Latest from Lena

Sorry I have not blogged in a while. I have been racing a ton and have not had a chance to catch up.

Well where to start? The season started off great and I was able to get a couple of good SL results. I was stoked and feeling confident. Right before Christmas I got sick (bummer) and was off my game for few races. Went home to Tahoe for few days over Christmas to regroup and recoup and got back out east for the Sunday River NorAms.

NorAms are so fun. The venues are always good and the competition is awesome. I had a great experience race at Sunday River. The surface was WC injected, hard and slick. After 4 days of racing on it you could not see a track. Although I did not find the finish I had some great splits and was stoked at the opportunity.

We left Sunday River and headed for Okemo for two GS and two SG races. The track was awesome. Grippy and hard!!! The first day of GS I was really skiing well. Pushing hard. I was testing that fine line between success and going in the fence. I found the fence. I knew I was skiing really well and was looking forward to the next day and it got cancelled!!!!! I was really disappointed. I knew what I could do on this hill and wanted another crack at it in GS. The weather gods did not cooperate. The morning of the SG the wind had died down and it was game on.

I knew what I could do on this hill and was stoked to get in the gate. In the first race I skied really well and executed my race plan but gave the hill a little too much respect. I had a decent result but I knew I could make the adjustments needed to win. In the second race I executed my race plan, brought the warrior into it and ended up second. It was a special day because my team mate Delainey got the win!!!! (only got me by 16/100ths D!!!! Look out next time!!!) It's awesome when you can share the podium with the team. It means everything worked. We both executed, Sav had the line and our serviceman had our skis running fast. It was a true team effort and was great to be a part of.

We are on our way up to Bromont Ontario for a couple of SL races then to Sugarloaf for the Colby Carnival. Hope you all are slaying.

Until next time,

.)) Lena Andrews

Lena at NDS Camp, Loveland CO

Hi from Loveland CO. I am out here in beautiful, snowy Colorado for the NDS TERP camp. Things have gone very well. We started out with 4 days of SL. Despite all the new snow we were able to get good training. The folks at Loveland had done a great job of injecting and all the coaches worked really hard to get the piste in shape every morning. I was really happy about being selected for this camp. There is a great group of girls here and the level of the training has been very high. Since I am a GS/SG skier, SL always presents a challenge. I also had concentrated on GS/SG in October and had not really trained any SL since July! Needless to say I was a little rusty. It was fun to have four days to just run SL. I was really stoked on my improvement form day one to day four. (I was also glad when day four was over and we switched to GS!)

We have had two days of awesome GS training now. The sun came out and the piste was in excellent shape. Day one I was ready to get back to some GS and my skiing/times really showed it. I had a rough day on day two. My skiing was there and I was killing the top when I stuck my arm through a panel. It whipped around and smacked me in the back really hard. Anyone that has done this knows how bad it hurts. I was not going to let that keep me out of the game. I sucked it up and finished the day. After training I took care of my shoulder and now am the proud owner of a good looking bruise. Hey what doesn't kill us makes us stronger. We have two more days in Loveland then I am home for Turkey Day and six feet of new snow that has fallen in Tahoe!!! (STOKED) It will be short a visit though as I will be on a plane for Sunday River on the 29th.

My next blog will be from Sunday River, my new home for the season. I hope everybody's training is going well and your all having fun.

Happy Thanksgiving!

.)) Lena Andrews

Dryland, Dryland, Dryland...

Just thought I would check in before leaving for NDS. I came back from Europe and got right back to work in the gym. Like everyone else I did my Physical Assessment. Box Jump, Shuttle Run, Vertical Jump etc. Everyone who has done these knows what I'm talking about. Not that fun, but when you get the results they can make you smile. I have put in a ton of work this year and my skiing in October really showed the effort.

I am packing tonight for camp in Colorado. I heard that it is really good and I'm stoked to be back on snow. I also heard that it is really cold. Bring on the ice.

Train hard and remember to have fun.

.)) Lena Andrews

Last days in Stubai Austria...

Well in my last blog I said there was snow coming to the Austrian Glaciers and it came, and came. My three days off snow turned into five. Oh well, it was alright. We switched gears really quickly and went back into full dry land mode.

Anyway the sun finally came out and even after all the snow, the piste was still pretty good. It also doesn't hurt when you get to train with the SWE WC Men on injected. Tomorrow will be our last day in Stubai. I would love to go watch the ladies in Soelden, but if I hope to race there someday I would rather take the opportunity to train again. It also helps that I get to train SG with the SWE EC girls tomorrow.

I have some very good friends on that team and we are all staying at the same hotel and doing our dryland together. I guess I'll just have to check Soelden results in between runs, despite the heavy data roaming charges. I am hoping Maria PH gets her first podium and Jules can put one down.

Looking forward to getting home. Heard it through the grapevine that Colorado has some snow? I hope. I am going to be there in November.

.)) Lena Andrews

October in Austria! Lena in Stubai

Hello from Stubai Austria!

Woke up this morning to with snow on the trees to the valley floor! I have been in Stubai for almost three weeks and this is the first snow I've seen! Just finished up a 10 day camp and all we had was blue skies! I have never been on the glaciers in October and had 10 straight days of blue skies! It was awesome...but now it looks like I'll have to pay a little!!!

The first part of our camp went awesome. It was a GS and Super G camp. We had incredible snow conditions and were able to get so much accomplished. We had so much volume in a short time, over 1,000 GS gates and 450 Super G Gates, plus drill runs! I am so spent right now. These next few days off snow will be good.

Today we are going into Italy to sample some of the food (CHEESE!!!) and then are back on snow on the 18th. The glaciers of both Austria and Switzerland are incredible and October is always a special time, you get a chance to see and ski with National Teams from around the world. When you get the chance to come, TAKE IT!!!

I am in Stubai for another week then off to Soelden for the World Cup!!!

.)) Lena Andrews