Olympic Trials recap

Its now been a week since the last day of racing at Olympic Trials that had any meaning. With the team mathematically decided after Monday's racing, Tuesday was an opportunity to have some fun. I ended up finishing fourth that day. My legs were still strong, but unfortunately, I managed to somehow lose my whole left edge and fell on my own two laps into the race. Not a great finish, but after the emotional low of the day before, I wasn't really worried about the outcome. It would have been nice to go out and beat guys that had made the team over me one more time for pride, but it wasn't to be I guess.

Since then I have been dealing with the fallout of not qualifying for something that I had spent everyday of the last four years working towards. For the first couple nights, I had alot of trouble sleeping as thoughts swirled through my mind about this and that. I had expected a let down after trials no matter the outcome, good or bad, just because there is such a build-up to a competition that is as important as Olympic Trials. What I didn't expect though, was that I would feel so free at moments and then so crushed in others only minutes after. Its basically been like a big rollercoaster with plans of doing stuff that I have been putting off because it conflicts with training occupying the highpoints and then having something like a news story, that triggers a memory of a close call at trials bringing everything crashing down. Its tough to say the least, but there are many people in worse situations that me, so life goes on.

Coming back to Yellowknife has been good for me too. I haven't been home for a year and a half, and to be back in a familiar situation is very comforting. Everyone here has been so supportive and really seem to understand the sacrifices I have made to get to this point. The support I have gotten from this town has been truly amazing.

So whats next for me? Well I am still on vacation until Friday when I head back to Calgary. After that I am not exactly sure. I plan to get back into training slowly as I feel ready. There are no competitions for non-Olympic skaters that have any serious meaning until December, so there is no need to train at a super intense level right away. My coach Jon mentioned to me that I shouldn't just jump back in with my brain set on the next Olympic right away, lest I risk completely burning myself out. After failures at major competitions, I often tend to become hyper motivated. This time, I would like to take a couple months of easing back in and making sure that I have good variation in my training and life so that I can be 100% sure that I want to commit myself again at the level that is needed to be one of the top skaters in the world. I will be back in school after a year and a half hiatus this fall, something that will be tough, but is necessary too.

This next season will be tough because there will be so much attention put on the an Olympic Games that I wanted so badly to be at, but I can still make it a good year. Look for new posts that will move away slightly from the norm that you see on this blog coming up in the future.