div style=”text-align: left;”object height=”344″ width=”425″param name=”movie” value=”http://www.youtube.com/v/3-HUdr82eEoamp;hl=enamp;fs=1″param name=”allowFullScreen” value=”true”param name=”allowscriptaccess” value=”always”embed src=”http://www.youtube.com/v/3-HUdr82eEoamp;hl=enamp;fs=1″ type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” allowscriptaccess=”always” allowfullscreen=”true” height=”344″ width=”425″/embed/objectbr //divdiv style=”text-align: center;”br //divdiv style=”text-align: center;”span style=”font-size:85%;”span style=”font-style: italic;”CO Heidi to backcountry, ID/span/spanbr /br /div style=”text-align: left;”Like any job, cross-country skiers get their two weeks – ours are just two weeks of UN-paid vacation.br /br /How are these two weeks different that the 351 other days of a pro-athlete’s life?br /br /They are not logged. I wake up and go for a run, I meet friends for coffee, I go for a backcountry ski and then bee-line it to a deck for lunch. I shoot to the gym and finish the day with a bike ride and some grilled food. I wear lots of sunscreen and still get burnt. I laugh more than I speak and I am going all day long. I sleep hard at night and I am thankful every minute.br /br /These are the days of everything. You can do it all because there is not a race in the morning and there are no intervals at 7am. They are not days of slacking, in fact they are filled over the rim. I am healthy, I am able and these are my 2 weeks.br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_PPMeqZXka1Y/SfQAjKEBuEI/AAAAAAAAAj8/DDDL27x2zIA/s1600-h/Mom+and+Kate,+circa+1985.jpg”img style=”margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 146px; height: 200px;” src=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_PPMeqZXka1Y/SfQAjKEBuEI/AAAAAAAAAj8/DDDL27x2zIA/s200/Mom+and+Kate,+circa+1985.jpg” alt=”” id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5328884863082805314″ border=”0″ //abr /I am the luckiest kid ever and May first is on Friday. It might be the start of the weekend for most, but for me it is the begining of 2010. I have been sick and injured, broke and currently homeless but Vancouver is 10-months away. There are skeptics – but I am not one. The game has been on since I was 5 and it will not end today.br /br /Living the dream,br /Katebr //div/divdiv class=”blogger-post-footer”img width=’1′ height=’1′ src=’https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/4299718529371785873-6904093466268444395?l=in-the-arena-kate.blogspot.com’ alt=” //div
