anne Training Centre head coach: Louis Bouchard

A very busy stadium

Coaches and wax team

Stefan Kuhn and Drew Goldsack

3 Canadians in the top 10 !

2010-02-20T21:49:00.000-08:00

Congratulation Canada !

Canada was a power house in the Men's 30km Pursuit today. These results say it best....

Men's 30 km Pursuit (15 Classic+15 Free)

Rank	Bib	Country	Name	15.0 km Classic		Pitstop	15.0 km Free		Finish Time	Time Behind
Rank	Bib	Country	Name	Intermediate	Rank	Time	Intermediate	Rank	Finish Time	Time Behind
	1 000	2	Sweden	HELLNER Marcus	15.0 km	2		Finish	1	1:15:11.4	0.0
	2 001	17	Germany	ANGERER Tobias	15.0 km	6		Finish	2	1:15:13.5	+2.1
	3 002	16	Sweden	OLSSON Johan	15.0 km	5		Finish	3	1:15:14.2	+2.8
	4 003	8	Russian Federation	LEGKOV Alexander	15.0 km	4		Finish	4	1:15:15.4	+4.0
	5 004	15	Canada	BABIKOV Ivan	15.0 km	1		Finish	5	1:15:20.5	+9.1
	6 005	13	Germany	FILBRICH Jens	15.0 km	6		Finish	6	1:15:25.0	+13.6
	7 006	3	Czech Republic	BAUER Lukas	15.0 km	7		Finish	7	1:15:25.2	+13.8
	8 007	41	Canada	GREY George	15.0 km	8		Finish	8	1:15:32.0	+20.6
	9 008	24	Canada	HARVEY Alex	15.0 km	10		Finish	9	1:15:43.0	+31.6
	10 009	34	Sweden	SOEDERGREN Anders	15.0 km	18		Finish	10	1:15:47.0	+35.6

some great articles here to read for details on the race:
1- http://vancouver2010.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/20/team-effort-produces-two-medals-for-sweden/ 2- http://skitrax.com/8057 3- http://www.vancouversun.com/sports/2010wintergames/news/Olympic+cross+country+skiing+pursuit/2592002/story.html 4- http://www.ctvolympics.ca/cross-country-skiing/news/newsid=47724.html?cid=EWNL_20100221

A day off for me today. With stunning spring-like conditions I was able to escape into the Backcountry with my 'randonne' skiis....over Blackcomb Glacier and into Garibaldi Provincial park...before coming back to civilization at Seventh Heaven. A few shots of our journey... as well as the pristine tracks from the three of us: Mick Peatfield (our landlord), Mark Wittenburg(Whistler Chocolate entrepreneur) and me. I don't think the smile ever left my face today :)

Women's 15km Pursuit

2010-02-19T19:13:00.000-08:00

Another glorious day in Whistler ! Sunscreen is mandatory now. Even an early marshal Yoga session....

When the Jury skied by this morning before the course opened for the official practice at 9am... I was able to ask one of the Jury members if the courses met the approval of the previous days scrutiny: "absolutely perfect, " Thomas (SWE) declared. I almost melted with relief and pride. Quickly passed the praise on to Simon Smith who as head of the overnight shift was just putting the tools away.

Not many women warming up on the race trails during the morning time slot. Instead we saw more men, half CC and half NC skiers as the crowds started to arrive with their valued spectator passes. I gather that the women chose to warm-up on the 'recreational trails' - Top of the World, or Madelly Creek and Norwegian Woods. These trails are now closed to the public, but are some of the most stunningly beautiful trails - with views of the mountains, cathedral fir trees and cascading rocky creeks. Coming from the east, what I find most amazing is the depth of snow...the walls the groomers leave are 4-6 feet of solid snow high...even this year, the year of no new snow in 2 months.

Met quite a number of ski friends in the spectator crowd, James Young (Ottawa), Claire Rennie and her beau (Ottawa/Boseman), Maureen Bretz and son Matt (Toronto), Wendy Hanssen and family (Sault Ste Marie/Vancouver). Quite well organized, the access includes bus transport from Vancouver return. They all seemed totally stoked to be on site !

At one o'clock the gun fired and the pre-calculated-chevron-shaped-FIS-points-based Mass Start swarmed off the start grid. Sara Renner's FIS points did not let her enjoy the privilege of being in the Red Group - the top 22 seeded racers, but managed to get herself into the lead pack by the time Dirk and I saw her (.6 kms into the race). How this is possible on a straight up hill grind, with only four groomed classic tracks - I wasn't privy to see. Dasha who started not far behind Sara was in the middle of the field, followed by tip-2-tail sky striders Madelaine and Peri.

Two laps of the red classic, and then into transition zone - skate blue course. Each lap was 3.75kms.

The lead pack included Marit Bjoergen, Justyna Kowalczyk, Kristin Steira, Anna Haag, Aurore Cuinet, Olga Rotcheva, Marianna Longa, Arianna Follis, Theresa Johaug, Christine Kalle, Sara Renner, Evi Sachenbacher, and Olga Savialova.

Sara known more for her classic strength sure didn't let up after the exchange to skate. And coming into the final climb in a pack of three....it was exhilarating to see her win with in her group. A photo finish with Evi Sachenbacher...Sara secured the crucially important Sports Canada top 10 !

Here chatting with best friend, Gold medallist and well-advanced in pregnancy Becky Scott - our countries xc heroine, teamate Perianne Jones, coachs Dave Woods and Eric De Nies.

Back in Whistler, the streets are packed. Music is playing on every street corner, improv-skits and interactive crowd pleasers help make this a fun place to be. This photo shows you a bit of the it...with the backside of Maria Reisch (downhill combined Gold) as she walks out of the Roots store where I had to purchase a new watch.

Raking

2010-02-19T00:47:00.001-08:00

Biathalon and pursuit practise at XC

2010-02-18T21:55:00.000-08:00

Glorious day in the mountains !

An official practice day for Cross Country pursuit on the 3.75km red and blue.
Ski Jumping was closed.
Biathlon had the Woman's 15km individual start race, and Men's 20km.

In the marshal crew we were paired on key entrance positions. Our role is to protect the Field of Play (FOP) for the athletes. Not a bad role, when the sun is beaming down, sunscreen a must, and the mountains our background - I sure don't mind my volunteer job. My marshal partner and I decided to share our spot - allowing each of us time to head over to Biathlon to watch the races. I watched the Woman's in the morning - my first ever biathlon competition.

Luckily sitting next to an IOC press attache from Grenoble...who loved sharing her knowledge for the sport I was actually able to somewhat keep pace as to what was going on. The women skied 5 laps of a 3km race course, shooting first twice in the lying-down position, then twice in the standing-up position - each time they crossed through the stadium.
The leaders were constantly changing, even right to the very last group of skiers. The Germans were strong through the beginning, but landed outside the medals. Canada's Zina Kocher had many hopes resting on her shoulders. The pressure to perform with the Olympics in your own country is beyond belief... something one has to be prepared for as we've heard from background stories of Gold medalist Alexandre Bilodeau. By chance I met Kocher's mother post competition. I heard such a familiar story...on questioning what went wrong..perhaps her rifle mal-functioned - she normally shoots consistently - this is her strength.
Here Zina receives a hug from her partner in the athletes compound.
I was able to meet all four sets of parents of Canadian Female Bi athletes: parents of Megan Tandy, Rosanna Crawford (Chandra's sister) and Megan Imrie in addition to Zina Kochers mom and dad.
Just in case you were wondering...every missed target is a 1 minute penalty added to the running time. No penalty laps were skied on this race. In the end, the winner had only one missed target, and still beat bi athletes that had O misses - meaning skiing is a very important part of the race. The winner was:


1. Norway,	Tora Berger	40:52.8
2. Kazekastan,	Elena Khrustaleva	41:13.5
3. Belarus,	Darya Domracheva	41:21.0

In my real job as marshal ...I was positioned at the bottom of Downhillers Dream (formerly know as the Toilet Bowl) for some fast descents today. Just for Chris Paella back in Ottawa, who asked if I could video tape this downhill - I tried. Here's a Russian descent (with wax tech).

The Jury must have had too much time on their hands today as they skied by me a couple of times...one even for a photo op: Dirk, Gregory(Russia), Uros, Thomas(Sweden), Jonas. These were important rounds that produced six pages of notes for Dirk and his grooming team.

Then time for a personal ski on the southern trails, called TOP of the WORLD. Stunning view of Black Tusk mountain. Even at 2pm, the tracks were still hard and fast. So fast that a 'rebel' ski of mine took me out for a good abrasive beating on 'round the mountain' trail.

We closed the race courses an hour early today, as temperatures started to fall in the mountains as soon as the sun no longer hit the snow. 4pm the groomers were out in full force.
Dirk was very pleased when he came home tonight. Grooming went as planned - consistent corduroy, less 'berms', good tracks that seem to hold up with the mtn sun. Tomorrow's race will begin at 13:00 for the Women's Pursuit.

Sprints

2010-02-17T21:19:00.000-08:00

The predicted weather actually came through. We woke to clear skies, and solid tracks. Time to 'charge it' on the two downhill corners with total confidence or deal with the consequences....like Slovenian skier Petra Madjic on one of her warm-up laps. She fell off the turn and went right over the edge...luckily between two trees and into a deep tree well. Not only shaken, I believe she suffered an injury and was transported off the snow by the first aid crew. Straight back to post the 19th fastest qualification time, the determination to overcome her fall brought her the bronze medal. Other than the Canadians, Petra was the crowd favourite, which must have provided additional support for this heroic exploit.

Met the forerunner crew at 8am in the athlete's Day Lodge - check out their pre-event nutrition choices...

Each morning the marshals meet for our daily outline. Our chief of marshal's, Susan Denny who's ski world normally centre's itself on Vancouver Island's Mt Washington is a great leader and fun to work for.

The Sprint course couldn't have been better. It set up very well - solid tracks - most likely a klister base overwaxed - but then, I'm not privy to this info...and it seems to held closely locked away in the multitude of wax trailers. At this level of competition, teams not only have a wax tech team, but two completely seperate teams - one for glide wax and the other for grip wax. It's been rumoured that the Norwegians have a team of 22 wax service support crew for XC alone.

The qualification round seemed to go by extremely quickly. First the women, then the men. Canadians who qualified for the Heats were a bit different than expected. In the women, Sara Renner caught a chinese skier right before the finish corner that definitely caused her some trouble. Both her and Peri had strong splits where I was marshaling - top of the first climb. Peri mentioned afterwards, that she didn't feel her double poling through the stadium was as it should have been. It was great to have Canadians in the Heats - congrats on strong qualifyiers for Dasha and Chandra as well as Stefan Kuhn and Devon Kershaw in the men's race.

Norwegian Marit Bjoergen dominated the heats, skiing far out front on the Quarter final and the Semi, but it was a battle with Polish Justyna Kowalczyk who led for 2/3rds of the Final, she made her move on Canada's corner to a convincing finish. Having met Marit in Silverstar at the World Cup 4 years back, I was pleased to see this powerful, yet unbelievably warm, friendly and humble skier back on top of her sport.

In the men's Stefan Kuhn almost landed the 'lucky loser' position for the Semi's. In World Cups and Olympics, the heats are timed - so the LL is chosen based on their heat times (not the Qualification as we do at the provincial and national level). Norway had three men in the Finals and were dreaming of a potential medal sweep - but the two Russian's wouldn't hear of it. A close photo finish with Nikita Kriukov taking the Gold.

From the organizing side - this day was a good one. So good, we all got off work a wee bit early - in time to see the Barenaked Ladies perform live in Whistler Village.

Sprint Prep

2010-02-16T23:19:00.000-08:00

Beautiful snow in town this morning.

Took the bus at 7am up to WOP on my rest day, to see if I could bring Dirk back into town...was to be his rest day too. Scheduled back in August, when it was known that there was no event in the Cross Country stadium today. What was not known were the snow conditions. The snow that fell turned to instant slush, with temperature again at zero. 8-10cms did descend from the sky, which will make tomorrow's ski conditions amazing i am told. Why ? Cause it's already -3 degrees and tilling new snow into the old wet stuff as the temperature starts to drop will dissipate the moisture out of the snow making for better bonding conditions. Our evening crew is completing this task as I write today's blog.

Dirk's day off consisted of a 3 hour mid afternoon nap. He then headed right back up to Callaghan Valley to meet with the Jury, the course crew, and work with his groomers on the trails. They were all quite excited about the 'perfect' night coming up. Should be fast, firm tracks for Qualifications that start at 10:15. It will most likely get soft for the Heats that start at 12:30 as the temperatures are going up to 5 degrees, and sunny.

The Sprint course is in the sun. 1.4km for the Women, 1.6km for the Men. Both courses have been lengthened and the first up hill made steeper since the World Cup here in January 2009. This was done on purpose to avoid classic sprinters tending to use skate skis (no grip wax) and double pole the full distance.

Canada has some strong entries for tomorrow's sprints, especially in the Women's our traditional medal category. Sara Renner chose not to compete yesterday to conserve her strengths for classic sprints - her new specialty. Perianne Jones is our hometown favourite of course. She's looking strong and happy the few times I've seen her.

After a morning of running around I was able to fit in a fantastic triathlon to the end of my day:

Parked at the new Spa Skandinave that opened last weekend which is right on the Lost Lake ski trails, then changed into a bathing suit to enjoy the outdoor Spa experience with mountain views.

Met up with friends in the Village for the medal ceremonies and a live concert by Feist, had a beer at Black's overlooking the hill and watched the Fire and Light show of incredible Whistler talent jumping through flaming hoops just up from the Whistler Gondola.

Whew, need to recover now:)

M's 15km Individual start (2x 7.5km) Free

2010-02-15T19:54:00.001-08:00

Go Canada Go !

Four strong Canadians started - all finished well - infact 3 in the top 30, and Ivan Babicov landed a top 10 finish, with 8th place. Total competitors 98, with 56 Nations competing...xc skiing is the largest number of nations at the XXI Olympic Games.

Enjoy a few different photos from Trackside:

course challenges beyond the naked eye

2010-02-15T16:47:00.000-08:00

Three stories today...
1- Women's 10km individual race
2- Men's 15km individual start race
3- The Course conditions.

I'm going to start with the third, as I am privy to some insider knowledge.

I hope you are as incredibly impressed with modern grooming, ski & snow techniques and technology as I am after hearing what I've learned.

First it is important to set the stage. You've all heard that this has been the 100-year record for the warmest winter in BC. Even though the Callaghan Valley does not lack snow, it is quite interesting the how and why of its existence. For the 2009/10 winter, the temperature has never dipped below zero Celsius at any time during this winters snow fall. How is this possible I asked with naive surprise...Jody Johnson, who works fultime here at WOP and on the Haig glacier in the summer time grooming for the National and Provincial Teams, shared what a climatologist had explained to their grooming team earlier this winter : that the pressure here is strong enough to change the falling rain into snow at these 0 to +2 degree temperatures. They call it 'heavy' or 'hard' snow.

Second, the ground has never frozen up. Thus the ground is wet and warm, with the + degree air temperatures makes a mushy SNOW sandwich. This is a large sandwich, as there are 3-4ms of compacted snow here at WOP. Unique to this winter, and never before have these conditions occurred in Canada, even-though they are quite used to 'wet' snow here in the Whistler corridor.

Third, the Callaghan Valley has not received any significant amount of new snow since December. This makes for deteriorating snow when groomed daily. The molecular structure begins to break down and turn into what we call 'sugar'. Unless new natural snow mixes in to this 'old' snow, it is almost impossible to have it firm up. Salting helps in the short run, but increases the breakdown of snow molecules over time.

Last nights grooming started early around 5pm, as the temperature dropped. Bente Skari herself went out on the back of Dirk's snowmobile after the Jury meeting to observe how the classic track was put in. Was I jealous - you bet ! but not that Dirk was out on a date with a 'hot' xc ski woman...instead, that it wasn't me, that got to work along side a Cross Country skiing legend - a perfectionist in classic technique, someone to learn so much from. Classic tracks were laid down on the downhill portions of the Free technique race course.

These are the conditions our grooming team has to deal with. They are a vast group of very knowledgeable men (one women) that have over 200 years of collective knowledge from coast to coast. I would like to share with you that George Lefebvre, Canada's most famous groomer who has groomed at every Olympic Games starting in Calgary is also here...but, working with me as a course marshal with his wife Irene.

The temperatures dropped to -2/-3 degrees for most of the night, thus allowing the snow to firm up. The crew is very careful not to over til, or til too deeply - cause we all know we need it for a full two weeks.

With yesterdays torrential rain, the snow would become rock hard if not carefully orchestrated when to groom and how much. In the end, the grooming team was pleased their expectations came true...they knew that the 5km and 7.5km race courses needed to hold up for over 350 racers (2 laps ) even before adding in the number of warm-up laps. For this reason the warm-up time slot on the race courses was shortened, and restricted to the upper red course and outside passes on both the up, and final down into the stadium. Preserving the 'salted' inside corners for race time.

The final verdict for today - that the courses held up extremely well. Only the corners broke down which is to be expected, yet hard to improve upon. Yet, the plan for tomorrow has already been molded...a constant steep learning curve.
Some snow is predicted for tonight/tomorrow - a total of 4-8cms. Yahoo ! Let's hope it drops below zero...wouldn't that be a golden moment !

W's 10km individual start (2 x 5km) Free

2010-02-15T16:27:00.000-08:00

Warm up loop opened at 8am. You can see this cool set-up, that has ups, downs, flats and all infront of the athlete 'Day Lodge' - a stunning BC Log structure, with hand carved totem pole support posts, an abundance of window - with a view- even cast iron chairs with Inukshuks cut of their backs.
The snow as mentioned in my course conditions piece is fragile, thus warm-up on the race courses was shortened to only 45 minutes before race start. At 10am...the first woman shot out of the stadium to cheering spectators waving a multitude of flags, banners and strong voices.

Canada's sole entry was Madelaine Williams, of Edmonton AB. Seen here on TV walking to her start in the large Olympic stadium.

Individual starts sure bring out the inner drive of ski racers. Yes, you get splits along the race course, to let you know how the others are fairing...but really its a race all for yourself. Certain skiers excel at individual starts, others rise to a different level in a mass start.

Which do you prefer ???
Hey, let me know you're reading my blog with a comment ! It's appreciated :)

The winners....Sweden, Estonia, and Norway sure set an amazing pace.

First competition for Cross Country...

2010-02-14T21:05:00.000-08:00

It's amazing how nervous we all were this morning arriving at WOP - it was the day to test the venue, five years of planning, training of staff and volunteers, test the race course, the grooming, the communication, the broadcasting, the timing systems, the spectator friendliness and flow as well as show off this incredible competition site.

The weather was horrible. It basically rained all night and through the early hours of the morning. They groomed with the snowmobile pulling ginzu groomers, which of course took twice as long as a large Pisten Bully. This was to disturb the snow as little as possible. Then early, still before dawn, the final tour with the "race base" on the 2.5 km blue race course. All seemed well, until the CC skiers arrived for their 8am official training were not pleased to hear their upper red course had not been 'salted'. This complaint then trickled down from the Jury, comprised of three TD's and Bente Skari, athletes rep. to Len Apedaile - chief of venue, to chief of course, Mike Edwards, to Dirk - chief of grooming and out to his crew in waiting...MAD rush to get the ski-doo's with spreaders up on the red course , let the Urea absorb the moisture and firm up...which takes 15-20 minutes - so cross country skiers could go out and train. This took no more than 45 minutes, and by 8:45am the upper race course was open to athletes.

Meanwhile at the ski jump, the warm-up jumps were starting at 9am. Then at 10am the official first portion of their 'duathalon' - jumping on the Normal jump.

At about 11am, the biathaletes were warming up on the north end of cross country and it started to rain - hard. A bit of wet snow, but mainly rain. Nordic Combined athletes were supposed to be able to warm-up on the blue 2.5km loop. A delay was requested to rake out two steep downhills and re-spread 'race base'. Now manually done, this takes a wee bit longer, thus another 45minute delay. By 11:45am, the NC skiers zoomed around their course. It was raining hard - not great at biathalon for spectators, or their racers, that need sharp vision to focus in on their targets. From the loud cheers we heard, it did not seem to 'dampen' any spirits....

At 1:45pm the leader from the jumping segment a FIN starts his race. 34 secs later Todd Ludwick from USA heads out, and soon after numerous other NC'rs in order of how well they jumped form a pack. Four laps of the 2.5km blue course, and race order changes quickly as stronger skiers work their way up the ladder. In the final lap, there are three US skiers in the lead pack. "a new coach, three years ago" has helped make the US a strong force to reckon with internationally. The French skier, Jason Lamy Chappuis passes Johnny Spillane, USA in the stadium for the Gold. Good fun to watch.

I cannot complete this day with out saying:

Yeah Alexandre Bilodeau !!!

You've broken the ice, parted the snow and glistened the path for all Canadian athletes here at the Vancouver2010 Games...Merci !

Wet conditions

2010-02-13T18:39:00.000-08:00

The higher altitude of Callaghan Valley isn't high enough for snow - at 850 metres ( Whistler Village sits at 650m, Vancouver at 117m, Cypress mountain's Freestyle venue at 906m) the third highest precipitation location in Canada is seeing an abundance of rain.

This makes for slushy snow. Last night the grooming team tested 'race base' - basically a form of salt, trade name Urea, that gets sprinkled on the surface of the snow after it has been groomed. Within half an hour the snow firms up. The test was successful, and the plan tonight is to 'salt' the full Blue 2.5km race loop as well as the warm-up loop. This will be done by snow mobile, last night driven by Dirk which pulled a roller to cover the sled tracks. A second hand (in this case Dave Woodfine of Kawartha Nordic - and former MKC head instructor) operating the salt spreader.
Tomorrow is the first competition for WOP's cross country venue, with Nordic Combined event. Competitors begin with one ski jump on the normal hill, followed by a 10-kilometre cross-country ski race which consists of four, 2.5 kilometre laps of the freestyle blue trail. The first skier across the finish line is the winner.

A sport dominated by Europeans, Bill Demong of the USA is a solid performer. Jason Myslicki is Canada's only entry.

Proud to be Canadian

2010-02-13T10:44:00.000-08:00

Hope you watched the Opening Ceremonies last night and felt proud to be Canadian ! No one says it better than Shane Koyczan in his poetry slam..."We are More" - here on u-tube: http://www.youtube.co/watch?v=zsq68qRexFc - he shares his words with us.
The vibes in Vancouver are crazy...everyone is wearing something red or white with Canada on it, flags flying off cars, balconies and tatoo'd on cheeks. Katrina skyped us from Australia saying she was about to join her fellow slalomites to huddle over a laptop to catch the feed in their Team compound outside Penrith at the Sydney Olympic whitewater course.

Back in Whistler, Dirk and I walked into the Village, met up with Doug Edgerton, the owner of Yellowstone Tracksetting Systems who's been a great resource - he was chief of grooming in the Salt Lake Olympics - for a beer and a plate of raclette on the patio of Swiss Haus off one of the squares. The TV feed came to us in German. Just after the Canadian athletes entered BC Place in down town Vancouver, a gaggle of 65 athletes that chose to stay in Whistler came parading right by us escorted by well-clad Royal Canadian Mounted police.

A very emotional moment.

Opening Ceremonies

2010-02-11T15:43:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow, please take the moment to watch the Opening Ceremonies for the XXI Winter Olympic Games.
That we "Volunteers" were given the opportunity to view the official rehearsal last night was an incredible experience. Everyone I've spoken to since was overwhelmed with how Canadian the show was, and how amazing our country is. The diversity in cultures, land and seasons are so well celebrated with beauty and technological ability - but the best part in my mind was the absence of Hollywood glitz. Instead real ingenuity, talent and Canadian un-presumptuousness. The acoustics in BC Place are outstanding...which only added to the aura of musical talent across the country. And for stadium ticket holders, they become part of the show...receiving a box of 'goodies' that help make it an interactive experience beyond expectations. At times my tears of pride were trickling down my face...a small suggestion is to have a hankie close-by !

It's snowing !

2010-02-10T16:14:00.000-08:00

"Best night so far", Dirk announced as he arrived back at 4am from grooming. They switched to an earlier start to catch the snow in transition - as it was starting to freeze. The crew is increasing in size with Michel from Quebec City and Jeremy from Montana having just arrived.

"Perfect conditions," is the words I overheard the German skiers mention to their head coach, Cuno as they were circulating back on the red classic course at the north end of the stadium.

I was able to pass this information on to Dirk only by telephone, as we are now on opposite schedules. I left at 5am this morning for my marshal post. And am now in Vancouver, about to go to the Opening Ceremonies Rehearsal - a benefit for all Games Volunteers. The excitement that snowflakes were cascading down from the sky will help the conditions even more. There are 5cms predicted today, and 10cms tomorrow. Fantastic for Whistler...but, Vancouver is still receiving rain.

Met up with the Olympic xc forerunners - and gave Michelle Workin-Hill a big hug as she arrived at WOP with her fellow forerunners, chosen from across the country. Michelle and crew raced an interval time trial with two laps of the skate blue course today. This was the first of three test days for the timing system, host broadcast cameras and stadium announcing. At first I was a wee bit confused...as the announcers were announcing the top men's names, and these came up on the stadium pixel board. I soon figured out that each forerunner was a replacement skier for a true Olympic athlete making for a very realistic rehearsal.

February 9th

2010-02-09T21:00:00.000-08:00

Fantastic Day at WOP....weather is just brilliant. Tracks are fast, hard and dependable. Teams are arriving and thrilled to be skiing here. Broadcasters are getting personal stories. Volunteers are finding their niche. Course teams are fine tuning. Whistler Cooks are providing delicious meals, with the soups being four **** and changing daily. Transportation is improving, still a bit of a puzzle needing to be solved. And the awards podium was 'tried-out' today.

I spent the morning in the race office photocopying course marshal schedules, and race maps - so we're ready for our full gang that arrives on Friday. Thursday(11th) and Saturday(13th) are Venue training and Job Specific training days.

Then out on course, where we really do have the BEST job. Welcoming athletes, coaches and service/techie types to Canada, Whistler and the Olympics ! Sometimes I just step back and smile...to take in the moment, that this is the Olympic Games in Canada. We can be so proud, as from my stand point, we're doing an amazing job.

Back to serious stuff. Russians held a serious time trial...looked like a te am sprint, but the men tagged off the women in the stadium. They pushed as if it were a race today. Even had to clean up "excess" in the finish line. The Norwegians arrived ! Petter Northug of Norway was working on power. He had his own TV crew following every step. And I learned that top athletes have their own wax tech/coach. 1 on 1.
XC Analyst, Jack Sasseville was here with CTV, but more interested in Jason Myslicki our sole Nordic Combined athlete who came out of retirement with World Cup points gained in Seefeld, Austria earlier this month to compete at the Games. “Today, I managed a jump that at least put me in a fighting position for World Cup points. I played a very strategic race and was successful. Today wasn’t a day of non stop hammering, but really a lot of strategy in the pack skiing. I’m excited to get to Whistler to jump a hill on which I am more comfortable.”

My favourite moment of today was meeting Zina Kocher of Red Deer, AB....most accomplished bi-athlete since Myriam Bydard. She was training on the cross country trails...as were most bi-athletes. Not sure why...but here's some trivia. Vancouver2010 is the first time that all three Nordic events are held on the same Venue....WOP. Pretty cool.

enjoy the photos.

Security Sweep of Whistler

2010-02-08T21:37:00.000-08:00

Today WOP was scoured by over 150 police officers, some with dogs. They were mainly looking for bombs. As of tonight, security will step up, and accreditation mandatory for entering most areas. Parking has become a privilege, not only up at WOP, but in town. A bit of a nightmare, as the regular skier parking lots have now been taken over by Whistler Transportation. There is no more parking in the Village. A big tricky if you do not live in the Village. The busing system is still being worked out...most drivers are not from here, so they are totally lost, and end up needing directions from their passengers. This is definitely an Olympics for people that love walking.

Dirk and I both had the day off. We knew this well in advance and had booked ourselves into the remote and decadent Callaghan Back-country Lodge, 12 kms above the race venues. Yesterday we skate skied up the 400m climb. I had forgotten that the climb was continuous, sometimes so steep we had to diagonal skate up...there were no flat sections what so ever. Once up on top, it is so worth the ski, that we quickly forgot how much work it was. We were greeted by an Aussie couple that resides at the Lodge, cooks gourmet meals and offers you tons of great ideas, or a cup of tea if you just want to relax by the roaring fire. As sleep has become a luxury, both Dirk and I went for an afternoon nap before dinner. A full nights sleep felt so special. We were up before the sun, and skied the 5km lake loop with head lights before breakfast. Then an exploratory snow shoe through the copious amounts of white fluff taking loads of photos, as each turn was more breathtaking than the last. Another mini-nap, a delicious hot soup for lunch and we were off on our skiis.
First a loop to the base of the Solitude glacier, and then down the screaming excitement of Wild Spirit Trail - imagine Penguin hill down for 10 kms ! I believe our smiles are permanently etched into our faces.

Temperatures are dropping again to - 3 degrees tonight, so the grooming crew left at 9pm to catch it in the transition. Hope to see Dirk in the early hours, before I head out for my marshal job. Whistler is starting to fill up...athletes from across the globe in their country uniforms are everywhere, and loads of 'smurf-coloured' Vancouver2010 volunteers, as well as the ubiquitous media. We met up with Sarah Recoskie (Barry's Bay friend, and head of the Kids 'instruction' program on the mountain) at the Mongolia Grill, Pierre Harvey was sitting in the booth next to us with his RDS (french TSN) crew, and Jim McCarthy strolled in having just arrived from Ottawa for his big role as assistant XC chief of competition. Small world within this big one !

CONGRATS Sara Renner !

2010-02-06T21:15:00.000-08:00

A bronze medal for Sara Renner in todays classic Sprints ! The World Cup competition in Canmore, AB is the final race before the Olympic Games -what more can we ask for - a Canadian on the podium !

Here in WOP, preparations progressed well today. The weather was excellent: -5 degrees overnight set-up the race course, and spectator walk-ways really well. Music was playing in the stadium as more athletes tested out the race trails. The conditions were fast, and sharp downhill corners, such as 'Downhiller's Dream' on the blue course gave some a shock. I was marshalling at the bottom, and often heard yelp's of surprise as skiers came screaming around the final turn often on one ski. This will be a short entry, as I too had little sleep last night, joining Dirk, Jody and Brett on the mid-night shift in the groomers. And then a full day on course as a marshal. This would probably be my only chance to experience the race courses, and get to sit next to my hubby while on the job...before security won't allow this kind of frivolty. I sat in the passenger seat of the PB 100 which is ideal for the smaller spectator walk-ways that connect to the more remote but exciting areas of the race trails. The majority of time was spent in the fancy high-tech PB 400 where Dirk and Brett circled behind each other - 3times each around the red and blue trails to perfect those tracks. It gave me quite a different point of view.

Torch came through Cross Country today

2010-02-05T18:08:00.000-08:00

Our first day using the Bus system was a bit sketchy. I'm pleased I bought a head light to find my way walking the km down Lorimer Av from our home stay to Whistler Village at 6am. A bit tricky to find Lot 5, the only depot to catch the bus to WOP. I didn't realize the buses only leave once per hour, and missed mine by 5 minutes. I was to be a marshal supervisor today, not a good idea to arrive late. After begging a night shift snow removal lad who was on his way home (but in the other direction), I hitched a ride up to Callaghan. Made it in time to sign in, receive my lunch ticket, and head to our marshal trailer for our "Just-in-time" training ! Pfew, that was close. Tomorrow, I'm getting up earlier, to not make this a trend. Still on Ottawa time, so OK for this.

Dirk was up and at it, about 2 hours after I went to bed. His crew is doing a great job and were stoked to finally see athletes skiing on the race trails. Not many teams are here, most are in Canmore at the World Cup. And I believe the Norwegians are training and living in Silverstar, by Vernon, BC. The Swedes maybe too ???

Around 2pm, the torch passed through the Cross country stadium, carried by rowing Gold medalist, Don Arnold now in his '80's. A few photo ops were had - here are two shots - the first being co-chief of competition Rob Berhardt with chief of venue, Len Apedaile. And the second is chief of stadium Mark B, chief of course Mike Edwards, groomer Simon (formerly of Hardwood Hills) and Dirk.

As the torch was run down the Callaghan road by quite a few local sensations, one being Mountain Biker Leslie Tomlinson ...we were stuck driving behind in a very slow train that took us 2 hours to make it home. But the excitement of seeing so many Canadians dressed in red and white waving our flag was amazing. Later tonight the torch is going up the mountain with the late crazy Canuck Dave Murray's daughter, Julia who will be competing in her first Olympics at the age of 21. Then a slew of surprise skiers will bring it down to light the cauldron in the Village Square. The realization that the Olympics are here...in Canada is now quite alive !

WOP opens tomorrow !

2010-02-04T19:07:00.000-08:00

Athletes arrive tomorrow at Whistler Olympic Park...the first access to the race trails since last year. Only groomers have been making the rounds of both the red classic, and blue skate loops since October '09 - packing all the early snow, and tilling the wet additions since. Good news is that temperatures are dropping to -3 tonight. Dirk is already in bed (5pm) as his alarm is set for a mid-night awakening. The to-do list is long for the shift of four groomers tomorrow morning: recreational trails up to the Callaghan Backcountry, the race loops and the stadium need special attention... the Torch is coming through at 13:00. How and by whom is still a mystery...but, not to worry, we'll be there with our camera's.

I was able to get an early ski in this morning in downtown Whistler - the Lost Lake trails are part of the non-vehicle commuter system during the Olympics. This was a treat, as I was the first skier out this morning and enjoyed virgin tracks. At one time I was pleased to see another skier had joined me, when I realized I may be lost as I was only skiing backwards over my own tracks - yikes....loads of options out there !

I then headed up to Callaghan to help get the Course Marshal trailer set up for tomorrow's first marshal briefing and course controls. We're a small crew at the onset: 6 of us during these early days before the competitions begin. We're all very excited to be wearing our new uniforms - love the turquoise colour - that must be worn at all times during our shifts.

We're in Whistler !

2010-02-03T20:37:00.000-08:00

Day 1 - Dirk and I drove up to WOP (Whistler Olympic Park) together on Feb. 02nd for our venue tour. It's a 10 km drive up the Callaghan Valley from Hwy 99, or better known as the Sea to Sky Hwy. Mike Edwards, Dirk's boss was very pleased to show him the Olympic layout and pass the course prep duties on to ensure it'll be ready for Friday. Friday is when WOP opens for athletes to arrive for training. This will be the first time this year that anyone will be allowed to ski on the Olympic race trails.

The recreational trails up Madelay Valley have been open to the public all winter, but now closed until after the Olympics.

Day 2 - Dirk's up at 3:30am to start grooming at 5am. The first day in a month that the temperature has dropped below -2. Much rain and zero degrees has stimulated a bit of panic around here... to firm up the race trails. Alpine has the same problem as Cross country. And on Cypress mountain where the freestyle and snowboard events are being held...snow is being helicoptered in, to replenish the rained out natural snow. Today was successful in the cross country stadium, as the finish line was perfectly leveled and it set-up well before the sun began to rise.

I snuck in an alpine day today, as my own work as a course marshal only begins on Friday. The mountain is quite empty - locals are busy preping for the Games, and inbound tourists that are not interested in the Olympics choose other ski destinations to avoid the 'hupla'. This is a normal phenomena around Olympics, I am told. I never-the-less had a blast. The sun came out, visibility was superb, temperature perfect and snow very friendly. Legs are tired, but a cold Whistler Pale Ale at the Longhorn helped remedy this problem.

Some cross country teams have already arrived and are training here in the village at the Lost Lake ski trails. I plan to give these a try tomorrow morning.

EASTERNS2010 - what an amazing weekend !

2010-02-01T09:00:00.000-08:00

A Quick wrap up to share the excitement out on the snow at Nakkertok this past weekend...635 athletes raced in frigid conditions - so cold, that Saturday's Skate race start time was delayed by two hours to let the air warm up....the manually moved-by-100's-of-volunteers snow helped the groomers produce perfect conditions making for fast conditions. The downhills were slick - so much so that snow plowing on the in-run to Dirk's Dive was not an option...tuck and giv'r was the best approach. The stadium looked stellar with sponsor banners lining the fencing, banners flying in the wind, the PA system pumping out fantastic music, and letting the hundreds of spectators know who was up next or coming down the finish lane.
We also introduced an eco-friendly approach to food and fluids at these Easterns, congruent with the Olympic Green Theme. From the response of over 300 athletes bringing their own bowls, cups and spoons to the Food Tent for their lunch - it was deemed a hit. My favourite were the colourful IKEA cups that were washed and rinsed on the spot for the Finish fluid feeds. And minimal packaging was all recyclable. Yeah !
The amazing part of running a race of this magnitude is the need for volunteers. And this is an area that Nakkertok seems to do well in...not only did we receive compliments on how well the race ran, but my favourite is " that everyone is so happy and friendly". A huge thank you to all volunteers that contributed this weekend, and this is not Nakkertok members alone, we had skiers from across the Ottawa/Gatineau snow-base come out to help make the weekend a big success - thank you !

Here's a great video clip from Dave McMahon from Sunday's Classic Mass starts :http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7HOPp50rdKg
And you can view race results on Zone4 - for Saturday: http://www.zone4.ca/results.asp?id=2747 and Sunday: http://www.zone4.ca/results.asp?id=2746

Eastern Canadians....this weekend at Nakkertok

2010-01-28T09:24:00.000-08:00

We beat the rain !

Monday's rain gave us quite the challenge in Ottawa, but volunteers at Nakkertok, our ski club came out in droves to shovel snow back on to the race trails. "It's like 15cms fell", described Dirk Van Wijk, chief of course at the 2010 Eastern Canadian Championships. " 15 cms of snow was shovelled on Saturday in anticipation of the rain. Then today, two crews of volunteers shovelled again: on to the areas that the rain took out, and stock piled two huge areas that I'll be able to distribute tomorrow into key areas with the Piston Bully". Rob Lafleur has also committed another PB 200 to make sure we're set for Friday's training day. 635 athletes from across the country have signed up on Zone 4 for the weekends races. Athletes representing Eastern Canada, travel the distance once a year for this "largest xc ski race in Canada". This year in addition to Eastern athletes, skiers from the Yukon, Alberta and BC will be travelling the distance to race in this Nor Am competition to collect valuable Cross Country Canada (CCC) ranking points.

Spectating is free ! And a day ski pass at Nakkertok Nordic Centre is only $10. Nakkertok boasts excellent conditions despite the twist of weather that has hit the region. Marc Mineault, Nakkertok's chief groomer will be maintaining the 30kms of recreational trails all weekend long, while the competition focuses the big machines on maintaining the 7.5kms of Olympic calibre race trails that criss-cross 5 times through the stadium for maximum spectator viewing per lap. A spectacular snow shoe trail system has been added to Nakkertok this season that starts in the Stadium and heads north up the ridge and over a pristine wilderness that is waiting to be discovered.

Races start with Saturday's Individual Start Skate Competition at 9am. Sunday will host the Classic Mass Start Races, again at 9am.
Come out to cheer on your local favourites, your neighbour's kids or your home province !

We're looking forward to an exciting weekend !

Claudia and Dirk Van Wijk

proud owners of Nakkertok and active volunteers

Dirk and Claudia head west - February 01st

2010-01-12T12:04:00.000-08:00

Olympic Opening Ceremonies fall on Friday, February 12th igniting the flame in downtown Vancouver, BC for the XXI Winter Olympics !

Two days later, XC Ski action begins at the Whistler Olympic Park (WOP). Totally thrilled to be on-site at WOP, Dirk and I will be able to offer you "trackside" updates from the snow at Callaghan Valley.
Dirk has quite an important role, as Chief of Course preparation. His team of 12 groomers will be working around the clock to ensure "perfect" ski conditions for Skate and Classic events.
Claudia is one of 45 course marshals - fancy word for the best 'seats' in the house !
Together we will be bringing you information not necessarily available through regular media. If you have specific questions - we may be able to get answers - so send us your comments too !

Cheers to a superb Games!
GO Canada GO !

Claudia & Dirk Van Wijk