Jumping Journal: February 04, 2008

Another warm jump session.  At least it was dry...that is one good thing given the weather forecast for the next day or two.

 

After overnight lows made it down to another bone chilling 28 degrees temperatures climbing back up into the upper 30s today.  It remained cloudy, hence the lack of much temperature variation.

 

I arrived at the hill about 3PM for the usual helping out with the lift.  I saw Jay head out to groom the landing hill while I was at the top lift shack.  I also saw Cannonball head over toward the jump so I knew he was going to get everything ready to jump this evening.

 

After I got done with the lift I went over to the jump inn and watched Cannonball as he waxed up his skis to get them ready Salisbury this weekend.  I ended up playing back some of the video Bill and Cannonball shot of us guys jumping yesterday.  I realized by watching the video I was doing one thing wrong on the inrun.  I didn't have my back straight, I was trying to look like the Hunchback of Notre Dame.  I've did this for ages.  I did manage to get a nice handle on it last year but I hadn't realized until this afternoon that I was back doing it again.  I knew from watching the video yesterday afternoon that I was being quite rounded with the shoulders in the air but never thought to take the look back to the inrun and see how the inrun looked.

 

Finally, Dan, Bill and Matt all arrived for what was going to be another Masters only jumping session on the mighty K50.  We all suited up and headed on up the jump.

 

My first couple of jumps were rather rough on the edges.  The first one made me think it was time to recut a new track on the inrun.  It seems like I remember thinking that yesterday as well on the first jump???  I was working on keeping my shoulders up and trying to keep the rest of the inrun position the same otherwise.  Neither of the first two or three jumps went very far.  In fact I would think my longest jump of the night was around 37-38 meters.

 

I watched as Matt came down for his first jump, boy was he short.  He didn't like the jump either.  I think it was really both of our imaginations as the rest of the night I didn't notice the problem on the inrun.  It's amazing how the mind can play tricks on you.

 

By jump four I was starting to get into the groove of things once again and the only real problem that I was having for the next several jumps was dropping the arms around the transition on the inrun.  I had trouble with the, rather unusually like, for the two or three jumps before it finally stopped.  I think the real culprits was the fact I was focusing on one area and let everything else take care of itself instead of trying to focus on everything.  Granted, some things are easier said then done.

 

The one thing I did notice all night was how rough the landing hill/outrun seemed to feel.  I was noticing it both of the last two days and tonight almost seemed worse.  Even though it had been groomed it still seemed awfully rough/bumpy.  I think we must have lost enough of the natural snow that we are starting to get down to the harder packed snow that the groomer just isn't able to chop pu as well.. At least that's my guess.  I can't figure out any other reason for it.  It looks like the groomers has went right over the top of the bumps and not knocked them down and smoothed them out any.

 

By jump seven and eight I was getting things settled down pretty nicely but the jumps still didn't have the nice feeling and nice distance to them that I was seeing last Monday and Tuesday.  I was still mostly jumping around 35-36 meters.

 

The last two jumps, nine and ten, of the evening both were quite a bit better on the inrun.  The final jump had what felt like the best inrun position of the whole winter thus far.  I seemed to have the shoulders/back and squared away better and it seemed like my shin angle was probably the best of the winter as well. I was much more on top of the ski than I normally would be.  At least it felt that way.

 

Even with the better inrun position it still didn't get me much further than 37-38 meters.  I'm not sure what the difference was tonight.

 

After jumping we put the plastic down on the inrun to prep for the rain that is forecast for later tonight through Wednesday.  To finish of the evening we headed back in the jump inn to watch the videos that both Nick and Cannonball shot of us jumping.  It did seem like I was a bit more forward than yesterday.  It seemed like on the last couple of jumps I may have kept the shin angle better.  Granted looks can be deceiving and to really tell anything I would have to go back and compare jumps side by side with the jumps from yesterday.  I did notice that it seems like all the adults are having the same problem of not jumping for the ski tips like the kids do.  I wish I fully understood the reasoning for this.

 

Tomorrow isn't sounding promising at all and Wednesday may be a washout for the pre-state high school meet at Andover.  Hopefully I will be able to get out at least on Thursday and grab another 10 jumps and set me up perfectly for a nice match to last winter...200 jumps off the K50 before Salisbury...I need 10 more to hit the goal.

 

Crash