Testing

Summer training rolls on. Those of our athletes following the Bates summer workouts have been doing some testing the past few weeks. The girls in Bozeman did an uphill double poll TT up triple tree. Corky PR'd in the Harpers Hill Climb TT in Sun Valley-- awesome!! We are spread between coasts but all are working hard and constantly making small gains. That's what it's all about!

gaining fitness out on the trail

skate technique

Ben crushing a very tough route!

The Truth about Injury

This May I skipped short term for several reasons, one of which was to be healthier and get a head start on my training. This was the year things would go right. This was the year I wouldn’t get injured. This was going to be my year. Instead, I came home to an immediate injury to my poor mouth with my wisdom teeth extraction, a persistent cough that lasted a month, and my second bout of IT band syndrome.

Injury is something most of us have experienced. It sucks. It feels unfair. Most of the time it comes out of the blue. It took one run after a week of recovering from my teeth to send my knee over the edge. As with every injury I’ve had, I considered quitting.

Injuries are what athletes fear. We fear not making our goals because we have become “compensated”. The real truth about injury is that it is an opportunity for a fresh perspective. The truth is that through PT, twenty five needles being stuck in my leg, and time off, I learned something valuable.

My first step was recognizing that I wanted to continue. Injuries happen to everyone and they don’t mean that your season is over. Instead, they are an opportunity to expose and work on your weaknesses. I have spent a lot more time rollerskiing this spring and in the Fiddler gym (i.e. my garage) picking stuff up and putting it down. Strength has always been my least favorite part of training, but as I’ve gotten stronger, I have realized the value in it.

During this process, I’ve also learned a lot (maybe more than I wanted to) about my body. Through acupuncture, I learned that the gal bladder channel is linked to the IT band and to the shoulders. It is also linked to the liver channel, which is related to stress and anxiety. Now, I was a little superstitious about Chinese medicine, but somehow all of these channels make sense. I have tight shoulders, IT bands, and am an avid worrier. So now I’m a believer in acupuncture, bring on the needles!

I also had to come to the recognition that my body is bizarre. I have a turned pelvis due to slight scoliosis (how fun!) and my knees don’t align with my shins. So, like everyone else, I’m not perfect. Through PT and a more refined strength plan, I’ve improved my hip strength and overall body strength to help support my weird body.

There have been a lot of things I didn’t expect that have come out of this injury. I’ve gotten to spend a lot more time with my really cool physical therapist and quirky deep tissue masseuse. I have recognized the importance of strength training and stretching. Most importantly, I am more grateful of the things I can do.

When I was in Sun Valley with my parents in early May, I was so disappointed that I couldn’t run the miles of trails that I trained on senior year of high school. That ended up being the first time I realized that I could hike. So I hiked around, with some nagging pain, but one day I said, “if all I could do was walk, I think I’d be a happy person.” It turns out I ended up seeing a lot more of the scenery than I ever did while running those same trails.

I volunteered at our local half marathon this past weekend and watched hundreds of runners with all kinds of weird gates. I wondered how the heck these people could run thirteen miles when I could barely run ten in a week. Then, I backed up and remembered when I couldn’t even run two steps several weeks earlier. Today I enjoyed my first run with little to no pain, progress is being made.

So injury, although feeling like a hindrance, can be an amazing opportunity to slow down. It can remind you of your values, make you learn something about yourself, and spark your determination. Injury is just another challenge where you have to make the decision get up and take the small steps forward. Like my girl KC says, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.

Exploring SV

There are always sitting activities...

Grateful to be able to hike with the awesome group of teenagers I'm coaching for the summer

Until next time,

Snorel

how many snapchat geotags can we collect from across the country?

10.

Like Amy's previous post says, it seems that Bozeman is the place to be for the Bobcats this summer (kinda funny because MSU's mascot is also the Bobcat). It's great being able to come home to familiar faces, even when I'm not at Bates.

Maddy and I arrived in Bozeman on June 4th after a six-day road trip across the country. We made it out here pretty smoothly to our surprise. My car (her name is Annie and she's awesome) only needed one pit stop to get looked at and she killed it for 2,692 miles.

After packing Annie and scrambling to say goodbye to as many people as we could, we were on our way to Vermont on Friday afternoon. We spent the night with Maddy's family and picked up the statue (long story, but essentially this is one of the reasons we drove out). We were lucky enough to see Halie in Brattlboro for an hour or so. It's weird going from seeing someone everyday to not seeing them for six weeks...we needed our Halie time!

and we're off!

We left around 6 AM on Saturday morning and spent some quality time on I-90W as we made our way to Ohio. Before leaving for the roadtrip, my mom told us to stop in random towns, find a diner, and have a meal– it's the best way to experience the people and culture of that town. So, that's what we did: The Scotia Diner in Scotia, New York was diner stop #1. If you ever find yourself there, I highly recommend the blackberry pancakes. We got to Ohio around 5 or 6 PM and had a family dinner with Maddy's grandparents, aunt, and cousin. We spent two days in Ohio and were totally pampered– pedicures and all. We realized this isn't the typical cross country drive that most people think of, but it was nice to have a day off from driving and for Maddy to see her family.

the second geotag of the trip

We left Cleveland on Monday afternoon and arrived in Chicago on Monday night. Maddy was the real MVP that day because she drove five-lane Chicago traffic in a stick with TWO bikes on the back and didn't stall once. She also remained really, really calm– I think she was surprised by that :)

Chicago was a blast! We stayed with our good friend, Kylie, also a Batesie, for two nights. On Tuesday, we went out to lunch with her mom and sister for her sister's birthday, ate way too much food and then walked around Chicago for a couple hours to get rid of the food baby in preparation for her sister's birthday dinner. We met up with another friend from Bates who lives outside of Chicago, as well, so Maddy and I got private tours of the city.

being tourists at The Bean

beautiful Chicago!

Wednesday was our longest day– we were driving from Chicago to the Badlands in South Dakota. We left at 5 AM and arrived at 7:30 PM. Many rounds of Madlibs were played, as well as every genre of music you could think of: from Taylor Swift to middle school dances to country, rap, and even some classical. We had diner stop #2 in Sioux Falls, South Dakota where we had a late lunch. I have a friend from high school who is working in the Badlands this summer, so we spent the night in the park. The plan was to get up and go for a road bike around the Badlands, but we quickly realized that wasn't going to happen when we woke up to heavy wind, rain, thunder, and lightning. Instead, we drove through the Badlands, took lots of touristy photos, and were back on the road to do touristy stop #2 of the day: Rushmore!

The Badlands

Happy to be here!

touristy pictures with some cool guys

After Rushmore, we jammed to some burned CD's courtesy of a friend and Maddy's cousin. I drove the last leg into Bozeman and I'm pretty sure my jaw was dropped for a solid hour– I couldn't get over the mountains! I'm now understanding why it's called Big Sky country :)

So, 2692 miles later, we made it! Maddy's settling in at home and I'm settling into my apartment that Amy, Olivia (Colby skier), Sarah (Williams skier), and I are sharing for the summer. Keep checking to see what adventures we get ourselves into!

-Sadie

There is nothing quite like a crowd of bobcats to make a fun summer! This summer, with some randomness, some planning, and some coincidence, many of the nordie bobcats will end up together in Bozeman, MT. The full time summer crew will include Maddy, Amy, Tara, Sadie, Ben, Nick ‘15, and Filly ‘14. At some point or another we will have visits from Condor ‘15 and Snorel. While so far there are only a few of us here, it is amazing to feel the Bates Skiing family so far away from New England already. We are excited for many many fun hiking, running, biking, swimming, paddling, climbing, and cooking adventures to come ! Stay tuned.

One Last Blog Post from Hallie

47 carnival races 

30+ teammates

24 carnival weekends

4 years

4 assistant coaches (Dylan, Wilson, Matt, and James)

4 Chummy Cups

4 Rangeley camps

3 team carnival podiums

3 trips to Soldier Hollow

3 seniors of 2015

2 Foret Thanksgiving camps

2 continuing to ski 

1 working at a CA start up

1 short term where we were all on difference continents (Africa, Asia, and Oceania)

1 Craftsbury Thanksgiving camps

1 Camp Condor

1 Coach

1 Becky

Here goes my last post on the Bates nordic blog. When I came to Bates as a freshman, I had no idea how quickly these four years would fly by. And fly by it did. On Sunday Connor, Nick, and I graduated amidst a rain storm and lots of family and friends. The saying "once a Bobcat, always a Bobcat" rang true, as there were plenty of alums roaming around, most notably Caroline and Gabby! Of course, teammates past and present were remotely in touch, congratulating us and making sure we were having the best of times. And, Evan Dion visited for a few days at the beginning of the week, which was awesome!

Here are a few pictures from the weeks leading up to graduation and absolutely none from graduation day (and then I had fun looking at old pictures so there's a few that date back to the early days).

Baccalaureate 

Baccalaureate- with PC too!

Gabby!

Caroline!

Coach was inducted into the Scholar- Athlete Society this weekend for his countless accomplishments and contributions to athletics at Bates, in Maine, and nationally

Senior Athletes and Coaches Dinner

With our alpiners too- congrats Emily!

In case you forgot we ski!

Chummy Cup #4 in the books

Thanksgiving Camp Senior Year- maybe a bit too comfortable around each other at this point?

Junior year Turkey Day camp

The first Rangeley camp!

Thanks to ALL who have made these four years wonderful, especially coaches, teammates, and parents. 

Love,

Hallie

And thanks to parents, iPhones, Steve Fuller, and Facebook for the pictures- as always.