Cory's race training has continued through January with a couple of Kokanee races, training on Thursdays and Saturdays with the VASS Blue Streaks, and on Mondays with Special Olympics.

His 3rd Kokanee race of the season took place on January 13, with strong winds and snow falling rather heavily. As a result, the race was reduced from 2 runs to a single run, since heavy snow poses a danger to the racers.

Here's Cory taking a long look at a very long race course...it's hard to see but it disappears around a corner in the far distance where the trees narrow. 45 gates in total, and it would take Cory one minute, 45 seconds to complete it. What do they think this is...the Olympics??



Waiting with the other racers for the race to get started...check out those flags flapping in the wind!




And some pre-races warm-ups with Coach Sammy Kent:




And then it's race time. As this video begins, Cory gets a bit off course and has to ski through thick soft snow and that slows him down quite a bit:





After each Kokanee race, there is a video review of all racers....here's Cory taken from the projection screen so the quality is poor:




Cory usually finishes last in his age category at Kokanee, so we always laugh about his goal being not to finish last. And on this day he doesn't finish last, 3rd out of 4 racers. And finishing third gets him a bronze, a bronze Whistler Blackcomb promotional pin that is.

The announcement! which I found quite funny...




The award!




But having participated in all 3 Kokanee races so far, and with only one other racer in his age group having done the same, that gives Cory enough points from the 3 races to put him in 3rd place overall, out of 14 racers!




And then there's a few days of training with the Blue Streaks on Grouse Mountain:

First run on fresh tracks, always a delight:



A little practice through a short stubby course:




A quick run down The Peak:





Nothing like a bit of slalom through the fog to quicken one's feet:




And then a few runs down a dual slalom against Cory's main rival from Special Olympics, and he's pretty pleased with the results...



Until....




Then Cory wins again as his rival crashes:




And then even though it becomes obvious that the blue course has a real advantage over the red course, Cory prefers to stay in the red one...a strategic little move perhaps since the race that counts is still 5 weeks away...




The rivals in action:




Cory showing some great technical skills here...upper body pointing towards the finish line, eyes looking ahead to the next couple of gates, hands up and in front of his body, hips forward over his feet, knees bent for stability and angled to the side for good pressure on this ski edges





And looking forward to a couple of races this week...and in one of them he'll be racing against his rival, so we're both looking forward to see how he does.





We'll update again soon. Leave us a comment, we'd love to know you visited our blog.

Kokanee Race #2

Cory continues to train hard for his upcoming Qualifying races at Special Olympics' BC Provincial Games in March, 2011. These are the races that Cory must likely win if he is to qualify for Special Olympics National Winter Games in Alberta in 2012.

He is about to start ski training 3 times a week now, including the Kokanee races at Whistler on most Thursdays. He continues to bowl twice a week, a bit of basketball once a week, with some weekly weight training too.

Yesterday was the second Kokanee race of the season, a Giant Slalom on the Ptarmigan run on Whistler Mountain. Even the "lifers" admitted that yesterday's race was a very challenging one with lots of fresh soft snow (racers prefer harder surfaces....not just for speed but for safety, soft snow makes it easier to catch a ski edge and crash) and a couple of gates on a very steep part of the hill that had plenty of offset (horizontal space between the gates...the more offset the greater a turn is required in order to get through the gates).

Cory has usually finished last in his age group in the Kokanee races, so we laugh about his goal - to not finish last. Unfortunately, on this day, he did finish last. But it's a series of races and since Cory completed his race he did earn 43 points and now, after 2 races, he is in 5th place out of 13 racers.

Whistler Adaptive Sports Programs Coach Sammy worked with Cory and noticed that Cory usually improves significantly on his second run through a course in comparison to his first run. It's quite likely a matter of Cory gaining confidence after his first run so we'll have to work on Cory's race preparation. We also discussed the fact that there's now only 8 weeks to go until the Qualifying races, so it's time to move from technical skill development more towards mental preparation. Cory has improved his technical skills and we believe he is capable of improving his racing speed, but so far his confidence hasn't kept pace. He needs to develop more trust in his skills in order to increase his speed.

On this day, he once again improved his time by 2 seconds in his second run versus his first, so it's certainly something we'll have to work on.

Here's Cory with Coach Sammy talking things over at the start of the race course:




Then it's time for a course inspection prior to the first run with Coach Sammy and VASS Coach Rob:




And Cory's first run, negotiating that challenging gate on the steepest part of the race course, and then does pick up quite a bit of speed through the delay gate as the course flattens out (a delay gate is an additional gate added to the course that does not require the racer to actually make a turn around it, but changes the rhythm of the racer's turns...it's the blue gate right after the red gate situated directly in front of the camera position)




And his second run...while he is quite far from the camera at the beginning of this video, it still shows his speed coming off that steep pitch at the top. Coach Sammy wants him to start his turns earlier - another indication that Cory hasn't quite grasped the improvement in his skills...he's still turning at the same speed he used to do, yet he is racing faster, so his turns are now delayed. This results in a need for him to turn his skis sideways to slow down in order to get around a get and completely eliminates his speed improvements. But his turns through the gates in this section of the course at least are quite good and he maintains most of his speed as he tucks through a flat portion of the course.





This coming week is the start of Cory's training with his Vancouver Adaptive Snow Sports Blue Streaks Race Team on Grouse Mountain, then training with Special Olympics British Columbia Delta on Cypress, and then Kokanee Race #3 at Whistler. So we'll be updating soon.

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