Special Olympics Ski Racing - A Silver Medal Performance!

The location:
The Jolly Green Giant run on Whistler Mountain

The Date:

April 19, 2008

The Weather:

Sunny but a very chilly -15 degrees celcius, with gusty winds, but racers will always take visibility over warmth

The Event:

The Disabled Skiers Association of BC (DSABC) 2008 Provincial Championship Giant Slalom

The Result:

A second place finish and a silver medal!

Starting with some video - the first video shows Cory getting through the last few gates of his first run, and the second was taken at the top of his second run. We had talked about tucking as much as he could especially if the wind kicked up as he stood in the starting gate. He goes through several gates in a tuck, so it was good strategy.

You can certainly hear the wind and you can see some of the flags whipping about too.

The gold medallist is a very good skier, he beat Cory by just under 4 seconds in the first run, but fortunately, he is not a member of Special Olympics (at least not yet), so hopefully Cory will not have to worry about him. In the second run though, Cory was just over one second slower. The only way Cory could have beaten him was if he fell or missed a gate. Maybe next year's provincial championships!

Cory's main rival at Special Olympics, Jesse, finished third, only .91 seconds behind Cory in the first run, but he was over 2 seconds slower in the second run (though he may have missed the course inspection).

And considering how much I thought Jesse had improved since the Special Olympics Provincial Games in February 2007, it was a big big win for Cory to beat Jesse.

There was a lot of hoopla around this race. Just like in the World Cup, they held a bib draw the night before the race in the Whistler Village Square - Cory drew bib #35 (there were 41 racers in all). Fortunately, due to the cold temperature, the course was not affected much by the previous 34 racers that skied the course before Cory.

Cory also met some Canadian paralympic athletes - we skied with a blind skier who will compete in Beijing as a swimmer later this year. And the award ceremonies were held on a stage at the base of Whistler-Blackcomb and shown on a big screen TV - which I didn't notice, believe it or not, until Cory had received his medal.

Here's Cory on stage for the bib draw:

Cory checking out the course prior to his first run, with Whistler Village down below:

And then with Jesse:

And here's Cory visualizing before his first run. You can almost see him smiling - short term memory is a challenge for him so this visualizing is just for fun. We've seen World Cup racers doing this, so I asked Cory to do it as a laugh. But a few days later, I asked him about the race course and he remembered the placement of the first 4 gates, so maybe visualization might work for him after all! Then, ready to go, in his Volkl slalom skis (planning to get GS Volkls next year), his Atomic boots, and his new race suit. The blue one he bought last year has become a bit too tight and this one is a two piece - he finds it much easier to put on and take off - I think he'll be much more agreeable to wearing it maybe even during training next year.

And receiving his medal on the Whistler Blackcomb Stage:

And a year-end pic with his VASS coaches Carley and Roy:

So that's about it for this year - a very good winter for Cory. We had excellent snow conditions, with few rainouts (just one I think). We got up to Whistler for about 8 days of skiing and we're planning one more trip in May to Blackcomb for some spring skiing.

Now that he has found some good local coaching, Cory has decided he will not go to Hurricane Race Camp this summer as he did last year. I'm a bit disappointed since it was such a great experience for me as Cory's dad last year, but it really does not make much sense to travel to Oregon. Maybe in 2010, the summer before the next Special Olympics Provincial Games, just to give Cory as much an advantage as possible - we'll see.

And we expect VASS will provide Cory not just with good training and coaching next year, but also more racing opportunities too.

Equipment-wise, he loves his Volkl slaloms so much that he's reluctant to get a GS pair, but I think he's almost convinced that he'll be better off with specialized skis rather than using only his slaloms. And our good friend Greg Seidelin at Snowcovers has promised that he'll get Cory a great deal on a pair next year.

His Atomic race boots worked out really well too, once Greg got the Therm-ic warmers for him. The boots have been well-used and they sure show a lot of wear and tear after one year - but he can ski comfortably for hours on end, that's the main thing. So thanks again to Dave "Army" Armstrong at Atomic Canada.

Thanks too to Rob McSkimming and Bea Searle at Whistler-Blackcomb for allowing me to ski for free when Cory was training or racing at Gatebusters and Kokanee. And thanks to Tom Prozchaka at Gatebusters for allowing me to accompany Cory during the 4 times that Cory participated.

And of course thanks to Carley and Roy who coached Cory for only about 7 weeks and yet got a lot of improvement out of him - I'm convinced that if Cory had raced against Jesse earlier in the year, Jesse would have picked up the silver medal, not Cory.

Cory continues to struggle with the extended time-line to the next Special Olympics Provincial Games in 2011. He has a hard time understanding why he has to stay focused and working hard all the time until then. That's my job, to help him see how his commitment will help him get to where he wants to be, though there are no guarantees of course. But now that he's found some great training and coaching nearby, with the opportunity to race more frequently, I think it will become easier to keep him on track.

A summer of biking and fishing is now ahead, and I've got a few ski racing magazines to read to keep me going until next December. Cory's work/school schedule is uncertain for next September to May, but there's no doubt that whatever it may be, we'll try to accomodate as much racing and race training as possible.

We love to hear from anyone who reads our blog - sometimes we wonder if anyone does!! So please leave us a comment to know you visited.

So stay tuned for the next piece of news about "Ski Racing With Cory". And if you'd like to help those like Cory, Special Olympics in your neighbourhood can always use more volunteers.

Have a great summer!