What I’ve been up too…. OSLO!

First and foremost – I’m GOING TO OSLO for WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS! I got the call yesterday and am really excited! (More on this later!) Congrats to my fellow teammates, Sadie Bjornsen, Lars Flora, and Kikkan Randall for also making the team.

Life on the road has been extremely busy lately but I have no complaints. The APU team is approaching our 9th week together on the road (with a one-week short break for Christmas!) and we’re about to wrap up the first period of racing with two Super Tours here in Lake Placid. I am slightly behind on my blogging as of late due to our travel schedule and just plain being busy. I plan to write more about US Nationals but I’m saving that as a task for the plane ride home to AK. The time on the road has been sweet but I would be lying if I said that I’m not excited to get back to Alaska. My husband, Rob, has been holding down the fort at home and my cat, Buggz is lonely.

In the meantime, here are some pictures from the last couple of days!

Although it made for an early morning (5:30am after racing 4 races at Nationals!) Fast and Female Bethel was awesome. We had over 130 girls and 29 instructors for a day of skiing, dancing, and yoga. Here I am facilitating a Q & A session with the girls. Kikkan and I are leading the third annual Fast and Female in Anchorage on January 29th – if you’re an Alaskan girl age 9-19, I hope you’ll join us!

The whole group is excited! Thanks to Abby of NENSA for organizing and Gould Academy for hosting

If you’ve never tried Zumba before it’s an absolute HOOT. Think upbeat music and 150 people following an over-enthusiastic dance instructor. It was super fun!

Zumba was followed directly by yoga…. from one energy extreme to the next…

The APU girls team in our Fast and Female instructor sweatshirts with Betty, our “house mom” for the week of nationals. Good accommodations in Rumford are hard to find so we ended up staying WAY out of town in South Paris. Betty made the drive worth it by making us feel at home – she made our beds and picked up our crumbs – we are eternally grateful!

For those of you that wonder what I do everyday that I’m on the road… the last day of racing, the skate sprint involved a 16 hour day with almost 4 hours spent commuting in the car to and from the venue twice. Life on the road requires an insane amount of patience more often than not.

Have you ever seen ski bags on an open-air ferry? This is our team traveling from Rumford, Maine to Lake Placid New York via Lake Champlain. I’m really excited to be in new territory. I haven’t spent much time in the East and I love seeing new places.

Speaking of new places, this is my first time in Lake Placid and the Adirondacks. Here I am in the Cross Country lodge with my 2010 Vancouver teammate, biathlete Haley Johnson. She has a cool new article on Fasterskier this morning titled “Creating those Right Connections.” Haley is a great example of how an elite athlete can positively impact communities. We share a similar philosophy.

Here is Sadie giving Billy a congratulatory kiss!

Walking around Lake Placid is almost eerie when you consider the amazing athletic moments that have happened here. One of the APU condos has TWO copies of Miracle on Ice, the film that accounts the 1980 Gold Medal hockey game. The arena and rink where Eric Heiden won his Speed skating gold medals is only a couple blocks from where we’re staying!