It’s snowing

  More of the same today; GS in the morning and slalom in the afternoon.  We had parallel courses for both sessions so were racing head to head.  No doubt that I’m improving but so is everyone else and I only won when my opponent missed a gate.

  We finally got some new snow today, although from what I hear England (or at least the Chilterns) have had more.  Anyway there’s more forecast for the next few days so with a bit of luck there’ll be some decent powder next week.

  We’re staying in a Thomson chalet (Nathalie) that normally accommodates 16 and the chalet staff normally live out; we’re 18 and the chalet staff are occupying one room !  The rooms themselves are pretty small, even by French standards, so all in all it’s probably best described as ‘cosy’.

  The location isn’t bad though, about a 5 minute walk to/from the nearest piste and there’s a bus stop just a couple of minutes away if we’re feeling lazy.  It takes about 15 minutes to walk down to the centre of Méribel (but about 20 minutes to walk back up so if there’s a bus due I’ll often be lazy).

   Today I was lazy because my legs are beginning to feel the strain of the last few days training.  Tomorrow will be a timed course and then I’ll have a day off.

End of the end of season conditions ?

  Spent most of yesterday dozing on a sofa in the lounge just trying to stay up till dinner time.  As soon as the main course was over I went to bed (couldn’t face dessert).  Despite aching joints and being bathed in sweat I actually slept better than the previous couple of nights. Woke up this morning feeling weak but the aches had gone.

  Still not well enough to ski so took a trip down to Brides-les-Bains around noon.  Sunday probably isn’t the best day to visit a French town, especially not at lunchtime in an almost-ski resort.  It was deserted and looked like it had seen better days despite the fact it was an Olympic Village for the 1992 Winter Olympics and is still a spa town (although I guess there are far fewer people taking the waters now than 100 years ago).

  I suppose that if I was going to get ill at least I was lucky in that the worst of it was over the weekend and not when I had to be on the slopes.

  And it gets better; the temperature has dropped a few degrees and it’s actually snowing (just).   With a bit of luck there’ll be some proper snow overnight (and I’ll be back to something approaching full strength tomorrow).

Where to start

  Where to start is a question for me as much as you…

  The blog starts here, quite where it will go (if anywhere) remains to be seen.

  Initially at least, the idea is to make a record of the time I am about to spend training to be a ski instructor.

   Hopefully I’ll get a bit of feedback (some encouragement and/or advice would be nice).