Flaunt It Fail.

Friday, March 30th: Billabong Flaunt It Finals practice day at Sierra at Tahoe. Conditions- Really really sticky. The speed from the first jump to the second is tuck and point. I barely land on the knuckle every time. They inform us that they're going to cut a couple feet off the jump for the contest so it's easier to clear. Rail set up is awesome though. Stoked for that more than slope.

Saturday, March 31th: Showed up at Sierra, only to find that the whole mountain was on wind-hold. There were talks of catting the competitors over to the course, but eventually the decision to postpone the contest was made. I ended up going to Reno with the Mattingley's for lunch, and then getting stuck in a snowstorm on the way back to South Lake. It dumped 18" overnight.

Sunday, April 1st: Dreamed about my runs all night. Felt so good on the way to Sierra. First run during practice, I slipped the first jump and then rode by the side of the second jump to look at it. Get back up for my second run and here's where my over-confidence comes in to fuck me up. I watch a couple people hit the second jump from the start of the course and it looked like they went deep. I don't ask anybody who's hit them about the speeds, and just decide to send it. I barely knuckle the first jump and the I cruise into the second, make two pretty big carves. Apparently the speed was still "point it". In the air I knew I wasn't even coming close to the knuckle. I completely cased, probably a whole board length short of the knuckle. And my front knee just crunched. So I'm laying in the landing screaming bloody murder, someone comes and unstraps me, and ski patrol is called. I try to move out of the landing but can't even stand. I spend the rest of the day in first aid, getting xrays, freaking out, etc. I was mostly just bummed about not being able to ride, even though I was int he worst pain I ever felt in my life. I knew my season was over and that was the worst thing in the world.

Next 7 days: Spent the next week on a straight oxycodone binge. Lost touch with reality because if I didn't take them I was in too much pain to function, but being high for a week straight made me think my knee was ok. Still couldn't walk though... Also got really bad nightmares (I think this is from the pain killers?)

And then the next two weeks were a blur of me trying to figure out insurance information so I could figure out whats going on with me knee. I've been to the Kaiser in Sacramento, physical therapy in Roseville, and physical therapy in Incline. No one tells me the same thing. All the clinic at Sierra told me was that I didn't have a bone problem that showed up on the xrays. Kaiser/PT told me that I bruised my knee really badly and it could be 6 weeks- 6 months for it to heal, and that if it still hurt in 5 weeks it might be a torn meniscus. Then PT in Incline told me I could have a fracture that didn't show up in the first xrays. So now I'm back to knowing absolutely nothing. I finally got an MRI set up for Thursday, so I'll be doing the 2 hour drive to Roseville again, and then hopefully I'll know what's wrong.

UGH. Injuries suck so much. Missing the last two weeks of the season sucked so much. Everything sucks. Fuck knees. I hope I can ride in the summer. Here's some pictures from my Flaunt It experience.

My teammate from SNC, Ashley Vandermeer, and I

Ashley, me, and Alexis checking out the rail set up

Soooo Fun! Wish I actually got to compete on it!

Making it over Mt. Rose highway in a Mustang with no 4W during a snow storm

Hailee and Taelor Mattingley and I at the bowling party

Taelor killing it

Hope this is the only time I ever have this sight

The most fun was the open-door ambulance ride at 9:30am

Never thought this would be me.

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.

Open class, and open for improvements.

I don't know what I was thinking Friday night and set my alarm clock for 6am, thinking it'd give me an hour to get ready before I had to meet Jake and go to Sierra. I woke up at 6 to a text message saying "Hey I'm at Safeway" and almost crapped. I was supposed to meet him at 6am at Safeway! I flew out of my apartment like a bat out of hell and had this horrible feeling that I wouldn't be able to get in the event because of my own dumb move.

Well we got to Sierra at 7:30, and I was the first to get on the wait list. I was also able to register for the Superpipe event the next day. I didn't feel too worried about the course; it was pretty average. Flat box, down-flat-down box, and then a two jump line with different options for the jump size. I saw the other girls throwing threes off the big side but most of the time they weren't landing them. I figured I'd play it safe  and do a line I knew I could land in case the other girls didn't have clean runs. My first run I did a 50-50 to nose slide on the first box, 50ed the down flat of the kinked box and then slid off, did a sloppy front 180 on the first jump and then went for a tail grab on the second but couldn't find my tail. Yuck. I was planning on doing a front 3-revert-cab 3 for my second run but since my safety didn't go the way I wanted I thought I should do the same run again. Second run I only 50ed half of the flat box tail grabbed over the knuckle, 50ed the whole kinked box did a clean-er 180 and got my tail grab on the second jump. Playing it safe didn't work out though because the other girls were able to pull off their runs and score higher than me. I placed 6 out of 7 and I was only 3 points behind the girl ahead of me, so if I had done the run I wanted or at least did a cab 1 on the second jump instead of a tail grab I could have grabbed fifth.

Superpipe day. I felt good about pipe. I like pipe and think I'm fairly decent in the stunt ditch. Well the four girls I was up against were good, not fairly decent. During my practice I was getting above the lip just slightly and these other girls were a few feet above the lip. I rode the best I could and ended up fifth. It would have been nice to at least beat one person but I didn't really mind too much. I've only been riding pipe for a month and the girl who placed above me told me this was her sixth season riding that semi circle. I looked up my four competitors and they've all been riding big contests and placing high for a while. This was my first non-USASA event.

Even though I didn't place the way I would have liked, I had fun and learned a lot. I learned that if I keep practicing more I can hold up in open class. I learned that competition isn't the place to hold back and play it safe. And I learned that I need to step it up because the girls I'm going to be competing against in the future are more experienced and are pretty solid riders.

The DC park at Northstar is open today so I'm going to head out there to ride the big boy park.
Until next time,
CKOS

Spoke too soon.

Well I guess I'm doing Free Flow now.

I went to Northstar today to practice pipe stuff and my coach told me half way through the day that some lady who has stuff to do with Free Flow told him there's already been a few girls who have dropped out of slopestyle. Meaning, if I got to Sierra by 7am and got on the wait list I'd probably get a spot.

So now I'm competing in slopestyle.

Did I practice slopestyle at all today? Of course not.

I did nothing but jumping Monday-Wednesday this week so I don't feel too worried about that. I mean, I should be fine on the jumps as long as I don't psych myself out. My mind messes with me so much when I ride. There's so much that I know I could do if I let myself. But I get psyched and hold myself back. Can't let that happen tomorrow though. I think the jumps are going to be a little bigger than what I've ever hit. But it'll be okay. If I put my mind in the right place I should have no problem with a straight air- front 1 line. Should be easy...

My concern today was half pipe. I really want to do my best in pipe, which would be airing out and doing 3s and switch 3s above the lip. Today started out real bad in the pipe. I kept quitting after my first two hits. No bueno. During lunch though I changed my stance up and tried to put my head back in place. When I went back to the pipe everything felt better. I started getting higher. Then I started airing out. Jeeze. Getting air the the pipe is such a weird feeling. It's different than anything I've felt before. It scares me. But I like it. So anyways, I did that all day.

One of the ski coaches is picking me up tomorrow to bring me to Sierra, which is apparently farther away than I thought. I would really like to be at Sierra when registration starts at 7am, but Jake isn't picking me up until 6am. Mapquest says it will take an hour and a half to get there. I'm really hoping it doesn't take that long. Or if it does, I hope there's not a bunch of other girls already there on the wait list. Tell me again why there's only ten women's spots? It'll suck big time if I get there and can't compete. :/

So I'm crossing my fingers that it takes less than an hour to travel 57 miles, or that there're more spaces open than there are girls on the wait list. All of this would be a lot easier if I had just made up my mind earlier and registered when it was open. Ugh. Okay, gotta pack my overnight bag now. I'm going to either stay in a hotel or at a friend's house in south lake so Sunday isn't as difficult as this.

Indecisiveness strikes again

I decided to compete in the Gatorade Free Flow tour at Sierra.
The Stash Gathering at Northstar is the same day.
I decided to compete in the Stash Gathering.
No. Free Flow.
Nah I don't stand a chance in Free Flow. Stash Gathering.
Thursday Morning: Okay okay. I'm doing Free Flow. It'll be a good experience and maybe I actually do stand a chance now that I'm getting more comfortable on the bigger jumps.
Oh. Wait. Registration closed last night. Wow. Really? Yup. 8 hours ago.
Maybe I'll do same day registration. Oh. There's only 10 spots available for girls. They must be full anyways.
Guess I'm doing the Stash.

That's pretty much how it all went. I really need to make decisions earlier and then commit to them. Kind of like in snowboarding how I get screwed over when I make decisions about the trick I'm doing when I'm already in the process of doing it or how I only commit half way to tricks and then wreck myself. I spent so much time thinking I wasn't good enough for Free Flow that by the time I got stoked on it it was too late.

It's not like I'm totally missing out on anything though. I'm just gonna do the Stash Gathering and hopefully pick up some swag. It's also the Burton Demo Tour at Northstar this weekend so I'll be able to check out some of their gear and maybe find out about getting some (crossing my fingers with this part).

Nicola registered for Free Flow slopestyle and half pipe ages ago. I talked to her today and she said she's not going to do pipe anymore and I can take her place. Since I can't just "take her place" I have to show up at Sierra at 7am (or earlier) and make sure I'm first on the wait list. Now the problem of not having a car comes up. But if I can figure that out I can compete in a real competition and see how I hold up against other girls (since I haven't gotten to really asses my skill with the USASA comps).

My history has proven that things just kind of work out over time so I'm going to assume I have a way of getting to Sierra-at-Tahoe and practice for pipe. I haven't ridden pipe much in the past couple of weeks and I usually use my no-edge park board. However, I'm determined to ride my pipe board and actually get air on Sunday so I guess I'll just be lapping pipe all day tomorrow. The x-games got me all stoked on pipe and I really want to push myself to at least do half of what all those girls were doing.

Wish I was doing slopestyle, but I'm going to go into the Stash Gathering and Half-Pipe and do the best I can. I love snowboarding so much and just being able to do it everyday is the best thing in the world, even if I suck at making decisions.