Loving Life: January 2012

Having driven to Park City the previous day from Colorado, I squeezed in enough time to Ride at Canyons to stretch my legs out before heading to Tahoe on Monday the 9th of January.

We left around 10am after stopping by Starbucks of course. Anyone who knows me knows how addicted to coffee I am so there will be many more references throughout this post. The skies were blue, the road was clear, and we had my one and only Highlander set at a comfortable 78mph cruise control.Tthe speed limit is 75) With about 500 miles of open road in front of us, we thought it was necessary to set out at a diligent pace. Fortunately for me, I just got an I phone, thanks to my stepdad, so I had lots of entertaining things going on during the drive. I have become an instragram user as well so we took a ton of pictures.

Upon arriving, I was devastated to see how little snow there was in Tahoe, I had heard there wasn't any, but it's hard to believe until you see it! We checked into our place at the base of Northstar, and got to bed early to get ready for training the next morning.

Another beautiful spring-like morning in California had us up on the mountain around 9am. The course wasn't open until 10, so we had a bit to check out the other features on the mountain. The rail line that was setup before you got to the course was really fun to play around, and get warmed up on, but the course was the place to be if you were trying to ride park.

I had a great day training on the course, and felt pretty good. Considering I didn't compete until Friday, I didn't want to push it too hard. A few more days of fun in the sun and Friday had already snuck up on me.

It was a crisp bluebird morning the day of the 13th, and the course was incredibly fast. I had no complaints about the course which consisted of; two options up top, on the right was a down box to a flat-down box, and to the left was a down rail, to a really fun wall ride. To finish it off was two jumps. I chose to hit the left side because the judges had determined it was the "more difficult" line of the two. I had a blast weaving my way through the course, and got two laps in before the contest started.

I was 3rd to last in the heat of about 30-40 girls, so I had a long time to try to stay warm, and focused. Being so early in the morning, I knew people would have trouble putting a run down due to the shady conditions on the course, so I played it pretty safe on my first run, and qualified 2nd for finals.
When finals started the top 6 ladies were gathered at the top around 11am the sun was just peeking out around the trees to light up the course for us. Again I was 4th to drop so I had to stay entirely focused, and warm while waiting for my other competitors to take their runs.

I stomped both of my runs, but in the end I played it just a little too safe. I took third on the podium behind some very talented girls that were really fun to watch. Lots of respect to all of the other women throwing down on this course, it was wildly entertaining! I did my research before awards and found there was a Starbucks conveniently located right in the village where awards were being held so once again, I got some coffee.
We left early the next morning to head back to Park City, arriving a little later than expected we were both so tired at the end we had to hit the hay. Now, off to to Breck for some training, big jumps, and S.I.A.
Thanks to everyone at the REV TOUR and NORTHSTAR for putting on a wonderful event, as well as a thanks to all of my sponsors for your support (Gatorade, Capix, Akinz, Fydelity)
And one special thanks to ECHELON SNOWBOARDS for making this trip possible for me!