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.