At the beginning of August Hans, Eth, Misha, Susan and I headed to a week-long biathlon camp in Jericho. For the rest of the crew it was something they had done before but attending a true biathlon training camp was a very new experience for me. I had certainly never done that much shooting and there was a lot to learn every day. In some ways I felt like I was playing catch-up, since I’m pretty new to shooting I always had to ask lots of questions to clarify what the workout was or what I was supposed to be doing. A good example of this was one morning when Algis told me to “ski and shoot” to confirm my zero. That means you’re only supposed to ski a quick range loop and come back to shoot again, but I didn’t know that so I went out and skied a couple kilometers! Algis was standing there wondering where I had gone to.
Despite the fact that I sometimes felt a bit lost, I really loved having a week dedicated to biathlon. The huge volume of shooting made for plenty of opportunities to improve and it was fun to feel like I was getting a little better at every training session. Having almost all the biathletes in the country training in the same place for a week was also really fun. The camp ended with two roller ski biathlon races, a sprint on Saturday and a pursuit on Sunday.
Getting some last minute instructions from Algis.
Algis told me to approach the races just like training, but I still got a bit too amped up for the sprint and ended up shooting really poorly. I was determined to do fewer penalty laps the next day (it turns out watching people pass you while you ski around in circles is a huge bummer), so with the help of some coaches I identified a few changes to make before Sunday. It helped a lot and I even managed to hit 4 on my first prone stage! You’re probably not supposed to show any emotion after shooting – either positive or negative – but I was so happy after that stage I’m pretty sure I had a huge smile on my face from the moment I stood up all the way through the penalty lap. Obviously I still have a long, long way to go with shooting but I left camp feeling really excited and motivated to keep working on it.
My Dad came over from Maine to watch the races, which was wonderful!
The rest of the GRP came down to help with the races and cheer. Thanks guys!
Hans on the podium!
A couple weeks after Jericho we hosted our second BKL camp of the summer. Thankfully the week was not nearly as hot as the July camp. The kids did a great job and it was a fun week! Here are a few photos from the adventure race.
Craftsbury boys on the lake.
Embarking on the mountain bike portion of the race.
A couple BKLers taking a watermelon feed.
Josh and Soph consulting the map.
