We call it ‘Summer Sliding’ – when the weather is beautiful and the ice is on the track it just doesn’t get any better. Warming up in a t-shirt and then throwing on a speed suit and ripping down the track at 135km/hr is a perfect day. Perfect that is until you get to the 4th run of the session and your neck decides that is is too tired to hold your head up anymore. So it went on day one – after a great summer of training it was back onto the ice with the goal to get as many runs as I possible could during our 3 weeks in Whistler. I thought I was in good shape and looked forward to doing the 4 runs at a time like we did last March……. Meanwhile, back in reality…… It seems that we do indeed build a lot of strength in our necks throughout the season and then subsequently lose that strength over the summer. 4 runs was not an option in October. Having my face plastered to the ice from curve 9 to the finish (7 curves later) was not all that enjoyable. Imagine someone standing on the back of your head and trying to drive your car through rush hour in Los Angeles……

Alas, I did survive and even started to get the hang of the track after a couple of weeks. I was a bit worried that I wouldn’t find the flow after my experiences last March. In March I was not sliding well and found myself 1 second behind on most runs. I made good progress over the first 2 weeks and began to slide competitively with the rest of the guys by the third week. Selections came on the 25th and 26th of October (a 4 run race to try and mimic an Olympic style race) and I felt ready to compete well. The first 2 runs were both a 7/10 with a key mistake in each run costing me a few tenths of a second in each run. So, after day 1 I found myself 0.4s behind Jon and just ahead of Paul. I knew I had to slide well on the second day just to stay in second, let alone content for first. The third run (first run day 2) was by far my best and the time showed it. I slide into the 53 seconds for the first time ever and won the heat by about 0.7s as both Jon and Paul had good runs but not their best. My good run and their mediocre runs put me ahead and into the lead for the final run. I managed to just crack into the 53’s again (53.99) and held off both Jon and Paul to claim the first leg of our 3 race selection process. A great start to what I feel is going to be a season of redemption.