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)

Saturday, March 24, 2007

Jumping Journal: March 24, 2007

Day 46.  The season started wit a song parody it looks like it will end the same way.
 
Sorry to parody The Happenings, maybe not:
 
I'll be alone each and every eve
While you're away, I'll try to believe
 
Bye-bye, so long, farewell
Bye-bye, so long
 
Jump you in December
Jump you when the summer's through
There you go(bye, baby, goodbye)
Melting away in the springtime(bye, baby, goodbye)
Summer pasttimes(bye, baby bye, baby)
Are coming your way(bye, baby, goodbye)
 
Have a good time but remember
There is more fun with the cool air soon to come
So I'll jump you in December
And jump you as soon as winter comes
(counting the days 'til I will jump you)
(counting the hours and the minutes, too)
 
Bye, baby, goodbye
Bye, baby, goodbye
Bye, baby, goodbye(bye-bye, so long, farewell)
Bye, baby, goodbye(bye-bye, so long)
 
Have a good time but remember
There is more fun with the cool air soon to come
So I'll jump you in December
And jump you as soon as winter comes
(I'll be alone each and every eve)
(While you're away, I'll try to believe)
 
Jump you(bye-bye, so long, farewell)
In December(bye-bye, so long, farewell)
I know I will
Jump you(bye-bye, so long, farewell)
In December(bye-bye, so long, farewell)
Well, I will
Jump you(bye-bye, so long, farewell)
In December(bye-bye, so long, farewell)
 
 
Okay, I could be wrong but I highly doubt it.  I believe today was the end of the winter season.  Looking at the conditions on both the 25 and the 50 it pretty much is a finale.  Granted the 25 is mostly from grooming problems otherwise it would still be jumpable into roughly Tuesday or Wednesday next week before conditions would get sketchy.  Admittedly, I've jumped plenty of sketchy conditions over the past couple of spring but with only 18 jumps all winter long on the 25 the thought of jumping the 25 is quite hard right now, at least until the snow is all gone and it's time to jump it on plastic come late April.
 
After jumping under, beautiful conditions on the 50 on Wednesday this week I stopped by the hill around noontime on Friday to see if Dan was there doing some tracolating work on the inrun.  I found him them doing plenty of snow shoveling to get the inrun into any kind of jumpable shape.  The warm temperatures on Thursday, only around 60, had put one massive dent into the inrun.  I was hideously shocked at how much the inrun had melted.  It didn't fall below freezing on Thursday night and did rain some on Thursday during the afternoon while the small kids were jumping on the 25, but it wasn't hard rain and their wasn't much rain.  I guess, according to Dan, that it did rain hard some overnight Thursday night.  I'm still VERY surprised at how much the inrun melted down in 36 hours.  We did the repair work to the inrun to get it back in shape and then tracolated the inrun to get a track back on the inrun.  This track did look like it was better than the one we jumped on Wednesday, much straighter.
 
I arrived at the hill around 9:15AM this morning, the day for the end of the season party for the ski club, a day of doing the 50 meter landing hill slalom course, and pond skimming.  We had decided earlier in the week that we would jump early in the morning before the rest of the festivities got underway.
 
Thanks to the below freezing temperatures overnight everything had settled up nicely and was solid.  The temperatures were on the rise but they were still in the mid 30's when I arrived at the hill.  We was going to have to start from the bars as the top was melted.  We was actually going to have to start from the bottom two bars.  The top bar was completely down to wood.  The height of snow on the inrun was down way far from normal levels.  Looking down the landing hill everything looked fine and the outrun was questionable.  I knew it would depend on just how much the snow had hardened up overnight vs how much it had started to soften up this morning.  There was a lot of footprints and ski prints in the outrun that I knew could make stopping tricky.
 
I suited up and took and outrun and saw it wasn't quite as bad as what I thought it was but it was still going to be a little rough, not smooth as it normally is during the winter months.
 
I headed on up the inrun and I had previously noticed that it looked like their might be a bit of a kicker at the takeoff.  I didn't give it too much thought.  Boy, was that a mistake.  I got the go ahead signal and headed down the inrun, it was in real good shape, and I got to the takeoff and jumped.  I found myself, just like the first day of the winter, WAY high over the knoll.  It was the highest over the knoll that I had been in quite a while.  I pulled off the jumped and rode the outrun to a stop.  As I turned around I was yelling back up top that it had one heck of a mean kicker on the takeoff.
 
I walked back up and a couple of the other guys had got suited up and were heading up the jump with Dan.  I flagged Dan for his second jump of the day and Matt for his first jump of the day.  I walked on up the inrun and before I could get my skis put on Dan decided to cut down the takeoff some to help bring the takeoff a little bit more back to normal.  Bill had taken an outrun and was waiting up top with me when Dan finished up and I was ready for my second jump.
 
The second jump was just about the same as the first jump.  I was expecting to be high in the air, even though Dan had shaved down the takeoff.  This time I did manage to go a little further  The third jump was pretty much the same as second jump and so was the fourth jump.  At the conclusion of my fourth jump, both Matt and Bill and had decided to call it quits and that left Dan, Tara and I still jumping.  I knew I was hoping to make this the second year in a row that I would have the last jump off the 50 for the season.  I was fully ready to tough it out.  My jumping was feeling the best it has felt in a long time.  It was starting to seem like I was finally coming out of the digger hole that I have been in since taking the digger last month.
 
As I got back up to the takeoff Cannonball asked me how the conditions were.  I told him that they were in pretty good shape.  He was getting the gates dropped off and getting ready to set up the slalom course on the landing hill.  I headed up the jump and Tara headed down followed by Dan.  Tara was starting to walk back up so I knew she wasn't planning on it being her last jump just yet.  Dan did head over toward the jump inn after his jump so I knew he was finished.
 
As I had been walking up the steps I decided to try something out that I had read on the internet a couple of weeks ago.  I figured under the circumstance why not.  I had been jumping well enough that if I were to get over the height I was getting at the takeoff I could easily have one of my best jumps of the season.  I decided to make it the best jump of the season since I was thinking it may very well be my last jump of the season.  I hadn't seen Tara take her jump yet at the time.  When I saw she was going to take another jump I figured why not try the idea out anyways.
 
I got onto the bar and reitterated the idea to myself.  I got the flag from Cannonball and headed on down the inrun and jumped at the takeoff.  It was the smoothest jump I'd had in quite a while.  It truly felt like it was the jump of the season.
 
As I headed back from the outrun to the steps I kinda pulled into the middle of the outrun.  Cannonball motioned to me to come on back up and Tara was starting to make her way on toward the steps up the inrun.  I walked back up and watched Tara take her final jump of the winter.  I decided once again to make this jump even better than the one before it.
 
I headed down the inrun and jumped.  It was a solid jump until the end when I backed out.  Other than backing out at the end I feel it was the best jump I had pretty much all season long.  According to Tara it was a 37 meter jump and I had had a lot better jumps earlier in the season before I took the digger.  Amazing how your perception of things can be so amiss.
 
I would have to say that the idea I was using on the last two jumps is a very simple technique that I will have to do some more work with over the summer.  It does seem like it works and its hideously easy to use.  I will write more about it later once I can confirm or deny just how well it works.
 
Given the weather forecast for the next week it does seem like today was the last day of the season.  Admittedly, the forecast for tonight is for a light coating to 3 inches of snow, in some spots, higher elevations, maybe even 6 inches of snow.  The temperatures are suppose to rebound into the 50s tomorrow so it won't stick around long at all.  Highs are supposed to be in the mid 40's to mid 50's for the next week.  It doesn't look like April Fools Day will happen this year on the 50.  At least we did manage to, quite safely, increase the record out to March 24th for jumping on the 50.  If we were to get a nice early April snow storm, one happened a few years that allowed us to jump the 25 with 100% snow coverage until April 8th, then we could end up jumping the 50 in April.  The landing hill and outrun are in very good condition so far, it's the inrun that has taken the beating by Mother Nature.
 
I highly doubt I'll be trying any transition jumping this spring like I did last year.  Granted it would be interesting to see how things would go but I don't think I will give it a shot.  I'll just wait until spring fully settles in and then start jumping on plastic come the latter part of April.
 
It has definitely been a winter to remember.  I wasn't expecting much out of the winter but I ended up with a whole bunch of surprising results.  Their was no plan on jumping anything bigger than the 50 in Lebanon all winter long.  I knew the odds of it happening were slim and none.  Boy, was I ever surprised.  25 jumps off the 90 in Lake Placid and 20 jumps off the 65 in Salisbury provide for a VERY pleasant surprise.  I may missed 50 days on snow for the first time since 2002 but I ended up with almost as many jumps as I had in 60 days last year, 441 vs 418.  I'm still surprised by how few jumps I ended up taking on the 25, 18 jumps, and how much it seemed like I was jumping on the 90 vs the 48 at Lake Placid.  I must say that I have heard a lot of stories over the years about hard landings at the bottom of the hill.  On the 48 I'm getting close to the K point when I land on the 90 I'm landing pretty much where the knoll starts to curve downhill.  I think that is why I feel so much more comfortable on the 90 than on the 48.  I even feel more comfortable on the 90 than I did on the 65.  I have to admit that I like the 65 MUCH better than the 90 though.  I like the LONG table on the inrun.  I just have this attitude about jumps with character. I like a jump that sticks out from the rest of the crowd and the Salisbury 65 sticks out like a very big sore thumb thanks to the long table.
 
This will be a winter that I will remember for quite a long time to come.  Hopefully the surprises from this winter won't stop coming the rest of the year.
 
As of right now 9:20PM, it is spitting snow outside as I finish writing this.  Crazy, purely maddening weather.  This has been one of the hardest winters to leave behind.
 
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