Dear Interweb,
In high school I had a sense of dread about the question, “What are you going to do with your life?” Quietly, I knew that Plan A was to be a high performance/professional skier. But I knew I needed Plan B and an answer that would stop the questioning. I can’t remember how it started but my response towards the end was, “I want to be an astronaut”. I loved the look on people’s faces as I said it. After all, it is generally the answer one expects from a 10 year old boy. However, it quickly became a serious response as it suited my academic strengths plus my enjoyment of intense physical challenges. So, I researched the requirements and discovered that 20/20 eyesight is required, which I don’t have. The real blow was that the laser surgery effects on the eyes aren’t compatible with space travel. I think I would still like to be astronaut for my next career so I’ll just keep skiing and going to school, collecting a few PhDs and wait out the technology. Ha!
But in the meantime… I was thrilled that I got to be in space, at least virtually, for this Electric ad! Check it out in the inside back cover of the latest Freeskier Magazine.
And also check out fellow Albertan Mike Henitiuck on the cover! Yea!
Sincerely,
RozG
Post-Script: Thank you Jimbo Morgan and Bryn Hughes for shooting the photo!
My very first full page ad came out in SBCSkier a week ago. And…it’s the back cover! (It’s also in the Freeskier Women’s edition). It’s pretty exciting walking into 7Elevens and grocery stores to see my face on a back of a magazine. Thanks to to Kombi for the ad! And to Felix Rioux for the candid shot!
Psyched!
To read about the glove I designed for Kombi, check out my post from February. Thank you to all the shops that are carrying my design this year!
On our way down to New Zealand, Justin and I stopped over on the lovely little island of Rarotonga. My favourite Auntie Yo and three cousins, Aaron, Joel and Evan, happened to be there for summer vacation. It was a perfect opportunity to visit my awesome family, adjust to the time change and travel and have a mini tropical vacation. We had an awesome time snorkeling, finding and opening coconuts, having hermit crab races, enjoying the beach etc. Thank you Auntie Yo for having us! It was so wonderful to see you all!
My Auntie Yo, Myself and Evan at our beach house
Justin after his first coconut tree climbing adventure
Aaron and Joel working through the many layers of the best coconut ever
Evan and I in the Jungle!
Aaron, Joel, Evan, Justin, Myself and Auntie Yo on a hike
Justin tackling one of the biggest and best burgers ever, The Palace Burger.
Chickens roamed freely on Rarotonga, which led to a lot of "Why did the Chicken cross the road?" jokes
My cousins and I after an awesome dinner
On our way from Rarotonga to Queenstown, I stayed with Justin’s extended family in Aukland for a night,(Justin stayed there for a week after). Before I flew to begin my adventures in Queenstown, we did a morning of site-seeing. Thank you Anne, Rob and Grant for showing me around!
Justin and I on One Tree Hill
I am currently in the lovely Kiwi town of Queenstown. I am on my first “solo-mission”. I rented my own vehicle (my mantra has been “stay left, stay left!”) and didn’t arrange accommodation with teammates or friends. Through some awesome people in Canada (thanks Gabe!) I got hooked up with a place to stay at the RedBull house. My house-mates are some great snowboarders from the Czech Republic (Martin, Jan and Sarka), Slovenia (Silka) and Quebec (Sebtoots) as well as Zeb and Justin who work for RedBull.
View from the RedBull House! (Check out my sweet hoodie!)
I’ve been riding at the Remarkables, which is close to Queenstown, with some Czech riders. It has been a new experience being the only skier in a crew of coolboarders. I’ve really enjoyed watching their riding and listening to their opinions and amusing banter.
From the Remarkables parking lot: I really like the clouds in this photo. The cloud cover was really low so Queenstown was overcast but the mountain was sunny. Awesome for shredding!
The view from the road down from the Remarkables (Martin, Matie, Myself and Justin)
It was originally my plan to ride Cardrona, which is a mountain between Queenstown and Wanaka, but the Burton New Zealand Open for snowboarding was this week so the park has been closed. Congrats to my new friend Sebtoots for winning the slopestyle event today!
So stoked to be skiing again!!
Post-Script: When I first arrived at the house, two girls who work for the promotional sector of RedBull (they drive around in a decaled Mini Cooper and give out RedBull) taught me how to make a classic Kiwi breakfast called Weet-Bix, which are these logs of oatmeal-like whole wheat that you microwave with brown sugar and milk (or in my case, soy milk). I am totally addicted and think I’ll bring back a box to eat while studying on rainy Squamish days.
Post-post-Script: Even though I’ve really enjoyed the Czech snowboarders, I was really happy that my favourite Aussie, Anna Segal, had a sleep over. Check out her blog: http://www.annasegal.blogspot.com/
Our coach, Trennon, recently built our team a fanpage on Facebook. Trennon has been writing awesome updates about our team for several years (they are usually so good that I post them on my blog!) Our fanpage on facebook will be an easy way for the public to view the reports.
If you have facebook, become our fan here! Trennon (and the rest of the team) will be updating it frequently with news, pictures and videos.
If you don’t have facebook, check our webpage: http://www.canadiansuperpipe.com/2009/ (It will be updated soon!)
I spent three days last week hiking, camping and learning near Chaekamus Lake, an old growth forest very close to Whistler. The trip was led by our professor, Nobi Suzuki, who is a very endearing Japanese man with an immense knowledge, expertise, and love of nature. Though we were collecting data on biodiversity, sampling the forest for deadwood, familiarizing ourselves with herbs, shrubs and trees of the area, discussing readings from our textbook and listening to Nobi for over 10 hours a day, it didn’t feel like school. Nobi’s absolute love of nature was infectious and we were all enthralled with the new awareness of all he pointed out. The trip was truly “Quest-style”- innovative and intimate.
In the forest!
Our little class learning about ecosystems on the beautiful lake
My group members, Celeta and Bryn, identifying plants
The most inspiring and charming time was early each morning. We rose very early to listen to bird calls, learning to identify birds by their individual sound. From a lifetime of experience of doing studies in forests (wildlife/bird conservation, etc.), Nobi is enthusiastic and knowledgeable about identifying birdcalls. He listened to the all birds as if he was conducting an orchestra. I wish I had a video of it! Then, throughout the day, he would stop us suddenly, pointing upwards towards a sound, saying, “listen: ja-JA-JA-ja-JA-JA”, hoping we’d recognize them as easily as he did (that’s the call for a Steller’s Jay, Cyanocitta stelleri ). We didn’t…but we were completely enchanted nonetheless.
Post-script: The weather was amazing and we found a little time each day to enjoy the vistas and hangout in the sun.
The View from our Campsite
While I was at Sasquatch, I watched a dance party start near where I was sitting during Santigold and eventually joined in. I found out a few days ago that it has actually become very famous! The youtube video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GA8z7f7a2Pk) has had over a half million views and is highly rate. I started watching the dance party around the 1:00 minute mark of that youtube video and joined around the 3:30 mark. It was an epic dance party and I picked up some great moves!
Here is a feel-good-article, that appeared in the Calgary Herald, about the man that started the party. He’s from Calgary too! Click Here for the article!
The Association for Freeskiing Professionals was formed this year “to improve and progress competitive slopestyle, halfpipe and big air skiing”. http://afpworldtour.com/afp/ The board of directors consists of five key people/leaders in the ski industry and TWO of them are members of our team: Sarah Burke and Trennon Paynter. Canada is well represented and it is a good sign that the AFP chose these two dedicated, knowledgeable and thoughtful people to provide advice and direction!
One of the things they set out to do was to create an international ranking system. “The AFP ranking system was developed to track men’s and women’s competition results of more than 18 events held on four continents in slopestyle, halfpipe and big air in order to name true global world champions.” So throughout this season, all the major, international competitions received a weighting (maximum score) and the top ten competitors received a score based on their placement. The top four individual results for halfpipe and top 3 results for slopestyle and big air are used to determine athlete rankings and discipline champions.
The surprise to me was that they awarded an overall Champion for the skier (male and female) who had competed in all three disciplines. I found out reading the AFP press release on Freeskier.com which said: Overall World Champion: Women’s: Rosalind Groenewoud I am pleased to be the first female to win this prize and it motivates me to continue competing in more than just Halfpipe events. I think more skiers will once again compete in all events in the coming year and I hope to see more big air competitions which have a female category. (The male champion was American, Simon Dumont.)
Here is how our team fared in overall results per discipline:
Halfpipe Women: Sarah Burke, 2nd; Roz G, 3rd
Halfpipe males: Justin Dorey, 2nd; Mike Riddle, 10th
Slopestyle Women: Sarah Burke, 9th; Roz G, 19th (I only competed in one event!)
Slopestyle males: Mike Riddle, 15th
Big Air Women: Roz, 2nd
I haven’t done the math on how Canada did overall compared to other countries but here are some other Notable Canadians:
Slopestyle Women: Kaya Turski, Champion
Halfpipe Women: Dania Assaly, 9th
Slopestyle Male: TJ Schiller, JF Houle, Phil Casabon—8th, 9th, 10th
Big Air Male: Ian Cosco, 9th
Congratulations to my teamies and my fellow Canadians!
Roz G.
A win is a great way to end the season!
Here’s Trennon’s report:
Whistler BC
If there’s one thing that this team enjoys, it’s the annual WSSF event in Whistler. The 2 week long festival and it’s combination of sports, arts, music, (and even the odd party here and there) is the perfect way to cap off a long and sometimes grueling competition season.
The highlight of the festival every year is the Big Air competition down in the village. Crowds of thousands cram into the village to watch the best athletes in the world throw their biggest moves. This year was no exception, as the event organizers did an amazing job building a fantastic jump, and the athletes took full advantage.
Representing our team this year, was Mike Riddle and Rosalind Groenewoud. The rest of the team is in various stages of injury recovery, from the extensive contest circuit this year.
Mike did a great job in the qualifying rounds, which were held a day earlier in the terrain park up the mountain. Despite some challenging weather conditions, Mike stomped a great switch 1080 and easily advanced into the semifinal rounds in the village. In the best of two jump format, Mike caught an edge on landing his first jump, but came back strong on his second jump and landed a switch doublecork 1080. Unfortunately it was not quite enough to advance him into the final. The men’s final was eventually won by Shinji Osada from Japan, with Sweden’s Jacob Wester in second, and John Strenio of the US taking third.
In the Women’s final, it was all about team member Roz G! She came out swinging with a gigantic 1080 on her first jump, which instantly put her into the top position with a score that proved to be unattainable by the rest of the field. A great performance in front of a massive crowd, at one of the best events of the season, fantastic job Roz!! Second place went to Maiko Hara from Japan, and Canadian Megan Gunning took third.
Yay large novelty cheque!
Whistler Ski Invitational has officially started! Last night was the first training session on the Big Air jump in the village. The jump has a lot of kick on it (look how far above those people I am!). It was a little difficult to clear the jump yesterday because of the warm weather but Canadians Ian Cosco and Mike Riddle were still stomping doubles. Training also went well for me. I landed a clean 720 at the end of training and will be looking for some larger rotations tonight!
Sarah Burke and I were prequalified through to finals for tonight and will be joined by Megan Gunning, Dania Assaly and Maiko Hara, who qualified yesterday.
Wish me luck!
