October

For the past couple of weeks I have been spending a lot of time in the gym, between fitness and physical therapy. Now is the time of year where we try to rest up and get as healthy as possible to go into the season fresh and injury free. I have spent a lot of my off season trying to get my back and hips ready for the winter, and I hope it pays off. Next week I have physical testing to see how much we have improved our fitness over the summer. I am excited to see the gains I have made, and then it is off to Colorado on November 1st. Here are some shots of me and my teammates I took with my GoPro in Chile.

Chile Camp

For the past two weeks I have been in La Parva, Chile. I was extremely excited to get on snow but wasn't sure how my previously injured back would react to skiing.

At first the pain was terrible. I could barely make a right footed turn with pain streaking down my back and right leg. For about a week I was really struggling to get some good training. After about 8 days of playing around with different stretches, exercises, and massages, my physical therapist finally found something that helped. All my pain was in the lower back, so at first (obviously) we paid all of our attention to the lower L4-L5 vertebra, and the muscles around the lower spine. When that wasn't working we moved up to the L2, and surprisingly, the tense-knotted muscles in the mid-upper back were causing all the problems.

After making headway, I had a very successful Chile camp and got some GS, SG, and DH training. Oh, and we got a sweet powder day, which I have some footage of. For now, here is a time lapse of a Chilean sunset with my GoPro.