So the 2015/2016 season has come to a close. What a season. This year as a whole has undoubtably been my strongest, most consistent one yet. Full of accomplishments and big lessons that I know will help me in the years to come.
The racing wrapped up with Nationals a week ago in Whitehorse. Nationals is probably one of my favourite events to compete at. Best part about Nationals is that it's the grand finally to the year, everyone is just throwing down as hard as they can, no one is focusing on races after it, or on a totally different plan for the week, there's no real exterior factors - just racing. I had a decent week of racing for myself, I can confidently say I gave every race 100% and more, and in some, the results came through as well. Kicking off the week strong with a 2nd place finish in the 10km classic gave me a really positive outlook going into the week. I have never had issues pushing beyond my limits in races, but what I have struggled with is pushing hard and holding my technique. In this race I think I made a big step in the right direction, my technique wasn't exactly dainty towards the second half of the race, but it was an improvement. Improving, one race at a time.
The middle two skate race (15km skate interval start & 1.2km sprint) reminded me that although I have a long way with my skating, I still have worlds of work to do. I have improved my skate technique to the point where I am quite confident while skiing at a comfortable pace, but once I being to tire or rush it falls apart rapidly. Despite falling apart at the 4km mark of the 15km, I still managed to grit my way to a 6th place finish, which I was satisfied with. I was less than satisfied with my sprint, getting bumped out in the quarter finals was a bit of a letdown. But at the same time I learned I need to work on holding my speed better through technical sections, improve transferring power, and most importantly that the 2 minutes I spent racing that quarter final was a lot of fun.
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| 15km skate (photo: Jim Hawkings) |
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| 15km Skate (photo: Jim Hawkings) |
The week of Nationals wrapped up for me with the 30km classic mass start. Now although I do not tend to get upset over results, or let it get to me, I was pretty disappointed with 4th place. 4th is an extremely respectable position to earn at Nationals and I do believe I had a great race, but the 30km classic was a race that I genuinely had wanted to win since I was racing in the Juvenile Boy category. Especially this season I grew extremely hungry to cross the finish line first in this particular race, or at least earn myself a medal. I always make myself focus on effort and technical accomplishments before results, in training and competition, but this was the one race I allowed myself to solely focus on a result for. The race consisted of a 1km loop, followed by 4x7.5km loops (which I think may have been questionable longer than 7.5km, which is awesome). My race plan was to ski with the group for the first 7.5km loop, but once it was done go push the pace at the very start of the 2nd lap and try to make a break. The goal was either, Option 1: everyone calls my bluff and lets me go since we still had over 20km to go, or Option 2: everyone starts pushing the pace and it turns into a really tough 30km. It ended up being option 2 and it turned into an awesomely gutty race. Myself along with the others in the lead group continued to push the pace for the remainder of the race, then Antoine made an impressive steady push that we the simply could not match (see lap times and results for the race here http://zone4.ca/results.asp?ID=8169&cat=4082). I was bummed that I did not have the snap to keep the pace for 7 more kilometres, but I can make excuses until my hair grows grey and skin wrinkles, but at the end of the day it came time to perform and I just did not have it in me on that day. As disappointed as I was when I crossed the line without a medal, the day was not lost. A special shoutout to my teammate Kieran who had an amazing performance on that day. When I spoke with Kieran about my race plan the days leading up to the race, how I was going to try and break after the first lap, he simply responded to me, "I'm going with you." He decided that no matter how hard he had to go he was going to hang on the the leaders for absolutely as long as he could. And that's exactly what he did. By the time I crossed the line, took my skis off and turned around in the finishing pit I saw Kieran barreling down the finishing straight. Despite me being a baby and mopey about my race, this made me so happy. The guy finished 7th, which is stellar. Kieran is arguably one of the most underrated skiers in the country, trains a lot of quality hours and has also helped me become a better skier too. It was awesome to see a lot of handwork finally come together.
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| Team amped for each other |
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| Out of the gate (photo: Jim Hawkings) |
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| Top 4 group, final lap (photo: Jim Hawkings) |
I am now realizing is truly how awesome of an opportunity this whole process is. As I reflect on the season I am realizing how unique and cool it is, and how privileged I am. Like most people starting university, we question whether it is worth continuing something like skiing full-time (or any equivalent of sport, art, hobby, any kind of passion). Now seeing what I was able to do this year made it unbelievably clear how worthwhile it was. Getting to travel the country - the world, to ski. And just recognizing how much I enjoyed skiing as a whole, the racing, the training, the friends, family, everything. Awesome. I feel like I am already living the dream, but I know that it will only get better.
The biggest lesson I learned all season, is how much I love racing. How much fun the whole thing is. There is something so exciting about the simplicity of having a start line, a course, and a finish line - and the fastest one to get there wins. The idea of fun really clicked this year. People tend to misunderstand fun as some sort of specific section of life, but fun is so many different things. For example I can guarantee that mid-race, when wheezing for air and everything hurts (a lot), it's not a whole lot of fun, mostly just painful. But when you cross the finish line knowing you did the best you can do, that's fun, it's incredibly fun. Do I take skiing seriously? Yes. Do I want to be great? Yes. Do I have a big vision I want to see fulfilled? Yes. ... But when you break all of those down - It's fun. Training is fun, having dreams is fun, being with friends is fun, racing is fun. Being the best you can possibly be - is fun.
Looking back on the past year as a whole, it is difficult to single out a simple focus on just skiing. Most of the biggest lessons were through skiing, but for lack of a better explanation, a lot of life stuff happened. From my perspective, the season was one big battle between me and my mind. As I have explained in posts before, coming into the season I had no idea how things were going to play out. Alongside that I had a lot of people doubting me, some were convinced I was quitting skiing, and some people were just kind of mean and kicked me down in my social life which made getting started difficult. Although this shot me down an emotional rollercoaster in the fall and winter, it made me tougher than I have ever been before. Mentally, emotionally and physically. It pushed my threshold on how badly I wanted to be successful, in fact I almost quit a few times. But it all just made the vision so much clearer. If everything always goes your way there is no real way of telling whether you are doing something you truly love doing, but when exterior factors to your passion push and pull on you, but at the end of it your goals and vision are still kept close to you, that is how you know you are doing the right thing. I came here on a mission, I put the work in, and I proved a lot of people wrong. I didn't move to Ottawa because it made sense, or that it felt perfect, nor did going to school here grasp my attention that strongly. I took on the challenge for two reasons, one, I needed time to live away from home and learn life skill and take care of myself ... but most importantly I came here to represent an idea, the simple idea that if you want do something just to go out there and try and achieve it. That there are no secrets to fast skiing or great things in general. I trained alone all fall and winter, and spent my entire winter of training around a 1.5km flat groomed loop - alone as well. It sounds cliche, but don't let other people persuade or convince you of something you can't accomplish. If you want to try something, and you believe it can work, just try. Succeed or fail, by simply trying something makes you an infinite amount more successful than those who quit before they even took the first step. I often look back on my successes and try to imagine myself had they not gone well, if they had not worked out. And I make sure that I understand that I am proud of both. Proud of the core risk and effort I put in, regardless of outcome.
Now... what's the next step? I feel like I have made my point, I proved that you can move away or whatever and with the support of the right few people and work ethic you can still be great. I hope that the idea I attempted to represent sinks in with at least a few people, and that they can create their own paths as well down the road. With that, my job here living in Ottawa is done. I am moving home for 2016/2017. The program at Team Hardwood is really coming together, and we have a lot of work to do. Time to go back to Barrie and get ready to crush it in my last year as a junior. I have never been so ready. It feels like we have come a long way with the team and myself, but we are just getting started. The past few years have simply been the trailer to this much anticipated movie. I hope you've enjoyed the trailer, but it's time to roll the clip.
See you May 1st,
Rj
