Heather Mooney: West Yellowstone!

Since the last time I've updated, so much has happened! We had a great camp over fall break that included lots of OD workouts, a hike in the Adirondacks, a bonfire, and team pumpkin carving at breadloaf, we've had time trials with UVM, and time trials as a team, we've done bounding workouts in the dark with headlamps, and so much more. It has been a blast, and it has flown by.

Most recently, we just returned from a fantastic week of skiing in West Yellowstone, Montana!! The skiing was beautiful, there was at least two feet of snow, and it was sunny with temps around 20 almost every day...absolutely perfect skiing! It was a great camp, skiing twice a day most days, the trails are really fun, and we were able to ski all of them by the end of the week without ever getting tired of them! Most of us only raced the distance skate race, and overall as a team we had a solid day. For the first race of the season, I think everyone was pleased! I ended up 29th overall, 6th junior, and was very happy with that. I've been working a lot on my skating, and I think it's starting to come together. Also, for the first time I felt like I raced well at altitude, and am really excited to start figuring out how I need to ski differently up there!

For one of our OD skis, a bunch of us skied into Yellowstone Park. It was so beautiful!! Aside from the mountains and plains that were absolutely spectacular, we saw two bald eagles, two herd of elk, one of them fording a river, some trumpeter swans, and two bison!! I had never seen any of these animals before, it was so exciting! The bison started following us down the road, so we hopped into the woods and waited for them to go by. Just as they got near us, they turned their heads, and looked at us, we all thought they were going to follow us into the woods, but they kept going, it was so cool!!

For Thanksgiving, some of the parents got together to prepare us a delicious dinner. Somehow we managed to fit all 25 of us, plus coaches, and parents into the small living room at their cabin to share an amazing family-style dinner. Afterwards, we all sang along while Eliot played the guitar, Andrew the bass, and Bill Neal the mandolin. Although I was sad to have my first thanksgiving away from home, I think this one was my favorite ever! Thanks to all the parents who worked so hard to put together a terrific meal!!

Every day was fabulous skiing, and with nearly every team from the west out there, so it was really fun to be able to catch up with friends I hadn't seen since Spring Series last winter! Coming home to green grass has been a bit tough; West Yellowstone feels a bit like a dream now. But on the good side, we only have one and a half more weeks of class, and then final exam week, and then its off to the first Eastern Cups in Craftsbury! After that we have another camp in Canada, then we'll all be home for Christmas, and then we're headed to Rumford again for nationals the first week of January! And for me, I'll be home for a day after nationals, and then I get to travel to Innsbruck, Austria for Youth Olympics!! Faster skier has been doing interviews with all the skiers from the US headed over there, check out my article here: http://fasterskier.com/2011/11/youth-olympic-games-presents-heather-mooney/

Here are some pictures...they're a bit out of order