4 Years of Preparation For 4 Minutes of Racing

It was four years ago that Cory participated in his first Special Olympics British Columbia Provincial Winter Games in Alpine Skiing. He finished third in each of his 3races: slalom, giant slalom, and super giant slalom.





The two racers who beat him are no longer competing but it won't be an easy step up to the top of the podium as Cory has at least two very good competitors who have also worked hard to improve since 2007.




Over the last four years, Cory has worked on a plan we developed shortly after the 2007 Winter Games. That plan was to obtain better coaching, more race experience, improve his equipment, and maintain his fitness.


Finding better coaching started a few months later, when in July 2007, he attended Bob Vial's Hurricane Race Camp on Mount Hood in Oregon.




And later, in December 2010, he even worked under the eye of Rob Boyd, a former Canadian Olympic ski racer who won a World Cup downhill race which took place exactly where the two of them are standing now (the start of the Dave Murray Downhill run at Whistler):





Of course, since 2008 he's been a Vancouver Adaptive Snow Sports Blue Streak, training on Grouse twice a week and working first with Carley Stobbart (in pre-Blue Streak jacket days)




And now with Roy Sperling:





With Mark Anderson, from Whistler Adaptive Sports Programs at Whistler in 2010:




And most recently with WASP's Luke Hadley...




WASP's Chris Kent:




And WASP's Sammy Kent:






So it certainly seems that the better coaching part of the plan has been achieved.

And as for his equipment, from one pair of Head Monster recreational skis...




To a wax-room full of Volkl Racetigers, the longer set for Giant Slalom and Super Giant Slalom, and two sets of Slalom (one set is slightly damaged so we use those when snow conditions are poor...commonly known as "rock skis")




And now two pairs of Atomic race boots:





For fitness, Cory bowls twice a week, plays basketball every week and does weight training once a week as well.

So he's followed his plan and now it's almost time to put it to the test. But first some final days of training:

A Gatebusters slalom session with Luke Hadley on the Olympic run at Whistler:







In slalom, Cory has been working hard at getting his skis as close as possible to the gates, and he does a good job of that right here:




The next day, it's a Kokanee Slalom race on Raven/Ptarmigan at Whistler and this time it's under extreme weather conditions - minus 25 degrees C and winds gusting well over 50 kms/h. Cory wanted to train under any conditions so that he'll be ready to race under any weather conditions. But this was extremely cold.





And for his final training session before the Provincial Games, we headed to Cypress Mountain where he looked really good in this run following his rival Jesse:





So our next update will include the results of his racing on Friday and Saturday and we'll know by then about his chances to be selected to Team BC to race at the National Games in Jasper in 2012.

4 Years of preparation for 4 minutes of racing.