Jumping Journal: January 01, 2009

T minus three and counting.  One of those days of jumping that just goes much further than skin deep.  It's going to be a REAL LONG winter this year.

 

After jumping last Saturday Sunday came with quite a bang.  Yep, it warmed up nicely...all the way to 52 degrees with a nice warm overnight low of 39.  Most of the day Monday was in the mid to upper 30's as well before things started to return a little more winterish.

 

To say this did a number on the jumps would be putting it pretty much right on target.  I arrived at Storrs Hill Tuesday afternoon to help Cannonball get the jumps ready.  As could be expected everything was pretty much boilerplate and with a groomer that is down and out for the count until it gets fixed(more on this later).

 

While Cannonball works at the takeoff on the K10 I work on the outrun with the snowmobile and homemade drag to try to soften things up a bit.  It has been quite successfully decided that the K25 won't be seeing any jumping action this day.

 

Several of the new kids from last winter show up and jump for the last time of 2008 on the K10 while I stand around and talk with some of the parents.

 

Afterwards it was decided we would get back together today and jump again.  The forecast was for some snow Wednesday, thankfully.

 

In amongest the talking I learn that it sounds like and as of today is pretty much reassured we won't be seeing any jumping action on the K50 until at least around January 17th as the groomer wasn't picked up yet and was scheduled to be picked up on Friday, err tomorrow.  It should take two weeks for them to get it back in shape and delivered back to the hill.  After taking a look at the K50 earlier in the day on Tuesday I realized that the chances of jumping it without a groomer were pretty much zero.  It would take some rather unusal miracle to get the chance to jump the K50 before the groomer gets fixed.  There is a mound of snow they normally make and then groom into place right on top of the bridge.  The only way you could even attempt to jump the K50 right now would be to plan on landing and then laying it over and hopefully sliding to a stop before you got to the snow pile.  It is wide, tall and long.  There is no way you could safely pull off a jump with the pile there.  Granted I have managed in the past to jump/crash and come to a stop before I would have gotten to the where the snowpile is now.  I don't think I would want try that intentionally though.

 

I ended up adding another 2.25 inches of snow during the day on Wednesday.  Cannonball, who lives about 25-30 miles, if that much further south of me received around 6 inches of snow.  I guess further south got even more.  At Storrs Hill there was some new snow but not really all that much since it sets further to the north.

 

I arrived later than planned this morning to find Cannonball and Esky freezing their behinds off getting the hills ready to be jumped.  The sun was shining, QUITE BRIGHTLY, and the temperature was in the single digits.  To make matters even worse the wind was kicking up quite nicely. The K10 was already to go and Cannonball and Esky were working on finishing up getting the K25 ready.

 

After Bill showed up we went over and suited up and headed back for the jump.  As I got back I noticed Mike was there, without his daughter and one of the kids that lives near me had also arrived.  I got an email from his mother right before I left asking if the jumping was still on.

 

Bill rode the landing hill while I headed on up the jump.  My first jump of the day was SCARY!  It was one of the worst inruns I've ever had on the K25.  I started down the inrun and nothing felt quite right.  I wasn't on balance or anything.  I couldn't seem to get on balance either.  At one point I thought I was going to end having an agony of defeat jump.  I really thought I was going to fall over before I got off the inrun.  I managed to somehow stay on my feet and from the time I got off the takeoff through the end of the outrun the rest of the jump went smoothly.  It wasn't a long jump but at least I was on my feet.  It's a jump I won't forget for a while.  Yeah, a nice save!!!

 

As I walked back up the jump I stopped to see how horrible the track looked.  Cannonball had tracolated before we jumped.  It seemed like I about had to have totally destroyed the track.  Gee...all this after the nice track setting I did last Saturday.  Turns out it didn't look as bad as I thought it was going to look.  I could see where I had definitely come out of the track but I thought I was in far worse shape than it turns out I really was in.

 

The second jump went better.  Granted I was a bit hesistant and wanted to make darn sure that I got set in my inrun position right from the very get go.

 

Pretty much all day the inrun seemed to feel a little strange.  About midway through the session I was noticing a nice bump under the left ski that was catching me off guard.  I only noticed it for a couple of jump fortunately.  It stills seems like there is something not quite right on the inrun.  I am questioning if there is a bit of unevenness/level of the snow on the inrun.  It just doesn't feel normal at all.  I shall admit I am used to always being on the K50 right now and not the K25 so this is rather strange in its own respect.

 

After four or five jumps I start coming into more and by this time both Mike and Bill are up jumping with me.  I finally started to work on getting the hands back under control since I hadn't been keeping them out behind me back on Saturday.  It was going great.  It does help to just focus on it instead of forget all about it.

 

By the fourth jump or so my toes were already cold as ice and by the time I quit jumping I had solid blocks of ice for toes.  There was no feelign whatsoever in them.  It's been quite a long while since I last jump when the weather was this bad.  I don't know how much of it was the fact of jumping on the K25 instead of the K50.  You do get more of a chance to warm up in between jumps on the K50 since you have more stairs to climb.

 

My last couple of jumps were the best of the day getting down near 19-20 meters.  I was starting to keep the chest down more since I was keeping the hands up by my sides instead of letting them drop down more toward the hips.

 

After another nine jumps, for the second session in a row, I decided I had taken enough cold weather jumps for the early part of the winter and I decided to call it quits for the day.

 

Right now it looks like it may end up being a week from Saturday before I see any more jumping.  With the lights being out on the jumps it pretty much takes away any opportunity for any evening jumping like we would normally do so Cannonball is going to have a jump session down at Vermont Academy(VA) this Saturday and then be back up to Storrs Hill next Saturday to jump.  I doubt I'll do the VA session.  I didn't bring the skis with me and depending on what I'm doing tomorrow night I may end up helping out at the hill on Saturday as they are suppose to be doing some work on trying to get the lights back and up working since their won't be any other activity going on at the hill.

 

Tomorrow shall be interesting.  It could create another jumping opportunity starting next week.  I'll have to wait and see if I hear anything or not.  The weather forecast is perfect right now for snowmaking.  I'll have to wait and see if I hear anything or not.  It is that time of the year.  Time shall tell.

 

Crash