Jumping Journal: February 21, 2008

A great afternoon of ski jumping...and an awesome evening of ski jumping to follow.  The bad moon must be rising.

 

I arrived at Storrs Hill around noon time for duty on the lift.  It was one of the prettiest winter days I've seen in quite a long time.  Wall to wall sunshine everywhere you looked.  I couldn't find a cloud in the sky.  The wind was extremely light to dead calm pretty much most of the afternoon.  The air temperature was right around 20-25 degrees.  Like I said you couldn't ask for much better of a winter day than that.

 

Around 3PM I got relieved on the lift so I could go join the boys on the K50 for a nice afternoon session of jumping.  Turns out it was going to be five of us flagging each other and jumping.  Dan, Cannonball, Matt, Dave Remillard and myself.

 

The session didn't go too terribly bad.  It wasn't the best by a long shot and it wasn't the worst either. It was right down the middle.  Most of the early jumps I was jumping late.  Finally toward the end I managed to grab one or two where the timing was pretty decent and I managed to make down around 35-36 meters on each of them.  It still seems like I should have been jumping further than I was given the quality of the jump.  It must have been slower inrun speeds that was limiting how far I was going.  All in all, once everyone decided to quit I had put in eight jumps for the gorgeous afternoon.

 

As I was walking out of the jump inn Cannonball was getting ready to go cut a track on the K25 for the evening session with the newbies.  Knowing that I need to make up some ground on the total number of jumps for the winter I had already decided to jump the K25 in the evening...unless their just happened to be some kids that showed up to jump the K50 that didn't know we were jumping it in the afternoon today.

 

I carried the extension cord and drill over to the K25 for Cannonball and after grabbing something to drink I went up and helped him and Esky cut a new track on the K25.  After helping him cut the track I walked back into the lodge and waited to find out which hill I was going to be jumping.  A couple of  minutes later Bill comes walking in.  I was a bit surprised to see him.  Turns out he was planning on jumping the K50...at least until he heard how the inrun was.  It was then that he decided to jump the K25 instead and try to 'rebuild his confidence'.  Yes, the inrun was still in bad shape, WOBBLY!

 

After a few minutes I saw a couple of older looking kids walking toward the lodge with jumping skis.  I knew they had to be high school aged kids.  I didn't know which kids for sure though.  When they walked into the lodge I knew for sure they were planning on jumping the K50 since both of them jumped it this past weekend.

 

We walked on over to the jump inn and after stretching we suited up and headed on up the jump.  Since neither of the two guys had jumped it since the new track was cut I forewarned them BIG TIME to make sure that they were riding the whole foot on the inrun.  A girlfriend of one of the two jumpers was going to be flagging us.

 

The first of the two Hopkinton High School kids takes his first run down the inrun.  He looked quite smooth considering the conditions on the inrun.  He yelled at his girlfriend after he got back to the stairs to tell Joe, the other jumper that he came with, "The track is BAD."  Joe headed down and has no problem either.  I knew by watching the first kid that Joe wouldn't have any trouble.  Joe is way better than the other kid.

 

I head down for my first jump.  As I start down everything is going fine.  The first third of the inrun goes smooth.  The second third is a diaster.  I was all over the place it seemed like.  I was dropping the arms and everything else I shouldn't be doing.  I was keeping it in the track for the most part but my inrun position came unglued.  About the time I get into the transition I smooth right back out and jump on time and have the best jump of the day thus far.  I was a bit surprised at how well the jump went considering how crappy the inrun went.  I'm still a little confused about that concept.  I ended up around 35-36 meters on the jump.

 

The inrun on the second jump was practically the same as the first.  Top 1/3rd was smooth, middle 1/3rd was horrible, and the bottom 1/3rd was smooth.  Once again I jumped on time and had another flight down to the 36-36+ meter range.

 

After getting up top for the third jump I notice the full moon is rising on the horizon and another clear cold night is setting in.  It seemed like the temperature really started to drop between jumping sessions.  It felt like it was only in the lower teens while we were jumping under the lights.  By the time I headed home it was in the single digits already in many spots.

 

The kids agree about how bad the track is but they also say they are getting used to it.

 

My third jump seemed better on the inrun and the flight position just held on nicely.  The fourth and fifth jumps were the same as well.  I was still landing in the 35-36 meter range on each jump.  I was starting to notice I wasn't keeping the ankles cocked all the way into the landing hill.  I was definitely pulling out early.  Other than that I was having the nicest, most consistent jumps I've ever had.  I figure it was because their was no one around that mattered.

 

By jump six I decided to working on holding the flight position into the landing.  It worked beautifully right from the first jump where I started to focus on it.  I was getting into the 37 meter range.  Jumps seven and eight were also held nicely into the hill but I late at the takeoff on each of the jumps.  Jump eight was quite short compared to the rest of the jumps this evening.  It was more like 31-32 meters.

 

Jumps nine and ten both were smooth on the inrun and the timing was much better.  I held the flight position all the way into the hill on each jump and ended up with 36-37 meters on each jump as well.

 

It was the nicest jump session I've ever had.  I haven't felt better about my jumping then I did tonight.  Even though the inrun position in the beginning wasn't worth a darn I was still keeping my wits about me and having nice jumps.  To do it on the second jump session of the day was even more amazing.  At the end of the session I was feeling great.  I could easily have taken another five to ten jumps without trying.  I'm not sure what the difference was but there was a marked difference between the jumping I normally do and the jumping I was doing tonight.  I'm wondering how much of it had to do with no one other than kids being around, no coaches or anyone else 'that mattered'.

 

Other than January 23, 2007 I haven't seen 18 jumps in one day on a combination of hills yet alone on just the K50.  To feel as good as I did at the end of the session is incredible.  I wish I could feel like that after every jump session.  It must be the full moon or something, LOL!!!  Yeah, that bad moon rising.

 

Crash