Something Special Happened This Week

Well, something just happened that I just have to post. It's late October as I write this (even though our blog is currently set in July). One of the things I've started doing recently is searching other blogs relating to Special Olympics. Unfortunately, there are all-too-frequent ugly references to those who participate in Special Olympics in many blogs out there. When I can, I will comment on the blog that these are offensive comments and that the authors of them betray their ignorance of the dedication, hard work, and incredible challenges that each Special Olympian faces every day.

So I posted such a comment yesterday on someone's blog and I was very pleasantly surprised with an email the next morning apologizing for the insensitive remarks and the blogger removed them immediately.

Not only that, but the blogger has now posted a link to our blog on the front page of his, that looks like this:

"BLOGWATCH: Cory's Dream

The blog’s header tells what it is all about:
Ski Racing with Cory The story of an 18 year-old young man with autism, his love of skiing fast, and his dream of racing in the Special Olympics World Games in 2013. Poignant and rousing, this blog opened my eyes to the plight of mentally challenged children and their families. It takes an amazing amount of determination to deal with the hardships, and it is simply inspiring to see the blog author Michael encourage his son Cory to achieve his dream."

Here's the link to that blog:

http://thadhinunangan.blogspot.com/2007/10/blogwatch-corys-dream.html


Now I believe it takes a special person to apologize, especially in the impersonal world of cyberspace, where it is so easy to be belligerent. But it takes a remarkably special person to not just apologize, but to then take our story and try to educate others with it as well.

The blog's author is in the Phillipines, so he has never skied. But I have thanked him for his very special gesture and Cory and I have invited him to join us at anytime, since we'd love to have him learn to ski with us.

An example of the world of the internet at its very best, isn't it?

Special Olympics Ski Racing - Hurricane Comes to a Wonderful End

So Cory and I are now into our last two days of his training at Hurricane Ski Camps on Mount Hood, in July 2007.

We're used to the routine, we make sure we leave a few minutes earlier than the others and we are the first in line for the first lift of each of the last two days.




Here's Max arriving at the lift, a few minutes after us, with Samantha behind him:


Then Samantha and Ben:

And then Bob Vial walking by us on his way up, with Max in the foreground and Samantha right behind him.


Today we switch from Giant Slalom training to Slalom, so we need a different set of skis. We returned the GS skis to Atomic the day before to learn that they had no SL skis available in Cory's size, but he can keep the boots for at least another day. So off we go again to all the other manufacturers' shops, until we find a pair at Volkl's out of the way location - around a corner and up some rickety stairs. A pair of Racetiger World Cup Slalom skis, 155 cm to be exact.

It's a good day of training - Cory is faced with some new slalom-style layouts but he does fine and the Volkl skis seem to be particularly good for him. He's making good pole-plants and getting more aggressive on his turns. Bob talks to him about keeping his eyes further down the course - not watching the tips of his skis, but to use his peripheral vision to see directly in front of him and keep his head up looking towards the next gate. Cory is always impressed when someone uses a big word - "whoa, peripheral", and I take a few moments to show him what Bob means by putting my finger at the side of his head and telling to keep looking forward. As I move my finger forward, he now begins to see it in this peripheral vision, and that's how Bob wants him to see his ski tips.

Doing this kind of demonstration is important for autistic people to understand what is being said. And he begins to ski with his head up a bit more.

It's a bigger crowd of athletes today, so it makes for longer lift lines. During one of our waits, I begin talking to Cory about his week at Hurricane and he talks about how much hard work is involved - the early rising, the organizing and carrying of all the equipment up the mountain and back down again.

I laugh when he says he's more of a "baggage handler" than a skier while at Hurricane, that there's more baggage handling than actual skiing. It's a funny comment and underscores a certain ability to correlate that I didn't realize he was capable of - so that was pretty cool. But it also highlights his difficulty in understanding the real value of the camp. It's true there really wasn't a lot of skiing - when we ski together we'll often get in more runs in a couple of hours than we did in a half-day at Hurricane. The value was in the learning and how much better a racer Cory was becoming, but he really couldn't see that, he just couldn't understand why there wasn't more skiing. It was the first of many conversations that we've had, and continue to have about Hurricane.

Another really interesting aspect of the week that he did not really notice, but I sure did. I realized how much he wanted to do things for himself. As parents of an autistic child, albeit a highly-functioning one, we constantly walk a fine line between needing to do something for him or letting him get on and learning the activity for himself. Obviously, we try to let him learn as much as he can (try teaching tying a shoe lace to a young autistic person!), but we also don't want him to reach a frustration level with the many challenges he faces every day. And real life steps in too - there just isn't always enough time to let him do things that the rest of us can do in a few seconds.

For example, he can take a lot of extra time just putting on a hoodie - he wants to make sure that the hood is not caught up in the back of his neck, so he will shake the shoulders of the hoodie several times as he puts it on. The rest of us do that in a moment, but Cory will take 30 seconds or so to make sure it's on properly. He's a bit of a perfectionist in a world that has little time for perfection.

But I realized sometime during our week at Hurricane, that he was trying to do a lot more for himself. I remember packing up our backpack and suddenly his hands were right in there with mine - getting in the way more than helping - but the wonderful thing is he wanted to do it himself. It's pretty cool to watch your son growing up - taking more responsibility - right before your eyes.

So now he's agreed that this winter, he will learn how to get on a chairlift with a backpack. The lift attendents ask you to remove the backpack (so that you are sitting as far back in the chair as you should be, otherwise the consequences can be a real downer, so to speak), so you need to get on the chair while carrying your poles and the backpack. We'll try that this winter at our home mountain - Cypress Mountain just north of Vancouver, BC - so that next summer he'll be carrying his own backpack on Mount Hood. That will sure make my life easier next year.

So a good uneventful day on Mount Hood.

Snack time with Max, Cory (and his Atomic boots), Ben, and Sam, all a-smiling for my camera:



Later that afternoon, the whole gang of us heads out to a local lake, to cool off from the record heat, then a bar-b-que dinner and marshmallows around the fireplace.















Max and Cory on the left;
Ben and Sam on the right

Another of Max & Cory

And a chin-up contest, where Cory holds his own:

























And then it's the last day of training at Hurricane. All goes routinely (it's definitely a routine now), another warm sunny day, until we get to the race course. This time, with each of the 15-16 camps setting up full slalom courses, the hill is a maze of red and blue poles. Cory is perplexed and confused - he can't tell where he needs to ski - and since he is very concerned with not missing any gates, he is starting to panic a bit.


"No problem, Cor, I'll take you through the course and show you". Now Bob is busy with Ben who has equipment problems, so I take Cory through the first couple of gates and then suddenly realize that I can't tell where our course goes either. Suddenly, we hear somebody yell at us "get off our course" and it's clear we're on the wrong course, so we move over, go through another couple of gates, and then hear "get off our course" again from a different group.


So we're totally confused and I decide we might just as well ski down to the lift and try again. Keep in mind that an autistic person has difficulty adjusting to new environments, and is typically much more comfortable in a set routine. But the entire week has been anything but routine for Cory - everything has been very different. An unfamiliar place, a different home and bed, different food, different people, different ski equipment, different training routines and courses, and now a completely different and challenging race course that is nothing like he has ever seen before. And add in extreme heat and wind to the whole scenario too.


So we get back onto the chair and I see that he is so confused and afraid that he has some tears on his face. Now there's never a great time for a melt-down, but this is really not a good scene. Several hundred elite skiers of his own age simply would not understand what Cory is faced with - the real challenge that his autism is presenting him with at the moment - the real difficulty of dealing with the pressure of adapting to so many new things, and now the fear of skiing through the race course and missing some gates. The pressure that he has felt during the entire week is now coming through in real raw emotion.


I have maybe 5 minutes to get him calmed down and re-focused on his racing. Fortunately, he is sitting at one end of the chair and I am right next to him - so the two other racers do not really know what's going on. Keep in mind too that the wind is still blowing hard and it's difficult to be understood, but I tell him that he really needs to get it back together by the time we reach the top. Fortunately, I remember something that happened at breakfast time that made him laugh, so I begin talking about that and just as we get to the top, he has calmed down. But he is still very confused about the race course.


We then ski over to our lane and I quietly go up to Bob to tell him that Cory is really confused about the course. So Bob does his best to explain the course to us, but it's still pretty hard to see exactly where to go.

But within a few minutes, it's Cory's turn and even though he is still afraid and confused, he goes for it.


Well, not only does he go for it - he skis brilliantly through the entire course and nails every single gate. Bob calls him a natural slalom ace and we ski back to the lift.


But this time, it's not Cory, but now I'm in tears - I was just so proud, not just by how he skied, but how he faced his fears, showed a ton of courage, and nailed the course. I caught up to him at the lift line and quietly said to him "you have the heart of a champion". To this day, he still doesn't understand what he accomplished in that moment, but I told him that he proved to me and to anyone that even with autism, he CAN do anything. That he has the heart and the courage to face any challenge and defeat it face on. He truly has that hard-to-define quality of a champion - heart, courage, guts, determination, persistance - whatever you call it, he's got it.


And I cried pretty much all the way to the top of the chair - just like he had a few moments before.


My wife and I were very, very proud when he won his 3 bronze medals in the Provincial Games - setting a goal for himself and achieving it the way he did - but this was an even prouder moment for me, because of the hurdles, the raw fear and obvious confusion , that he had to overcome. The only unfortunate part was my wife was not there to share it, but I couldn't wait to tell her all about it on the phone later on.


I still am emotional as I write this - 3 months later. What a wonderful, wonderful moment in my life as Cory's dad.

Though I don't I will ever need a visual reminder of what Cory accomplished on July 11, 2007, and how I felt about it, here's one of Bob's videos showing Cory going through the slalom course later that day, in his Atomic RT Ti100 boots and on his Volkl Racetiger World Cup skis. And that's me skiing behind him.

Unfortunately, Bob received a cell phone call just as Cory started.







The next day, it was time to say good-bye. I took a few moments the night before to thank Sam, Ben, and Max for accepting Cory as they did and for helping us all week long. They were obviously pleased that everything worked out and I think they were somewhat surprised at what an autistic person was all about (Sam had asked me earlier about autism and I had given her a general outline).

Then it came time to say thank you to Bob. I'm sure that a parent who has no intellectually disabled children can not fully understand how I felt at that moment, but I did my best to express my gratitude to Bob for giving Cory a real opportunity to realize his dream, and for giving me such a special moment in my life.

Many others would have found a way to refuse Cory's participation, for whatever reason. But from the first moment I contacted Bob, he was completely open to making this work, and for that, I am forever grateful.

Thank you, Bob Vial.

Cory, with Bob, at the top of Mount Hood:

So now we're into slow season - July to December - but we have a plan to develop and we need some help to make it happen. Stay tuned.

Special Olympics Ski Racing - Days Two & Three at Hurricane

So we survived the first day. Lessons learned from Day One:

1. we need to be better prepared to get to the hill early and ready to board the lift, so that I don't start putting my skis on backwards again!
2. we also need to be better organized so that all our gear is easier to carry from the car to the lift, then onto the lift and to the hill
3. Cory's boots are far too "mooshy"; we need to get back to Govy quickly after training so we can get better selection for demo skis and boots

It's another 5am radio alarm wake-up, 5:15 jog, 5:30 breakfast. But this time, since we now know the way up the mountain (lesson #4 I guess from Day One), we make it a quick breakfast - who can eat at that time anyway?? - and we're on our way by 5:45. Another beautiful day a-rising, and Cory and I are the first ones in line at the lift, giving us plenty of time to get boots on, helmet on, sweaters and jackets on (even though it will be far too warm later in the morning for anything but a T-shirt), make sure the back pack is ready to go, and all is much better during the load.

With one hiccup though. The Atomic ski boots that Cory is demo-ing are much, much stiffer than anything we've ever used before, and Cory is unable to get his boots on by himself. Conveniently, there is a bench right at the front of the line, so we set ourselves up on there to get our boots on. While I'm struggling with these really stiff boots to open them up enough for Cory to get a foot in, I realize that any attempt to have Cory blend-in with the other athletes is now totally useless - not only am I the only adult in the entire line-up except for the liftees (as lift attendents are known), but I'm now on my knees wrestling with Cory's boots in front of them all. Note to self: tomorrow we don't use the bench where everyone can see us.

It's a pretty good morning of training - Cory's Atomic RT TI 100 boots are helping and his Fischer race skis are making a difference too.

Something else that we've learned - flex. Racing ski boots are much more rigid than recreational boots - the idea I believe is to transfer more of the power coming through the legs into the boot and therefore to the ski. The more rigid the boot, the less energy is absorbed by it, so it is transferred more effectively to the ski. The downside though, is it takes a lot more "oomph" on the part of the skier to make the boot work, and the comfort level takes a dive. It's just another of those sacrifices that competitive athletes have to make to be successful - more efficient boot, less comfortable boot. Funny though, things like that don't seem to matter to any athlete standing on a podium.

Top World Cup racers would use boots with a flex of somewhere in the 150 range. So Cory's Atomic RT Ti 100's have a flex of 100 - a very moderate rigidity for two reasons. Cory is not used to a rigid boot, so a higher flex will really be uncomfortable for him and two, he only weighs about 120 lbs., so he has not yet fully developed his leg muscles, so a higher flex will make it difficult for him to use the boots as they are meant to be used - and he could be sitting back on his skis, rather than over towards the tips as he should be.

The amazing thing is, considering it's his first ever set of racing ski boots, he finds them quite comfortable, and it's really only at the end of training that he finds any discomfort at all. So we're onto something good, and we hope to be able to keep the boots for the rest of the week, but we'll have to check in at the Atomic shop in Government Camp every day to see if that is possible.

A similar story with his first racing skis - a more rigid ski that requires more effort than a recreational ski, but gets much better results with faster turns, more grip, less skid. Now, we've not really considered buying racing skis before - with a price tag of over $1000/pair - that's not something you walk into a shop and buy without trying them. So this is Cory's first opportunity to try them, and according to Coach Bob, he's skiing better today.

Here's Cory standing in his new Atomic boots amid a jumble of Fischer skis. That's Ben resting to Cory's right. And Cory's wearing his new blue & white race suit.

Like Day One, Day Two is Giant Slalom training with different drills and short courses throughout the morning. Bob continues to provide constant feedback to all the athletes and is video-taping several of the runs. Cory is improving his plant plants just about every time he skis through a course.

By noon, the sun is high, as is the temperature, and with the snow conditions deteriorating, it's time to head back to Govy. Once again, we can ski only a portion of the way down, then change out of our ski boots into our runners, take off sweaters, and lug all our equipment back to the car in the parking lot. This time we make it back to Govy in time to have a good selection of equipment to choose from and since Atomic will let Cory keep his boots for another day, he also chooses a set of Atomic GS skis, and we return the Fischer skis.


Another stop at The Huckleberry Inn for another milkshake of course, this time sticking with good old chocolate instead of huckleberry.


After another famous Bob dinner, then it's time for video review, with Bob going over the day's proceedings. That's Cory in the foreground, with Max on his right, then Ben, and Samantha lying on the floor under the table.









Now onto ski waxing. Cory has returned his Fischers, so he doesn't need to wax his skis, but the others do, and they take the time to show us how to do it too. So I wax mine, using an iron to melt the wax - don't want the iron to smoke though, since that means it's too hot. So a little bit of trial and error and I'm done. I find myself being really drawn into the whole ski racing culture thing - the early rising, the hard work of organizing and schlepping all the equipment, trying different skis and boots and learning all about that, and now looking after our skis with a little TLC by waxing every day.

By now, the others are interacting a bit more with Cory - they've seen that he is not too much unlike them. Samantha in particular was really trying to help - she showed us how she waxed her skis, and I noticed several times during the morning training that she would look over her shoulder while standing in line at the top, or in the ski lift, to make sure that Cory was there and doing OK.


In fact, Samantha was instrumental in getting Cory to understand how to use his ski edges properly - she used a certain exercise with him on the hill, whereby he stood sideways to the hill in his skis, Sam stood a few feet away down the hill, grabbed one of his poles and tried to pull him towards her and down. The only way Cory could prevent that was to put a lot of pressure on the inside edge of his skis, and that is the type of pressure a racer needs to exert to make correct turns. After that, Cory's turns definitely improved.

Ben was the youngest of the group, and Bob had a good time bugging him a bit throughout the week. Ben comes from a wealthy home, so Bob got on Ben's case about not having a butler around during training to do everything for him. We all enjoyed a few laughs at Ben's expense during the week and to his credit, he was very good-natured about the whole thing. Because he was a bit younger and had less race experience than Sam or Max, he kind of hung around with Cory a bit more than the others.


Max was the de facto leader of the group - not just the oldest, but also the best skier. If Cory can get to Max's level, a world championship is a definite possibility. Several times, Max chipped in with encouragement and advice for Cory - so the week was turning out really well in every way.


Even some of the other coaches on the mountain would stop and speak with Cory - praising his skiing and offering encouragement. I'm guessing Bob had spoken to some of them about our situation, so it was pretty cool of them to go out of their way to support us.


So that's about the end of Day Two, early to bed of course, what with another 5am alarm.


"Time to wake up, Cor. We gotta get going if we're going to be first in line at the lift again" I say to Cory, fighting back the "I'd really like to stay in bed a bit longer feeling". Actually, getting up early for skiing is one of the best reasons to get up in the morning, especially on a nice day, so it really wasn't that difficult. And on this day, the Portland radio stations are forecasting record-setting heat of over 100 fahrenheit.


So now we have our routine nailed, and once again, we are first in line at the lift. Bob walks by a little later and since Max, Ben, and Sam are right behind us, says "Hurricane Front and Center", so he's obviously pleased to see us all organized and eager to get started on our 3rd day of training.


And here's some proof, it's just after 6:15am at the foot of Mount Hood:



Another Giant Slalom day, this one with longer courses and since Cory likes to ski fast, he's pleased. But, a HUGE problem - he's never seen a course like this before. The only courses he's raced in have a very standard set up with gates off-set at regular intervals throughout the course. But this one is different.

Bob explains that this course has a "delay gate" - Cory and I don't know what he is talking about. Apparently, this is a training tool to deliberately change the racer's rhytym part-way through the course. It's an extra pole that forces the racer to delay a turn slightly, thereby changing the rhythm of the turns and challenging the racers a bit more.

Now the extra pole looks exactly like the other poles which indicate a gate. I've mentioned earlier that Cory is always very much concerned with missing a gate - he knows it means disqualification, and in the black and white world of autism, a gate is a gate, there can be no such thing as a gate that is not really a gate. In hindsight, if Bob had called it a "delay panel", instead of a "delay gate", then maybe Cory would have understood better.

This delay panel was set very close to the previous gate, so trying to make a turn before the delay panel was very difficult - the idea was for the racer to make a turn AFTER the delay panel. But as Cory raced down the course, he saw a panel behind another panel, figured it was a gate not to be missed and tried to make an impossible turn. He caught one ski in the panel, rotated his body around it as he crashed to the ground and brought his hand forward just as he hit, and we discovered later, injured his thumb by spiking into the hard snow. At this point, he was still sliding down and then crashed into another gate which finally stopped him. But he got up, and finished his run.

It was unfortunate, not just because of his injury, but Bob had been video-taping this run, and it was the only opportunity to have Cory on video, skiing at a good speed, since it was on a long run. But the fall spooked him a bit, and the rest of his run was rather cautious.

By the next day, his thumb was a dark blue, very well-bruised, but not painful enough to stop him from training - so all things considered, it could have been a lot worse.

And this day, it was really, really hot up there. I mentioned the wind in an earlier post. It sure made communication difficult - you sometimes had to be very close to someone in order to be heard. And since Cory has difficulty processing information even under the best conditions - he gets frustrated when he can't hear instructions properly. So this and the heat added quite a bit of stress to the entire training time.

On Atomic RT Ti 100 boots and Atomic GS 12 skis, Cory continues to make progress. He's making good pole plants now, planting them at the right time to initiate a turn. Once again, I notice that he sees something differently than me: when using his poles, he's often trying to push with them, instead of just gently touching the ground with them to initiate a turn. After all, in Cory's eyes, that what poles are for - to give you the ability to push with your poles to get started or gain speed. So we need to work on that concept - what Bob calls "popping the balloon" with a ski pole - just a gentle touch, not a hard push which actually serves to slow him down.

I also notice that he keeps his hands up so that his poles will clear the ground - not realizing that if he bends his wrist backwards, he can then hold his poles parallel to the ground so that he can keep his hands lower for more aerodynamics and a lower centre of gravity. So we'll work on that too.

So here he is in action, Atomic boots and Atomic skis and with a sweater over his race suit, it's still early in the morning:




And then later in the day:





And some of the others in action. First Ben:













Then Sam:


















And now Max:

And a last one of Cory:

On my next post, I'll cover the last two days of training at Mount Hood, including a very proud moment to be Cory's dad, a ski purchase, a good-bye and a huge thank you to Bob Vial.

Special Olympics Ski Racing - 1st Day at Hurricane

"Good Morning, it's 5am on July 7, 2007, in beautiful Portland Oregon and we're expecting beautiful sunny skies and very warm temperatures for the next few days". That's our radio wake-up call, yes at 5am, for our first day at Hurricane Ski Camp.


A definite routine to learn - 5am wake-up, 5:15am jog up and down the street, 5:30 breakfast, 6:00am load up the car, 6:15am arrive at the base of Mount Hood at Timberline Lodge to wait until the first lift leaves at 7:00am, 7:15 arrival at our designated lane.


Now, one of Cory's challenges is getting himself ready on time - he has a tendency to be too meticulous, too perfect and is often rushed to be where he needs to be at the time he needs to be there. Putting on his ski socks for example, can take about 5 minutes per foot - to make sure he gets the sock on perfectly, with no bumps or folds, etc.


Another of Cory's challenges is motor skills - he'll virtually always find a clumsy way to carry something, so it makes it difficult for him to carry his share of the equipment. And speaking of equipment: here's what needs to make it up the hill:

skis, boots, sweater, jacket, helmet, poles, two pairs of gloves, goggles, several water bottles, fruit, sandwich, sunscreen, x 2 of everything since there's two of us going up.


So we do get everything loaded into the car and since we've never been to the hill before, we need to follow Bob and the others. Now once they arrive at the ski hill parking lot, they've done this before and they are on their way to the lift in no time flat. Meanwhile, Cory and I are struggling with how to carry everything so it takes us a bit longer to get there, so we in the back part of the lineup for the lift. We learned rather quickly that Bob expects his skiers to be at the front of the line so we'd have to make some changes to our routine if we were to get there a bit earlier.


So here we are in the line-up for the lift, and it's becoming quite clear that all these young racers are very much used to the routine, but we're not. And as Cory's dad, it's important to me to try to give Cory as much opportunity to "fit in" as much as possible - to not stand out as someone different. Cory does need help from me sometimes with various pieces of equipment - so not only is everyone else doing all of that by themselves, but I am in fact the only parent there - all the other racers are there on their own. So trying to make Cory blend in just isn't going to happen.


And these racers are always in race-mode - once the lift is open, look out - here they come, they want access to the lift and they want it NOW...


We manage to get Cory sorted out with boots, helmet, goggles, gloves, and poles. I've got my boots on, my helmet on with goggles, my gloves are on, but I'm still carrying my skis, my poles, and the backpack with the remaining stuff in it. And I'm so concerned with Cory being ready, that when the time comes to drop my skis to put them on and get on the chair lift, I started putting on my skis backwards!


Turned the skis around just in time to hop onto the chair and up we go - stress level just about as high as it can go.


And again, all of this is new to Cory - we've never been on this mountain before and we need to change chairs half-way up. Sure enough, we have to ski off the first chair, down and around a corner, then back up to the next chair - all of this while carrying a back pack which is new to me.


Sure enough, getting off the first chair was OK, but couldn't get going fast enough to get up the small hill to the next chair, so now I'm scrambling to herring-bone my way up with poles in one hand and back pack in the other. Cory doesn't make it up either - so now he and I are in the way of the skiers trying to maintain their speed up the hill so they don't have to do what we're doing.


I was soaking in sweat at 7:15am and we hadn't even started skiing yet.


Now we get to the top of Palmer Glacier and learn that there are about 15 or 16 other ski camps there - about a couple of hundred young skiers up there and we need to find our group. The glacier is set up like a bowling alley - each camp assigned its own alley, and we find our group on lane 9.


And then I see the view - WOW! We are somewhere around 9,000 feet, with the glacier stretching out below us, and Mount Jefferson in the distance.

Beautiful, absolutely breath-taking, not just the scenery, but the wind too! You can hear the wind on this video - a 360-degree panorama.

So now onto the first ski runs. Bob has set up some basic giant slalom-style courses, just to give Cory, Max, Ben, and Samantha the opportunity to make some basic turns to show Bob what each of them can do. I'm impressed with Bob's coaching style - he gave feedback to each racer just about every time they did a run, commenting both on what they did well and what they needed to work on. Later he took some videos of each racer and we reviewed them in the evening back at the house.

In Cory's case, his pole-planting needed improvement - he was planting his poles too late, thereby starting his turns too late and therefore making his turns well below each gate and slowing him down as he skied across the fall line to get to the next gate. And I noticed that Cory was skiing very tentatively - all the newness seemed to be making him very cautious. He is very much afraid of missing a gate. One of his peers at Special Olympics missed the opportunity to go to the World Games in Japan in 2005 because he missed the last gate of his run at the National Games in PEI and was disqualified, and Cory does not want that to happen to him - so he is very concerned with making every gate, even in practice.

At this point, Cory was still using his own equipment: a pair of 3-year old recreational Nordica ski boots and a set of Head Monster m70i skis that Cory had just bought back in December. Bob took one look at those boots and delivered one of his many "Bobisms": 'mooshy' - his boots were too soft, too 'mooshy' to give him the power and control that a racer needs. And while the skis were very good for recreational skiing, they were not designed for racing. So we'd head back into Government Camp later in the day to find Cory racing boots and racing skis.

Later in the morning, the snow gets quite soft and the ski conditions deteriorate, so we're done by around noon each day. So it's now time to pack everything up once again - at least the water bottles are empty so the backpack is lighter! - and head down. Well, it's not quite that easy. There's only snow until about 3/4 of the way down (see the photo above) so then it's hoofing it back to the parking lot.

That means not just carrying your backpack, but your skis, and your boots too. So we ski down as far as we can, and change into our regular shoes. By then, it's pretty darn hot, close to 100 degrees fahrenheit - it's a good workout carrying all that stuff in that heat wearing long underwear, ski pants, and a t-shirt.

And again, we're a bit slow, not being used to all this and by the time we get to the ski shops in Government Camp, most of the free demo equipment is gone. We walked from Rossignol, to Volkl, drove over to the Nordica shop, and finally found a pair of GS race skis in Cory's size at the Fischer shop, but no boots. We finally found a pair of racing boots at the Atomic shop, so Cory was ready for the next day with his first set of racing skis and boots.

Then a little down time and dinner. That's Bob on the right, with Samantha and Max on his right, and Ben on his left. Bob fed us really well all week - that's bar-b-que chicken, baked potato, and corn on our plates.

Next up, more early mornings, new equipment, a fall and an injury, and making progress. And record-breaking heat.

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Special Olympics Ski Racing - Hurricane Ski Racing Camp

So we didn't have much luck looking locally for better coaching, but the internet helped us find Hurricane Ski Racing camps on Mount Hood in Oregon - about a 6 hour drive from us here in Vancouver.

Cory did not hesitate when it came time to pay the $1200 Cdn it would cost to attend, so after we sorted out some details with Bob Vial at Hurricane, we registered online on the Hurricane website at http://www.skihurricane.com/.

Bob graciously allowed me to accompany Cory at no charge and he suggested that I contact Steve Kruse, the general manager of Timberline Ski Area on Mount Hood to see if he could help as well. And Steve was just as generous - allowing both Cory and me to use the lifts for free for all 5 days. If you'd like to know more about Timberline, here's their site http://www.timberlinelodge.com/.

So thanks to Bob & Steve, a week for Cory at Hurricane Ski Camp was now do-able, so we started to make plans to attend from July 6 to July 13.

Now while Cory has had some racing experience, he has not yet learned to ski aggressively enough to knock down gates while skiing a slalom course. Since we anticipated and hoped that Cory would learn this at Hurricane, we had to start looking at getting him some protective equipment.

This would mean either a padded race suit or protective pads for his shins and forearms. So back to the internet - and quickly realized that trying to buy ski race equipment in June is a bit of a challenge - everything seemed to be sold out.

But we were able to find a race suit in Cory's size - a light blue one with padding - so we ordered that and it arrived a few days before we left.

So we're all set to drive down to Mount Hood - where we've never been before - to experience a ski racing camp for the first time. One of the main challenges to those with autism is the difficulty to deal with changes to daily routine - and our week at Hurricane was of course going to be completely different from any other days in Cory's life.





So we set off at 6am on July 6 to beat the line-up at the US border - I also wondered what the border officer was going to say when I told him that we were going skiing in July, but he didn't react at all - and we arrived at Government Camp (a small ski town at the bottom of Mount Hood) later that afternoon.






333His hat says : Bronze Medallist, Alpine Skiing Advanced, Special Olympics British Columbia Winter Games 2007, Kelowna, BC


We took a bit of a detour once we got past Portland, Oregon, to follow the Columbia River - a very picturesque drive with several waterfalls - so it took us more like 8 hours - but very much worthwhile to see.




Scenes along the Columbia River:

And our first look at Mount Hood:








Now getting closer. This is the north-east side of Mount Hood. Government Camp is at the base of the south side and the ski camp is to take place on Palmer Glacier, also on the south side.




Mount Hood is 11,249 feet high (3,429 m), which kind of explains why we can ski there in July. It is a dormant volcano, the highest mountain in Oregon, the fourth highest in the Cascade Mountains (Mt Rainier near Seattle being the highest). It was given its name by Lt. William Broughton, a member of Captain George Vancouver's expedition in 1792 - and named after Admiral Samuel Hood of the British Navy. Mount Hood has a 3 to 7 percent chance of erupting over the next 30 years. (trivia courtesy Wikipedia).

Bob Vial had arranged to rent a very nice private home at Government Camp and he was there when we arrived, along with the other 3 athletes participating in that week's camp: Ben, Max, and Samantha. Bob had told them about Cory's autism, but as it is with most "typical" teenagers, they didn't really know what to expect, so it took a couple of days for Cory to fit in comfortably, but all of them were friendly and helpful.

The house at Government Camp:




Government Camp is your typical alpine ski town - one main street filled with ski shops & restaurants. One of the main buildings is the Huckleberry Inn. Huckleberries grow wild in the area - there look like small blueberries, but taste a bit more tart than your average blueberry. And the Huck Inn, as it is called, features the Huck Shake - a milkshake made with huckleberries. All first timers absolutely must try one - and Cory and I each had one on our first day - and we both found it to be different, but just OK. But still, one of the many unique experiences for us over the coming few days. We found any shake at the Huck Inn to be very good - and since we watched them make them and realized that they make them almost entirely out of ice cream and very little milk!


Here are a couple of photos of Government Camp:





















Another interesting shop at Government Camp is Fuxi Racing - owned and operated by the remarkable Franz Fuchsberger. To say Fuxi (as everyone calls Franz) is outgoing is a understatement of the grandest order. He greets everyone in his shop, makes everyone a great deal on any type of equipment they need, and then skis with everyone up on the mountain as well. For us, it was our first time in a ski shop geared to ski racers only - like kids in a candy shop. Check out his website if you want to know more about Fuxi Racing at http://www.fuxiracingusa.com/.

And probably the coolest thing about Government Camp is that just about every major ski and ski boot manufacturer has a spot on the street where they lend skis and boots- at no charge! - to anyone attending the ski camps. So Cory has a chance to try out real racing equipment for the first time - in fact, we barely knew that these things existed at the time, so we've learned a lot about racing skis and racing ski boots while we were there - more on that later.

So, we're at Government Camp at Cory's first ever ski racing camp and tomorrow is his first training day.

Special Olympics Ski Racing - Putting the Plan into Action

So now it's March 2007 and we have a plan - weight training, better coaching, better equipment, and more race experience - but it's near the end of the ski season.

Time for a couple of trips to Whistler-Blackcomb on one of our favourite runs - the Dave Murray Downhill. This run will be used for the men's downhill and Super G races at the 2010 Winter Olympics, so we both think it's pretty cool to be able to ski it. It's named after one of the original "Crazy Canucks" - the Canadian ski team in the 1980's - who has since passed away. Apparently, it does have the reputation of being a fast and challenging course - and it certainly is fast and challenging for us. I'm usually ahead of Cory at the top, but by the end of the run, he is well ahead of me - he has a lot more stamina for speed skiing than I do!

Here's Cory by the signpost leading to the Dave Murray downhill:

And then on a different day, at the top of it:

And a few more pics from different visits to Whistler-Blackcomb:

Beautiful sunny day after a heavy snowfall,

with Whistler Peak in the background

The

"Inukshuk"

the symbol of the 2010

Olympic Games

almost covered in

snow at the top of Whistler

Hut and cell phone tower at top of Whistler
And for one very special day, Cory's mum joined us - using the sno-limo that allows non-skiers to enjoy a great time on the mountain:

So a few fun days on Whistler, then back to the Plan. Need to find better coaching...so we get in touch with a local ski club - the Vancouver Ski Team. We met with their manager to explain the situation and he was very sympathetic - he would try to come up with a plan to accomodate Cory's needs but it would all cost close to $3000 per year. We gulped a bit - but if that's what it would take then so be it.

The Vancouver Ski Team was planning to do some summer training camps, on Mount Hood in Oregon in July 2007, and on Whistler in August 2007. We hoped Cory would get the opportunity to attend at least one of those.

So we waited a few weeks and heard nothing back from the Vancouver Ski Team. Eventually we heard back from the person we had spoken with - he had moved to Scotland (!) and was no longer involved with the Vancouver Ski Team, but he had spoken with a couple of other people on the Team about Cory and I should contact them. Well, after leaving a couple of phone messages and sending a couple of emails with no response, it was clear that we were getting nowhere with the Vancouver Ski Team.

So we had to start again looking for better coaching for Cory. Onto the internet then, and since we had learned that there were ski racing camps on Mount Hood, we did an internet search and discovered a number of different ski racing camps that were to take place there throughout June and July.

So we picked one that looked good - Hurricane Ski Racing - and sent an email to the person who runs it - Bob Vial. Sure enough, we got an encouraging response the next day from Bob. One big concern was the cost - $1200 for Cory to attend for one week, but since I would have to go as well, if I had to pay $1200 too, then that would be an expensive week. Bob graciously offered to let me attend at no charge, so we just had to iron out a few details, and it was a go - Cory was to attend his first ever ski-racing camp on Mount Hood in Oregon, from July 6 to July 12!

I still find it ironic that we received such a positive and helpful response from someone in a different country, and yet could get no one at the Vancouver Ski Team - in our own backyard so to speak - to help us out all.

And what a week of training it turned out to be!

Next up, preparing for Mount Hood and a lot of hard work...