Fantasy Skiing Done Right

Here on the Williams Nordic team, we don't mess around when dealing with serious matters like games. Here we present the latest competition, Fantasy Tour de Ski. The League is commissioned by yours truly, and includes all of the Williams men in Quebec, plus my brother Andrew (aka Magnus, from UMPI) and Chris Stock (Harvard). Prizes for winners each day include having their dishes done by the losers, and eternal glory.

Below are the various documents involved in making the whole thing work. (My status as commissioner, by the way, was given after pick order was decided). You'll notice some errors, like Isaac spelling Diggins wrong a few times, but I hope most of the math is right. Updates to follow. Tomorrow is an off day, so most of us will have something like fantasy football's "by-week blues", and we will have to find other ways to get our jollies out.

Draft board. Picks were in snake pattern (for example 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 1, 2, 3...etc.)

The full draft list

Magnus killing round 1. Phil and Ben really taking hits from Tscharnke and Ingersdotter's unexpected scratches.

Ian killing round 2, making a neat Nesbitt boys sweep of the first two stages. Ben takes a huge hit from Teischmann dropping out.

Current standings after 2 stages

Day 4 - December 30th

We had some fresh snow this morning for our 2, 3, 4, 4, 3, 2 L4 classic interval workout. The team skied really well and everyone brought energy to the workout even though we've been skiing a ton since arriving on Wednesday night and L4 intervals are always tough! The afternoon workout was an "easy" skate and everyone on the team skied trail 23. One word: AWESOME! Josh succeeded in leading the men's team in a great crock pot beef dinner. Thanks you Josh's mom for the outstanding recipe! Here are a few pictures from the afternoon and evening: another great day:)

Hannah and Kalle leading the train

more train..

more train..

more train...

and MORE TRAIN...a big crew skiing together:)

the intersection to uncharted territory

Having some fun

Still having fun:)

Olivia, Hannah, Sarah, Laura, Elena and Jenna

PLEASE DOUBLE CLICK ON THIS PICTURE :)

Oh, and in case it's hard to imagine what trail 23 might have been like, here's a little Iphone video!:)

IMG 2630 from Williams Nordic Ski Team on Vimeo.

The very end of trail 23...SUPER FUN!

post dinner debate....actually, post dinner broccoli tutorial

post dinner chat

An awesome crew

ALSO AWESOME:)

Day 3 - December 29th

We woke up this morning to a beautiful blue bird day and headed off in search of trail #23, but ran into a orange ribbon keeping the trail closed just long enough so we couldn't check it out. It's open now though and much of the team is determined to ski it tomorrow afternoon! The snow was squeaky, but temps weren't too terribly cold and we had a great morning distance skate workout. The afternoon workout was an easy classic ski with some speed training. The team worked on striding and double poling at extremely high speeds and we had a "young vs old" relay race to wrap up the speed portion of the day. I'm not sure if the "young" or "old" crew won....we might need to have a rematch!

After the speed training most of the team took an 8k cruise on a really narrow classic only trail, trail #38. It was a complete change from the extremely wide boulevard type trails that are typical up here and it was a blast skiing through the woods and taking in the scenery. Olivia's mom cooked a delicious Lasagna dinner for us all to wrap up another great day for the team here in Canada. 

Casey, Josh and lots of trees!

Peace and quiet on trail 38

Isaac and our "team member for a week" Chris Stock

Phil and Hannah cruising along through the woods

The Trail #38 Crew. All SMILES:)

Day 2 - December 28

We woke up to a beautiful morning with moderate temps and a fresh blanket of snow that fell overnight. It was a perfect morning session for some classic technique work. We focused on a few fundamentals and spent a large portion of the morning practicing these concepts while skiing at a slower pace.....easier said than done sometimes! We're heading out this afternoon for a Threshold skate workout on trail # 31.

Elena all smiles skiing back down a connector trail

Sarah and Olivia resting up for the next run up the groomed trail without poles

Andrea Fisher from Bates (some connection to the Williams Team) and Hannah

Casey fine tuning his powder skills

Dueling Shakas from Ian

Day 1 - December 27th

Most of the team skied between 2.5 and 3.5 hours yesterday (mixed classic and skating). It was snowing pretty hard by the end of the workout, but the skiing is OUTSTANDING! Much of the team skied trail # 24 and it is rumored that trail # 23 will be open by Saturday, which we will definitely check out since it's quite rare for that trail to be open this time of year. Here are a few pics of the conditions.

Jenna and Sarah enjoying the perfect tracks!

155 kilometers open...they all look something like this

HMMMMMM.....TRACKS

Coach Fisher saying hello

We've arrived in Quebec!

We rallied the troops and made the drive north from Williamstown to Quebec one day early to avoid the snowstorm that is forecasted for tomorrow. We had ideal driving conditions and arrived before 5pm at Mt. Ste. Anne. The snow is plentiful and we're settled into the "Farm House" for a one night stay before we can check into the condos up closer to the mountain. The skiing is rumored to be perfect and we are amped to get on snow tomorrow!

More skiing

Mountain Trail

The Summit

Lift Line

The long drought is done

Did you miss it?????

I'm pretty excited for Quebec. It's not that I'm tired of Williamstown...a change of scenery would be nice, but I've been pretty beaten down by work this semester and from week one, the light at the end of the tunnel was always Canada. Quebec camp is the one week of the year when all I have to worry about is getting up in the morning and hitting the trails...the rest is just skiing. It's the ideal place to work on technique because not only do you not have to think about schoolwork, but it's also always the most perfect skiing of the year. Even the intervals feel surreal, like you're being willed along just because the name Lac St. Hilaire sounds kind of majestic.

When I packed my skis up for break, I left my road ferrules on my classic poles, thinking I'd change them when I got up to Quebec. Then David Dethier emailed me last night and told me the skiing was quite good, and I went up to meet Josh and Kalle up at the lodge with my rock kickers to scope out what I thought would be a bare, rocky scene. We were pleasantly surprised when we got there to find 6-8" on the trails and a moderate local snow falling. Certainly not Quebec, but certainly worthy of my training skis and snow tips. We'll be hitting it up hard tomorrow after Josh and I rip some old-school speedball with the Mt. Greylock Nordic Alums.

Speaking of old-school, there's an old-school nor'easter headed straight for us on Thursday. For those keeping score at home, that's actually a lot less ideal than it sounds. Don't look now, but if this storm becomes what they're projecting, we might have some issues getting out of Williamstown. Sophomore year all over again. Don't look now. Bud, even if it takes us 12 hours instead of 8, I'm still driving that damn van up on Thursday.

Happy Holidays everyone! Thank God for White Christmases!

The most beautiful thing in the world, the perpetual, local Prospect snowstorm.

Let it snow, indeed!

Greetings from Switzerland

It's been a week since I took my last exam and flew back home to Switzerland for the holidays and the homeland has not disappointed. If anything, it is even more breathtaking here than I remembered.
The weather was overcast and snowy through the weekend and beginning of the week but when I woke up this morning I was greeted with blue skies, bright sunshine and a few inches of fresh powder. It was the first bluebird day of the year and the whole family stayed on the trails for several hours.

View from our living room this morning

The skiing is unbelievable but my favorite part is the delicious European food that greets you post-workout!

Traditional "Roesti"

Selection of mom's homemade Christmas Cookies

Needless to say I've been doing a lot of skiing, eating and watching skiing and other winter sports on TV.
We are heading to the Black Forest tomorrow to spend Christmas with my grandparents in Germany and then on to the airport to go to Quebec.
Hopefully the snow will be as amazing in Mt-St-Anne and New England!


Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Finishing Up With Exams

Most of the team will be wrapping up their final exam workload within the next day or two! Keep an eye on the Craftsbury Eastern Cup Opener results (Eastern Cup Opener Results) this coming weekend as we'll have several athletes headed up there that were able to get their exams finished up early. There is an approximately 1.6km race loop set up for the distance skate race on Sunday (8.75km/5 laps for women and 11.25/7 laps for men) and the Saturday race is a 1.4km classic sprint. There is snow in the forecast for Prospect next week and Mt. Ste. Anne has 46km open already. Winter here we come.....time to ROCK THE COW!!

Sunday

3 hr OD. Classic Roller Skiing followed by a hike/run ending on the top of Petersburg Pass in beautiful weather.

One of the views along the way......this also happens to be our secret on snow training spot!

It depends who you ask what the best recovery food might be for this type of workout.

Here is one idea!:)

Annual Ski Team Holiday Party

After an excellent 4x4 min L4 skate workout on snow last Friday the team met up at Bud and Barb's for the annual Yankee Gift Swap Holiday Party. Dinner was excellent we had a great time. Thank you Bud and Barb for hosting and Happy Holidays Williams Ski Team!

Will unpacking his new Macbook Pro

Isaac is excited about this!

Practice makes perfect

Olivia with Christina's famous cinnamon bread

Casey's new vest from Will...Sweet!

Bud showing off his new look

Pure Joy

SO HAPPY RIGHT NOW!

Love this!

Hannah looking through her "Tea Party for 100" from Ben

Sarah and her new bike (donated to Jayvin shortly afterward and he is going to be STOKED on Christmas this year)

The "Go Paul" shirt lives on. Hi to Paul Kari from Kalle!

Hmmm, what will I do with this?

Caitlyn shows her dad how it's done