It has been great here in Spain. I celebrated Christmas in true Spanish style with Chio and her family. I’m now in Sierra Nevada. A huge thanks to Chio for assisting in arranging me to train with the Spanish SX team and arranged lift passes and of course accommodating me.

We’ve managed to get in some good training early in the morning before the public come out to play, practising speed. We managed to do some start gate timing and practised a small wutang out of the starting gate. Thanks to the team for having me.

I will head to Granada on the 30th and celebrate New Year’s Eve down there before heading back to Munich on the 2nd January and onward to St Johann in Tirol, Austria for the next World Cup.
Be in touch soon.

It’s been a very busy couple of weeks. But it does feel good to know that after eight years of University, very part time, I’ve finally completed my bachelor degree in multimedia (business marketing).

I’ve also been offered a scholarship from Smart Connection to start a Diploma of management in 2011, in return for being a guest speaker to their Diploma of fitness students. This is a great opportunity to continue my studies and obtain further qualifications in management.

With my degree under my belt, I had my strength testing which all came out with great results, it’s been an intense couple of months and it’s paying off which is always good to see. Huge thanks to Mick and Dave for all their help and support in the recent months.

So off I set, Europe bound, with a stopover in Beijing to catch up with an old friend who I used to ski race with before hitting the UK on the 1st December.

I will drive across to Austria on the 4th/5th of December (pending whether the Vectra will make it… but I have high hopes) and hope to start training on snow on the 6th December.

First two World Cup competitions are on the 18th and 19th December in San Candido, Italy. With only a few days preparation on snow, I will take these first two comps as a bit of a warm up and training opportunity, before hopefully performing optimally in January.

I spent the week up at Hotham, my first time on snow this season. We were faced with variable difficult weather conditions. High winds, snowing, bad visibility and different snow conditions. The Hotham events team did a great job, putting a lot of effort into getting the course prepared for an inspection and training on Friday.

On Saturday morning we were faced with similar conditions and we managed to get the qualification run off the ground.

I was happy with my run, particularly after I entered one of the berms in the middle of the run expecting it to be ice. Committing to the turn appropriately I found it was windblown soft snow which threw me back hitting my back on the ground pulling myself forward to continue the run, qualifying in second place. The weather was too bad, and the snow too soft in areas to make it safe, so the finals were postponed until Sunday morning.

On Sunday morning the conditions were still difficult but the snow was harder and the course had been worked on. After qualifying in second, I ended up with good gate selections and progressed into the big final.

I was pleased to find myself in such a good position after what has been a difficult year. It was myself, Katya (AUS), Yulia (RUS) and Violetta (RUS). I had a decent start but have to say I was just very slow along the top flat and found myself right on the back of Violetta in fourth place.

As we progressed down the course, Violetta moved out to take more direction into the hip jump and I went more straight, causing us both to scream and land on top of each other over the hip, thank fully we both stayed up and it was close coming into the final turns. I finished in fourth position.

I was pretty happy with the result as much as I would have liked to have held my second place, but it was a good quality final and good racing.

In the second event, I qualified in third place behind Katya(AUS) and Yulia(RUS) which I was again pretty pleased with. I progressed through each of the final heats and found myself achieving a nice overtake across the bridge in the semi final rounds and yet again found myself comfortably in the big final.

It was the same four of us battling for the podium once again. I had a pretty good start and once again just found myself slow across those top rollers. There wasn’t any overtaking and I managed to enter the last couple of turns and crash out.

After all the hiking up to the start gate which was about 200m above the chairlift fighting a head on wind, and two events worth of heats plus training runs all in one day, all our legs were pretty spent!

All in all it was a great weekend of racing and I was stoked to find myself comfortably in the big final for both events.

Onward to New Zealand now so I will be in touch soon!

I thought it was about time to write and give an update of where I am and what I am up to.

As you will see I have spent some time giving my website a facelift! I had quite a lot of new photos and content after my Olympic debut. I returned to Melbourne end of March, straight back into week four of university.

I played catch up at university and had a few, much needed, weeks break from training and tried to let my injuries heal up. I tried to get some wakeboarding in, but sadly that injury to my shin when I hit the fence persisted in giving me grief. I had a great time away at Bonnie Doon nonetheless.

I managed to pick up a job as a mascot. I work usually three or four times a week as Gilbert the Gecko which has proved to be really good fun. I am also assisting to run the snow sports dry-land programme at a local school.

I am still working as a personal assistant as well when needed. I have started back physical training and I’m coming into my last week for this semester at University. I will be completing my last subject next semester and should have my degree in Multimedia (Business Marketing) come November.

My three jobs are flexible and with just one subject at University next semester it should allow me quite a lot of time for training leading up to the next northern season. I am unsure of my plans this southern season, but I will try to get on snow if I can. I have been asked to do a photo shoot in New Zealand early September which is awesome.

My injuries are getting better and physical gains are coming back slowly. I also got my Olympic bib and all the 17 nation pins that I spent so much time collecting, framed and it looks great!

I will be in touch soon!

I rocked up to the event in Meiringen hobbling with bandages in my boots and anti-inflammatories. They moved the course at Meiringen which I was happy about. The course looked good. It was very busy but I knew with the pain that I was in this was going to be difficult. I took four painkillers and started training.

The course was so busy that first run I got a little lost and missed one section. I could feel the pain in my lower legs. The second run was an improvement and the third was going even better until I headed into the fastest section of the course where there was a jump into a long compression with an up jump.
As I was heading into the up-jump at full speed and approaching the take off, the gate keeper suddenly raised a yellow flag and I couldn’t do anything! I started to panic. I straightened my leg as a natural reaction, knowing that there was another competitor lying on the other side off the jump but I had no idea where.

This caused me to launch off the jump and whilst in mid-air I saw Sanna Luedi (SUI) lying in the fence. I knew that I wasn’t going to hit her but I was heading straight for the fence lower down. I landed with a fence fast approaching and only had one thought in my head “Broken legs for sure.” Then a split second later BANG! I was at full speed with flat skis straight into a fence.

Isi the Spanish coach and one of the Canadian coaches came running over to help. I was in pain but was OK considering. Now my tibia and fibula joint was really hurting me! My shin, well I had just gone straight over the top of them into a fence, so they were killing me and somehow I managed to pull my groin quite badly, and was unable to lift my leg.

Any normal person would say: “OK stop now!” But no, I got to the top, in a decent amount of pain, to find out that training had been extended by five minutes because of my crash and of course the only person who didn’t get another run because of it was me! It didn’t make a lot of sense. I took four more pain killers (taking the total to eight) and decided I wanted to do my qualification run so as not to finish the season with a full speed crash into the fence to dwell on over summer.

Struggling to move at the top, with tears streaming down my face and the people closest to me on the circuit saying: “Sar maybe you should just stop now”, I started my qualification run. I produced a terrible time and knew that my next stop was home.

Ken was shocked I managed to finish granted my physical condition. I left Meiringen limping, knowing I was already finished mentally and emotionally but now I was finished physically as well. Just to top it off, I had broken my race skis as well. Brilliant!

A huge thanks to you Ken. Your help was very much appreciated. I spent the next 24 hours hobbling around stiff with whip lash, trying to book myself back to Australia as soon as possible.

A few minor things I need to achieve in the next 48 hours or so:

1. Getting to France to pick up my car after the back suspension broke off on the highway and we left it near a garage on the side of the road a month and a half earlier.
2. Driving the Vectra 12 hours back to the UK knowing that it probably won’t make it further than Dijon
3. Changing my flight from Heathrow to Melbourne ASAP
4. Cancelling my flight to Spain (where the last World Cup was)
5. Making it in time to catch my ferry to the UK after missing two buses and two trains to go and get my car, and what should have taken four and half hours taking 12.
6. Leaving the Vectra in Fareham with family and getting to Heathrow with my entire luggage then venturing into London to pick up yet another bag of kit I had left there.
7. A short 32 hour journey home London to Melbourne via Honk Kong and Auckland.
8. Catch up on three weeks of university that I have missed

A busy time, but I am looking forward to getting home, and spending the next month resting and catching up on University.

“On the road again…like a band of gypsies we go down the highway…”

Chio arrived shortly after me into Geneva airport and we got a lift to the Formula 1 hotel with the French team guys for the night, slightly embarrassed that my skis were in a long plastic bag. The next morning we were greeted by Isi and Martin (Spanish coach and Tech) who had just completed a 20-hour drive from Granada and we threw our stuff in the back of the van and literally jumped right in on top of it!

We arrived in Grindelwald Switzerland and shortly after we arrived I was greeted by Ken Chance-Larsen. Ken is the physio who had been sent out from the UK by TASS (but he is Norwegian). I had told poor Ken that I didn’t have any injuries, but by this stage, my tibia and fibula joint was killing me from being smashed in Branas and my shins on my right leg were giving me serious grief.

I took painkillers and persisted with the training. Ken later bandaged my shin inside my boot as it was swelling right along the inside of the bone. Struggling with suspected stress fractures, I was unable to pressure my skis properly and I knew that the end of my season was drawing near.

Sadly the vital turn in the course at Grindelwald is a high speed compression type turn on your right foot with bumps. Not surprisingly, this is the area of the course I lost all my speed on in qualification and due to only 31 girls finishing; I made the finals in 30th position…eeeek! This was getting worse and worse.

The first day of finals the fog came in and you literally couldn’t see anything. They decided after running seven out of the eight girls’ heats they would postpone it until the next day and re start the whole race. Fortunately the weather was fantastic on the next day and we pulled a great race off. I knew nothing was going to help my shins now, so I just gave the start my all, had a decent one and then of course got overtaken in the vital turn which I tried to pressure my ski but just got pushed down and overtaken.

I followed on down and nearly had a large crash off the last jump. I entered the jump still on my edge, I came off, headed backwards in the air and I was sure I was gone, but somehow landed on both edges (putting further stress on my already sore tibia and fibula joint near my knee) and somehow managed to hold it crossing the finish line, shaking my hand as if to say “phew that was close!” The swelling down my shin had moved even further down extending about 20cm down my shin. Feeling like a bit of an invalid it was off to Meiringen to give it a shot!

After spending much of my time at the Olympics filled with disappointment, suddenly it was the losing ceremony and Team GB was off on a British Airways flight back to London. The next event was in Sweden in Branas and whilst I felt like I wasn’t really there mentally or emotionally, I made myself press on as usual. I flew to Stockholm Arlanda and got a lift with Tuomas from Finland to Branas (about five hours away) rocking out to his favourite death metal tracks along the way…I was stoked when he pulled out his Roxette CD for a change… I can assure you!!

The course in Branas last year was amazing. It was fast paced, had lots of features, big jumps down the last flat, and big double/triple along the last run into the last jump. I had always planned to at least finish the season with Branas as the course was great.

However, this year it was flat and had no features with tiny rollers you could absorb and ended up a total gliding race. In training I managed to get off balance in the air off the last jump, landing on my inside edge and I think hitting my femur straight onto the top of my tibia and fibula joint. It was nothing painkillers couldn’t get rid of! So other than star-fishing off the first jump, I just wasn’t fast which just added to my mental and emotional burden. Chio had an equally disappointing time there in Branas and we both decided maybe the Europa Cups in Spain were looking more appealing than the following World Cups in Switzerland.
Unfortunately due to the bad weather the races in Spain looked like they weren’t going to go ahead, so it was a five-hour, Death Metal filled ride back to Stockholm with Tuomas (greatly appreciated) and onwards to Geneva. I did find it a little strange at Arlanda Stockholm Airport (the supporting airport of the Swedish Olympic Team) that when I tried to check in my 20kg ski bag with two pairs of race skis inside, that they refused. I was informed that it is against the airport rules to have two pairs of skis in one bag.

Now I got to be honest, I am not convinced that Anja Paerson travelled to the Olympic Games with 20 ski bags for her 20 pairs of skis. But even better, they handed me a plastic bag to put the other pair in. I am also not convinced that Anja Paerson travelled with her race skis in plastic bags either! With tears dwelling in my eyes, I asked to speak to a manager and tried to explain to them that I simply could not travel with my world cup race stock competition skis in a plastic bag. After 45 minutes of arguing, a long queue accumulating behind me, and my boarding time approaching, I gave in and yes my world cup skis travelled to Geneva in a Scandinavian airlines plastic bag.

What was better upon arrival in Geneva was bumping into Jeff Sadis, the Techie for a few girls on the circuit, who had lost his entire luggage and was fuming. However, he managed to crack a big smile and have a good laugh as I cruised up to him with my skis in a SAS plastic bag over my shoulder. It was then that Jeff came out with one of the finest comments I have ever heard and it was so accurate that it almost made me cry: “It scares me how much of this sport is not to do with what you actually do on the race course.”

And that is right there, the story of my skiing career.

Three words to describe my Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic experience: amazing, inspiring and disappointing.

On 23rd February I headed to Cypress Mountain for my Olympic debut. The conditions changed from bright sunshine (that we had all week for training) to cloudy with wet snow falls. My training had been going well all week.

Along with most of the competitors I sat in the tent at the top of the course watching the live coverage of the first few competitors (if I could go back in time I would change this, but I can’t). I sat watching the first 24 competitors go down the Cypress Mountain Olympic course before deciding to get myself prepared.
I started to shake while watching the other competitors and left the tent feeling breathless and stressed. I don’t know why this happened. No one had put any pressure on me and no one had any expectations of me. After all, my lifelong dream was to get to the Olympic Games. I was living my dream. Yet I put a huge amount of pressure on myself to perform just ten minutes prior to my qualification run. I don’t think I will ever understand what happened that day.

I left the starting gate missing my start, missing my pole plant, twisting sideways and barely making it over the first feature. Interestingly all the competitors had spent most of their training time just practising the first two features. We had all never skied anything like them. Amazingly the Canadians flew over them with no problem every run. It is amazing what a year of training on them will do.
I lost 1.5 seconds from the winner in the first 10 metres. On a good day I will be 2.5 seconds behind on a full length World Cup course of 1 minute 8 sec in length. The course in Cypress was 1.2 km and I had already lost 1.5 seconds in 10 metres. If that wasn’t the start to a shocker I don’t know what is!
I continued on down the course after a terrible start trying to catch up time. The first few features I skied well, then about a third of the way down off the big Olympic ring jump I landed long, took an indirect line and just lost all my speed heading into the flat section of the course. I unfortunately had lost my speed and couldn’t do anything about it.

I didn’t manage to clear the jumps along the flat, which had not happened on any other run. I had an oncoming head wind and I hit the back side of the triple and the double, and then landed dead flat on the corner jump, crawling into the two final jumps. I knew I had stuffed the run up when I saw I was 33rd with one more competitor to go. I felt disappointment. I smiled for the camera and tried to appreciate my Olympic experience.

But when I saw the final time on the scoreboard that is when I just fell into a heap. The time was really slow, slower than I could even imagine. I had never been that far out in my life. Why did it have to be on the one day I have worked towards for 14 years when the whole world is watching?

I finished the event in 34th position. I was totally disappointed as I had been so competitive at the events coming into the Olympics. I think my result was a representation of what I had endured physically, mentally and emotionally in my journey to the Olympic Games. I guess I had hoped it might all finally fall into place but instead it was quite the opposite.

Everyone keeps trying to remind me I am one of only 35 women in the world who qualified for the Olympic Games for ski cross. I know I travelled a different journey to most. I know how hard I worked to get there and then I got there and it was satisfying. But for a result that bad to come along and crush that dream which I managed to achieve it is pretty devastating.

I spent a lot of the following days in Vancouver punishing myself over it. It is easy to say snap out of it and appreciate what you have achieved but I guess you always want more. I don’t think I will ever be satisfied with my Olympic experience. I am better than that but maybe one day I will be able to appreciate the hard journey in achieving my dream.

After days of devastation, I was pretty pleased to have achieved swapping my GB pins for an official pin from all 17 nations that competed in ladies ski cross. My collection is complete.

The closing ceremony was a great event. I would describe it as organised chaos, but it was enjoyable. Last night we had a final athlete party in the athlete’s lounge in the Vancouver village. After punishing myself all week and not hitting the town at all, I decided to give it a go. I thought it wasn’t going to happen after enjoying a cup of tea with Chio at midnight. We gave it one last shot and thankfully I felt a change and we danced into the early morning.

I managed to swap a number of pieces of clothing that night – a Czech Republic pyjama top, Swiss furry jacket, Swedish T-shirt and a Danish Curling top (I tried my heart out to get the mens’ Danish curling pants with colourful diamonds all over them, but he refused! He said it was because he had to do media stuff upon his return but I wasn’t convinced! All in all, my outfit was incomplete). Overall it was a good night and I finally had a smile on my face. I have really enjoyed the company of my GB Freestyle team mates Sarah Ainsworth (aerials) and Ellie Koyander (moguls). It has been a great experience for the three of us and I look forward to reuniting at the next major freestyle event.

Team GB departs the village today. We will set off for a final team lunch on the water, before heading to Vancouver airport and flying back to Heathrow. It has been fantastic to meet so many athletes from other sports. I have extended my trip to try and finish the remainder of the ski cross season, I just haven’t had a chance to enjoy myself this season. I need to remember why I do this sport; why I love this sport and why I enjoy this sport. I can’t say that I feel good at the moment, but hopefully after another month of events I will.

Then I am back to University to play catch up and hope to knock a few more subjects off the list. My next goal is to complete my University degree by the end of 2010. An Olympic Games and a degree in one year would be pretty pleasing. I am now in the process of trying to realise my next life goal. I will be in touch soon.