Silly Billies Return to Roam

Mass start of the long distance (I am near the back on the left) The Long Distance Much of the course was on the tiny scooter trails which you can't really skate on so you end up getting a massive arm workout. On Friday we had had a nice rest day, eating lots of Swedish food, waxing skis and hanging out at Hotel Tanndalen. We also went out for a nice cruisey ski on the trails right outside our cabin with our friendly Canadian room mates Nick and Robbie. Myself, Nick, Robbie and Chris in front of our very nice home for the week The weather was still pretty bad with snow and wind as we drove up to the hotel in the morning. We had all sorted out various systems for attaching energy gels onto our ski suits for some extra fuel out on the course. It was a mass start race, so we set off in a big pack of girls all racing hard - I was quickly out the back but there was still a little bunch around me - Japanese, British and Spanish skiers mostly. Crossing the bridge near the end of the lon...

Chris emerges from the bushes in the sprint relay The sprint relay was heaps of fun. Chris and I raced together, each completing 3 loops. It was still a blizzard and this made things extra challenging. We were both happy with our 18th place and it was really cool to be the New Zealand team together. Team NZ happy to finish the sprint relay Today is a rest day, then the long distance is tomorrow - Saturday. Right now we are about to zip home and make dinner, I am starving! So I have kept this post short and sweet - more will follow tomorrow. In response to the comments regarding sexy pants: we will try to get some better photos in the next two days - it is challenging to be competing and taking pictures and so far the race organisers have failed miserably to do the sexy suits justice, it just doesn't seem to be their priority for some reason?

Chris races in through the driving snow in the middle distance today Driving home last night we encountered extreme wind and whirling snow - it was representative of the day to come! In the morning it was still snowing heavily and we put on extra layers under our ski suits so we didn't freeze in the blasting winds. Chris just after he finished Chris says about his race: "Good, it was great fun and I was pleased not to make any big mistakes. The snowy conditions made it very hard to see causing me to crash several times, but it increased the navigational challenges which possibly benefited me. Now I am looking forward to the team sprint with sexy pants tomorrow." Chris ended up in 47th place. I had a bit of a frustrating time in the forest, I find ski orienteering challenging enough without throwing in snow blasting in your face so you can't see and all the tracks disappear. I got quite lost on my way to control 3, I was standing in a field and I couldn't see a thi...

On our way to the opening ceremony Hello! We are now in Tanndalen, Sweden, for the ski orienteering world championships. We arrived on Saturday and settled into a nice cabin that we are sharing with the two men from Canada - Robbie and Nick. We tried out the model map on Monday and found it pretty steep and a bit scary on the downhills. Our Trondheim clubmates from Wing - representing three countries at ski-WOC! On Monday evening all the countries gathered for the opening ceremony in chilly windy conditions. Tuesday morning came and it was time for event 1 - the sprint race. We had to be in a 'quarantine zone' by 10 am, so we couldn't see where competitors ahead of us were going. I started at 10.22 and made my way very carefully around the course - I decided this was the best tactic for me to avoid making any huge mistakes. I got pretty confused coming into the arena, there were distracting people, bridges and extra little map box thingees. Eventually I sorted out my brain...

I am well overdue for a new post - so its finally here! The problem is I have been so busy the last few weeks I haven't spent much time sitting in front of the computer. Most of the reason for this is skiing. Skiing seems to take up a fair bit of my time right now - skiing in various different forms, partly in preparation for our upcoming 'big event' - the world ski orienteering in Sweden in two weeks time. But it hasn't all been serious training (-: We spent the winter holidays in France, in the very over tourist populated but none-the-less beautiful town of Chamonix. On the Wednesday of our trip we got some horrible news - Christchurch (our home town in New Zealand) had been hit by another big earthquake, large parts of the city had fallen down and many people had lost their lives. It was awful to be stuck on the other side of the world not able to help out - and I felt bad about us continuing to have such a great time in France. Fortunately no one we kn...

The last few winter months have been really busy and lots of fun for Chris and I. Knowing this is our last winter here has made us appreciate how cool it is even more, and we have got out exploring Bymarke and surrounding Trondelag as much as we possibly can. I have posted some photos from various weekends and a couple of weekday excursions into the mountains. At the end of January Ally celebrated his birthday in Oppdal with us and we made use of a deal that was running there where you got a hotel for 1kr per night if you had a ticket for the ski area there. So we stayed two nights and had two days skiing with Helen, Ally, Tim, and the Czechs Tomas and Paja. The weather was a bit average, but we got lots of nice powder on the Saturday, even if we couldn't really see anything. On Sunday the weather was a bit clearer, but the wind was unbelievable. We took a tow up to this little 'warm hut' to eat our lunch - no one else was up there and the lift closed straight after we arri...