Myth #1(Mother Nature killed the sport of ski jumping) Debunked

Myth #2(NCAA killed the sport of ski jumping) Debunked Part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13

Myth #3(The US doesn't have the talent) Debunked Part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13

Mind Of A Ski Jumper Part 1, 2, 3, 4

The Ultimate Coach - Ski Jump Training Device

Jumping Season Digest: (see bottom of this page)

Friday, February 16, 2007

Jumping Journal: February 16, 2007

Short, very short.  That describes tonight quite well.
 
The Valentines Day blizzard of 2007 didn't provide much of an impact around these part like it did in other areas around the midwest and east coast.  I saw 12 inches of snow at my house and most parts around here saw pretty much about the same totals.  The cleanup took quite a while around home and again at the jump.  Wednesday, during the mid to later part of the storm, I and pretty much everyone else took off from jumping to wait out the storm.  Thursday evening I spent shoveling the in steps on the inrun and landing hill of the 50.  One of the kids and one of my other fellow master jumpers took a couple of jumps after the inrun had been shoveled and the landing hill had been groomed.  I was just too dead tired from all the shoveling to even think about trying to do any jumping.
 
Tonight it was time for the New Hampshire high school state meet.  This meet not only designates who the best high school ski jumper is in New Hampshire but also in the United States.  New Hampshire is the only state in the United States that still allows competitive ski jumping in the high schools.
 
I joined the Sunapee squad on the bus over to Andover for this evenings meet.  Several of the team members were missing thanks to the snow storm.  This whole week is the  state finals for all skiing disciplines.  Monday was the boys alpine race.  Tuesday was a day off.  Wednesday was suppose to be the cross country races, Thursday the girls alpine and today ski jumping.  Wednesday got cancelled/rescheduled.  Depending on which division your school is in decided when you would end up making up the cross country race.  For Sunapee the cross country race was today.  Well, they also cancelled/rescheduled the girls alpine event.  For Sunapee, they were rescheduled for...today.  As I come to learn on the bus ride over, for one unlucky ski jumper she was going to be running the giant slalom and slalom race as well as skiing in the 5 kilometer classical and 5 km free skate cross country race then driving back 2.5-3 hours back down to Andover tonight for the jump meet.  Yes, she did it all today.  I have to give a might congratulations to Claire Whittaker for doing it all today.  She even managed to bring in 3rd place at the jump meet among all the other girls tonight.
 
Throughout the day the wind had been trying to play a factor with the weather.  Last year the jump meet got postponed due to 30+mph winds and it was starting to seem like this year could be the same way.  Fortunately, the winds did start to die down once the sunset.
 
We arrived at the hill and I was already suited up and ready to hit the jump.  Well...that wasn't going to happen quite as easily as what I would have liked it to.  I did finally manage to get the chance to get up the tressel and take my one and only jump of the evening.  It wasn't the best of jumps by any means.  For some reason I just haven't had any decent jumps off the 38 at Andover at all this year and the one jump I took tonight was no different.
 
I decided against anymore jumps because of the wind, cold temps and the number of kids, I knew I would be spending more time trying to stay warm instead of jumping by a long shot and with the way I was jumping I knew it wouldn' be worth the wait.
 
The winds died down and the jump meet went off without a hitch.  I figured that there would be a lot of carnage as everyone would be trying their hardest to win.  Amazingly, there was only just a couple of crashes between the 60 jumpers taking three jumps each.
 
For the first time in as many years as I can remember the Hanover High School team isn't the state champs.  After they had a big number of jumpers graduate last year and their best jumper headed off to Lake Placid for the winter to go to school and jump they didn't have much of strong team like they have had pretty much every year.  Instead the new upcomer this year was the Hopkinton High School team.  They are facing the same problem come next year as they have a big senior class this year that will be graduating.  But for the first time in six or seven years someone other the Hanover is the high school champion.
 
One the individual side of things Josh Flanders from Lebanon ended up taking home the state title.  He placed second each of the last two years, including the controversial loss last year.
 
Next year already looks like it could be a real dog fight.  There are three VERY strong contenders in the making and who will win come next year should be really exciting to watch it develop as the season progresses.  Two of the three competitors, Jeff Colt and Parker Haynes are jumping on the bigger hills with both probably heading to Lake Placid next weekend to jump the 90.  Danny Jones on the other hand typically has stuck to the smaller hills.  He did break the record on the 30 meter jump at Newport this past weekend that had been held for quite a long while by fomer Olympian Tad Langlois.  He is looking to possibly try to rebreak his own record next weekend while everyone else is in Lake Placid.  Next year will be interesting.
 
Crash
Winter 2010
DateLeb 25Plymouth 25Leb 50And 38
Dec 121
Jan 056
Jan 063
Feb 024
Feb 032
Feb 046
Feb 073
Mar 063
Totals133102