Off to PA

In a couple hours I'm jumping on a plane with about ten kids from my team here at Mammoth to fly to Pennsylvania. First we'll compete at the US Open Qualifier, and then a couple days later is Rev Tour. I don't feel quite back to 100% in the pipe yet, but hopefully everything comes together in the next couple days so I can qualify for the Open by placing top 5, and then podium at Rev.
Crossing my fingers

I'll update soon. :D

Being ok with losing.

Well Rev Tour was less than stellar. I knew going into it that I was going to take it easy, and treat it as practice instead of a competition. So I didn't watch anyone else's runs, didn't look at scores, and just straight aired every hit both runs. I got 18th out of 19. Rough.

It's really hard to lose. It's hard to know you didn't give it your all. It's hard to be asked "So how did you do?" and attempt to justify last place with "Well, it was my first day back in pipe after an injury so I didn't want to try anything." I'm going to work extra hard between now and the next Rev stop I'm doing (Sun Valley in March), so I can actually be proud of my results there. It'd be nice to have a huge five again, and even nicer to be able to put back to back fives in my run. Hopefully I'll be able to get there.

As hard as I try to be mellow and be ok with losing, I really can't be. I'm just not that person. Character flaw? Oh well.

First Competition is Tomorrow!

Well here goes nothing.

Surprisingly, I don't feel nervous for tomorrow morning at all. I think I'm just in a good mental state.

I know I don't have a serious chance of fighting for a top spot in the half pipe contest tomorrow- I still see myself as being in recovery mode. Until four days ago, I was still just making turns. Now I'm slowly building my confidence back up in pipe, but I don't feel like I'm ready to throw a five first hit or go for a seven. In fact, I'm pretty sure I'm just doing straight air runs tomorrow.

I feel very relaxed though. I'm going into this thinking the only person I'm competing against is myself. As long as I ride better tomorrow than I did today, I've won. I think that's how I should go about this whole season- strive to progress every single day and treat each day that happens as a victory.

I'm not concerned with what any of the other girls do in their runs. I probably won't even watch them. I don't want to ride better than someone else, I just want to ride the best that I can for myself.

Louie Vito was recently asked in an interview something like "Does Shaun White being here today affect the run you're going to do?" He responded something like "No, because I don't want to beat Shaun White. If he comes in 19th, that means beating him could mean 18th place. I want to beat everyone. It doesn't matter if Shaun is here or not." This is kind of the same thing for me I guess- it doesn't matter who I'm competing against or what they do in their runs; I'm going to ride my best no matter what. My only concern is myself.

When you stop worrying about other people, your mind can find ease. (I'd like to attribute that to Buddha, but I made it up :/ )

East Trip Complete.

It was to be expected- What I planned got twisted and turned and I went on an unforeseen adventure.

USCSA Nationals happened, blah blah blah. I'm too lazy to actually describe everything that went on that week.

They almost got my name right after I spelled it out loud...

 
Here's the short list:

My team getting our 1st for team Slope

• I placed highest on the women's team in Giant Slalom with an 8th place finish. Who knows how that happened. I'm terrified of going fast. That's why I always knuckle jumps. Maybe I was born for gates. Ew.
• The pipe was about 12 feet tall, under vert, and wasn't straight for more than ten feet at a time.
• The Slopestyle course was pretty mellow. One rail and three jumps. The only strange thing was that it was like a fifteen second cruise between the second and third jumps. I hate having that much time to think.
• USCSA didn't have money for real judges or something and had the park crew guys judging the freestyle events. Not a fan of that decision. Always great when someone does a sketchy back 5 and you can hear the judge say "Oh a McTwist" because it was crooked.
• I placed 2nd in slopestyle, 5th in pipe
• They wanted people to die on the boarder cross course. I mean, probably not, but it was retardedly gnarly at the start. I didn't make it into the event because during my time trial I flew over a birm in the first 7 seconds of the course, tumbled through the fencing and was stuck hanging upside down by my board (I had my elbow in the snow, the rest of my body was above ground) until ski patrol came and unstrapped me. On the day of the guy's BDX contest, they were proud that only 6 guys got sledded off and only 3 had to go to the hospital.
• Our women's team took 2nd place overall, and I finished 5th overall 

Brady getting interviewed after his 1st in Big Air at Sunday River

So that was Nationals in a nutshell. My mom flew out to watch so I was pretty stoked to see her. After Nationals we drove to Vermont for Rev Tour. Sierra Nevada College was nice enough to get us a condo for that week as well, and also buy our food, tickets, and entry fees. Thanks so much! Our condo was an awesome 5 minute drive from Carinthia, Mt. Snow. The slope set up at Rev was really awesome. It was the most fun course out of the three stops I did. The jumps were awesome. I started off the line with a cab 1 mute, which I'm super super stoked on, because while the jump wasn't poppy, it was lonnng (I think 50'), and it was my first time ever jumping switch. Really proud of myself for that accomplishment. I didn't place as high as I wanted in pipe or slope, but a lot of my competitors came from US Open so I was up against really good girls. I landed my first Mctwist in pipe, but almost immediately caught my toes and scorpioned down the wall. Improvement! I ended up placing 11th in pipe, and 12th in slope, the best I've done at a Rev so far. And Carinthia had the sickest park set up I might have ever ridden. I'm so stoked on Carinthia. I couldn't play on it as much as I wanted because I had hurt my ankle at Sunday River and was trying to save myself for the Rev events. Their park went top of the chair to the bottom- and was an endless line of rail-rail-box-jump-jump-rail-jump-box-box-jump-jump-etc. You could just flow from the top to the bottom. It rocked!

Nash and I got an awesome Indian lunch

St. Patrick's Day Elvis

After Rev I was supposed to meet my friend Eric in Burlington, chill there for a couple days and then he was going to drive me to Waterville Valley for Flaunt It. Well, things came up, he couldn't bring me, and I couldn't get to Burlington. So I went to Boston with the rest of my team, they flew out Saturday morning, and my flight wasn't scheduled until Monday. So, I did was I always do, and met some strangers. I guess it worked out in the end. John, this guy with a cat named Mango that he brought everywhere with him, met me the first day and gave me a tour of Boston. Then that night we went to the bars and I met other couch surfer hosts. Partied at some random hispster dude's house, and crashed there. The next day I met up with one of the random guys I met, Nash, and went to the Boston St. Patrick's day parade with him. Got fairly day drunk, and then went out for the night. We ended up at the Hard Rock Cafe for this Battle of the Bands and watched a couple of really awesome bands compete. I stayed at Nash's that night and he drove me to the airport in the morning. So, it wasn't exactly hanging out with Eric and going to Flaunt It, like I planned, but I still had a pretty good time. Life unexpected can be an adventure.

Anyways, it felt so good to be back home. There's nothing better than sleeping in your own bed after being gone for 15 nights. Doing Billabong Flaunt It next week, and then I get to have fuuuuuun for the rest of the season. :]

Northstar Rev Tour Wrap up

Competing is teaching me that you can't always be happy with the judges scoring, so it's better to let your happiness be dependent on if you're happy with yourself.

I watched a girl in the beginning of my slopestyle heat do lipslide (down box), 50-50 (flat down box) and then straight air the two big jumps with different grabs, and scored at 51 on that run. My first run was lipslide to fakie (down box), cab 1 on (flat down box), and then back three melon to front five stalefish on the small jumps. I scored a 37. I couldn't figure out how more technical jib tricks and then two different spins could score so much lower than straight airs. I realize that the big jumps are scored higher, but to have two straight airs be worth more than two spins? I had been airing the big side of the jumps all week but then spun the small side in the contest on the advice of my coaches and multiple other people, who all felt spinning would be better than airing. The second odd thing I noticed was that a guy on my team had cab 7 to switch back 9 on the big side (clean, no hand drags or anything) and scored lower than guys who were doing regular 7 to 5 combos. Something was funny with the scoring at Rev for sure, but there's nothing that can be done about it now.

 I landed my run that I wanted, and I'm happy with that. I hadn't been able to pull off that whole run together until the contest, so at least I got it clean. All I can do is just work to make a better run for my next competition (USASA this weekend). I'm also making the decision to not hit the small side of anything in contests anymore. I don't want to have to deal with another straight-air-worth-more-than-spin issue. Straight airs are easier and less nerve racking. I'll gladly do those instead. Of course, by Nationals I do want to be spinning the big sides.

Half Pipe. That was interesting. I got my first run of straight air, straight, front three, cab three, front five, straight air, straight air, and then somehow fell riding out of the pipe, like five feet before the finish line. I wanted to die when that happened. I couldn't believe it. So for my second run I came around and did the same exact combination instead of putting my back 3 and switch back 3 in. I got it clean, but have a feeling my first run would have scored higher than the second had I not fallen. In this event I also felt I should have scored a couple points higher, but I'm happy I got my run, and I'll just have to work harder to get my airs higher for my next contest (USASA this weekend).

I don't blame the judges for "giving" me low scores. It's like school, your teachers don't give grades, you have to earn them. If I was scored the way I felt I should have been, I would have been a couple places higher in each event, but that's not a significant change. I'm going to have to really improve so I can earn higher scores and legitimately deserve a place in the top pack.

In the end I placed 18th in pipe, and 23rd in slope. I'd really like to place top 10 at Vermont's Rev Tour stop, so hopefully I can step it up and make that happen.

Northstar Rev Tour;; the night before.

I'm about to force sleep upon myself but I figured I'd post here really quickly.

Rev Tour is starting tomorrow at Northstar, and once again I'm competing in both Half Pipe and Slopestyle. I'm definitely less anxious about this one than I was about Copper (still not in the "confidence zone" though). I do feel a little more prepared this time, and I'll have both Austen and Spencer coaching me. I rode pipe with Austen today, and slope with Spencer yesterday, and having them there for me as coaches made me feel better about what I'd be doing in my contest runs.

I don't really have high hopes on making it to the Finals of either event, but who knows what will happen. Everything could somehow work out perfectly in my runs and I could make it in the top 6. I guess in these things you never know what the results will be until it happens.

My goal is to just ride my best, have clean runs, and be able to set my sights higher for my next slope and pipe contests.

I have to wake up at 7am tomorrow (EEEK!) so I'm out. Peace. Later. Night. Catch you on the flipside, internet world.

New Year, New (clever title here)

Ahkay. So I gotz a bit of catch up to play since the last time I posted.

Copper Rev: Well I went out there, and all I could do was give'r. Did my best, placed 22nd in Slopestyle and 32nd in Halfpipe. Would have liked to do better, but it was definitely a learning experience.

After coming back from Colorado I really started pushing myself at Northstar to try to get to the place where I wanted to be for Northstar's Rev Tour stop. I'm feeling pretty good. I've definitely improved since Colorado and I believe I'll place much higher this next week. Some things I'm happy about is that I was comfortably spinning 5s on the biggest jump at Northstar (until today- they just pushed the Rev jumps so the largest is slightly bigger but I think I can spin it in the competition), and I got my front 5 a little bit out of the pipe (airing, and spinning in the air puts me in a much better place than where I was at Copper).

Tomorrow I'm going to the Volcom Peanut Butter Rail Jam at Sierra-at-Tahoe and I think it'll be pretty fun. I'm not going there to win, just to have a good time, and who knows where that will get me. I just want to have some fun with my friends and eat free food.

Here's to 2012. I do believe this will be a good one. If it ever snows, that is.

A humbling day

Well today knocked me off my pedestal. I mean, I wasn't really on one to begin with, but I thought that maybe I could make it to half pipe and slope finals at least. I thought I had some skills.

After watching the girls out here during pipe practice I realized I'd be lucky to make Top 15. I got super discouraged after my first practice run. I couldn't even get to the top of the walls. I was able to air out every hit when I went to Mammoth so I kinda freaked out. Why could I not even see above the walls now? I was super bummed and rode like crap all morning.

It's hard doing a contest like Rev for the first time and not having a coach there for support. I called Austen, my mom, and Eric and talked to them all for a bit, which really really helped. They all told me the same thing "do it for you, don't think of it as competing against the other girls". We all know I'm new to this and don't have as much experience or skills as the other girls so really all I can do is my best.

After talking to them I went back out with a new attitude and my riding improved right away. Still not going as big as the other girls though. I just have to remember that snowboarding is fun, and as far as competing goes, I'm a newbie.

I hate losing. All I want to do is win. But I obviously have a couple of years of hard training until I'm there. I've gotta be tough, work hard, and not forget that I started all this because of my passion.

Colorado, I'm coming for ya

Wow, I can't believe Rev Tour is already here. My flight to Denver is tomorrow and I'm in the process of making sure I'm getting everything I need packed into my board bag.

I thought I'd feel really unprepared but I actually don't feel too bad. I'm kind of excited. I was feeling awesome on the jump line at Northstar today (btw, I got banned from Northstar today and then reallowed in the period of an hour), and now I don't feel so scared of Slopestyle. I can't wait to see what the slopestyle course is going to be- How big will the jumps be? How many? What type of rails? And of course I can't wait to ride pipe again!

I'm not expecting to place at the top, but hopefully I'll make it to finals for both events, and then maybe by the Northstar and Vermont Rev stops I'll have a shot at winning some money.

I'm just going to ride the best I can and have fun. See you tomorrow Co!