Landgraaf!!!

So, we're in Holland, at Landgraaf and training for the BASS races which are running over the bank holiday.

We arrived on Wednesday evening after the short drive from Calais, trained on Thursday and today with 5 trainees. Tomorrow, we have a few more joining us to bring in a total of 10 racers with Gerard and myself coaching.

View up the FIS slope

The deal with the hotel and centre is that we get a shed set up for ski prep and time on the slope for training in gates and free skiing.

The tuning shed

'Bieber' tuning

Training

So tomorrow brings more training on the hill with gate sessions in the morning and afternoon, then races on Sunday and Monday - watch this space for further details and information.

Aosta Race Academy Update

As some of you will know, we are well on our way with our new venture in Italy, the Aosta Race Academy.

We are very lucky to be working with Expedient Marketing the regions tourist board in setting up this venture. We will be working closely with them and also with the resort of Pila which is where most of our training will be based.
The last few months have been very busy with setting everything up but it is now all coming together with a new website for the academy coming online in the next few days, deals being brokered with sponsors and partner organisations. We still have our existing sponsors and partners on board, in fact Head skis are becoming more involved, running indoor camps with us this summer in the uk.

Our programme has already kicked off with the athletes already signed up and we'll be running our first fitness weekend in early June. From there, the athletes will have their fitness goals set out for the summer in preparation for the season ahead.

We'll have more updates on the academy and on Impulses summer activities through the next few months.

British Senior and Junior Champs round up

Well, we're now into the British Children's races in Meribel and the Scottish Champs in Courchevel but todays blog is an update on the British Champs which finished yesterday.

With varied weather, the champs ran well and we only lost the NJC downhill and the NJC girls GS due to the weather and conditions. It's a shame when we lose any races from the program but, given the conditions and weather this season, we were fortunate to get the races that we did.

One of the many early starts

The conditions meant a lot of early starts in order to get the best of the snow and to make the races as fair as possible for all entrants. So, with the 6.45 lifts open and 7.00 inspections, most races were done before the tourists had come out for the day!

Unfortunately, yesterday saw rain and low cloud which brought problems for the girls gs as the cloud was in over much of the course an, with this not moving, the race was cancelled after several hours of waiting.

The boys sl, however, actually benefitted from the wet conditions with the salt on the course made the track work well for the race. It was no fun standing there in the rain and the hill looked rough but a good race came out of it.

Rough looking conditions for the slalom in the rain

Very brown!!

Just below are a few of the results achieved by impulse racers over the champs:

Sam Fairbairn - 2nd Brit in the junior sl

Richard Goldsworthy - 3rd Brit in the junior sl

Sam and Richard on the podium

Matt Thompson:

1st in Junior dh

1st non team in dh
1st under 18 in dh
2nd in senior dh
3rd in senior sc
1st under 18 in sc
2nd junior in super g
3rd junior in sl
2nd overall in senior champs
1st under 18 overall in senior champs
1st overall non team member in senior champs
1st overall in junior champs
1st overall junior 2

Matt Thompson making one of his many podium appearances at the champs

It's not all work out here in Meribel though. One of our trainees celebrated his birthday today and the boys bought what can only be described as a firework to put on his cake!!!

Is there a fire extinguisher handy?!

Another 3 days of racing left now and a report will be blogged later in the week.

Super Combined completed!

With a very early morning, we went to inspect the super g at dawn. This was to ensure that we got the best of conditions and best chance to complete the race.

Inspection at dawn!

The early start paid off and we got a good race out of it, completing the race meant that we had the junior super g and the super combined in the bag.

Impulse athletes had mixed fortunes with 3 going out at different parts of the course but 2 completing. Elliot completed the super g, dropping his points in the process and Matt Thompson was 3rd Bit in the sg (2nd junior) and 3rd Brit (1st junior) in the super combined, giving him 2 junior titles so far.

Matt Thompson picking up his prizes for the super g and super combi

Rain this afternoon but should be clear tonight and the mens national champs slalom tomorrow.

Change of Schedule

Well, as expected, this morning arrived with the rain still falling at village level, meaning that the junior downhill was cancelled. This was good news for Impulse member Matt Thompson as it meant the junior results would be taken from yesterdays senior race, giving Matt the British Junior downhill title!

Matt Thompson on his way to the British Junior Downhill title
(Picture Courtesy of Racer Ready)

With the DH cancelled, came the decision to run the slalom leg of the super combined. The organisers got to work setting, and salting, the courses on the Meribel stade. The rain was easing by now and would soon stop. Inspection had to be made from outside the course to give the salt some time to work on the snow.

The race itself was very good, considering the conditions and the snow held up well. Our trainees performed well with Matt Jessop moving up to 33rd from a start number of 50, Ed Fenton-Fowler was unlucky at number 71 and fell about 20 gates down. Sam Fairbairn finished in 26th, making the top 30 flip for the super g run but was subsequently disqualified for incorrect passage of a gate which was a great shame as it was his run of the season so far!

Matt Thompson continued his successful run with 12th overall, 3rd Brit and 1st Brit junior. This gives him a good position in the super g tomorrow to capitalise on and, hopefully remain in this position (at least).

Early starts all round for a 7am inspection for the super g leg tomorrow. Here's hoping for another good race.

Slalom Training whilst the Downhill is on

Today we woke to clear blue skies and colder temperatures (initially), so the Downhill training run went ahead, followed by the first Downhill race.
None of the guys training with us were competing but one Impulse member, Matt Thompson, was second Brit and first British Junior in the race, scoring his best FIS points for DH in the process!!

Elsewhere on the hill, we were training slalom. We had great conditions but it did warm up very quickly. The guys all skied well for most of the morning but we had to finish in the gates by 11.30 as the snow was deteriorating quickly by that time.

Tomorrow should be the second Downhill but we currently have rain and the forecast for tomorrow is not good. There is the possibility that they will run the slalom leg of the super combined if conditions prove too severe to run the DH. We'll see what tomorrow brings. If there are no races, we shall continue with some more slalom training.

DH Training Cancelled but new snow!!

The downhill training was cancelled as we got out of bed this morning! None of our group were due to race, hence the later start but the others, who had got onto the hill for 7am, were disappointed.
We headed up high this morning with GS skis. No Gate training today but some technical training.
We found some good fresh snow above about 1800m, so the rain that we had for many hours yesterday turned to snow higher up.

The top of the Saulire, looking towards Courcheval this morning

After about two hours with the GS skis, the temperatures and high humidity started having a detrimental effect on the snow so we went and grabbed the SL skis for a couple of runs until the snow really changed, so we decided to call it a day and head back to prep skis for SL gate training tomorrow morning.