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March 16, 2007
USSA Results for Nationals
Yesterday's Super G at Big Sky was all about survival, and I'm happy to report that I was a survivor. I'm not particularly proud of my time or how I placed, but simply to be able to stand up and finish this treacherous course feels like quite an accomplishment. It was described by many as true World Cup race conditions on a course that was truly set up to test the best.
After two days of record warmth and a mountain that had turned to mush, cold air finally came in Tuesday night, along with cloudy skies and blustery winds. The snow on the entire mountain was frozen into one block of solid, impenetrable ice... really knarly even by New England standards! Racers from the East Coast referred to this as an especially "loud" day. Everything that was groomed, including the race course, was rock solid, bulletproof, machine groomed frozen granular ice with occasional patches of grey or blue ice where standing water froze. Anything that wasn't groomed could best be described as trying to ski on frozen chicken heads! It was rugged and fast, and quite frankly some of the worst snow conditions I can ever remember skiing on!
Yesterday's Super G course, which was set only for competitors in the A & B groups (elite men age 59 and under), was clearly set for the more accomplished racers and was actually faster than last weekend's downhill, which was also set to accomodate the elderly men & women who were competing on the same course. After my first course inspection, my initial thought was there's absolutely no way! "I may be crazy, but I'm not stupid," was a thought that continued to cross my mind. Quite a few others had that same idea as 15 of the 97 competitors scheduled to compete yesterday failed to start.
The start of the Super G was moved down about five gates from the start of the downhill, so it started just above the top of the headwall where I crashed on Monday. This meant that we would accelerate from 0 to 60 in a near freefall just one gate out of the start in less than ten seconds. Then it was big, sometimes blind but always rythmical turns between 60 and 70 mph across slick, boilerplate ice in flat light all the way to the finish. Then there was the wind gusting up to 40mph from the Northwest and pushing us from behind! It was really, really fast and terribly intimidating!
But I must say it really was a good, fair course that truly held up well with very few holes or bumps, and it looked a lot scarier than it actually skied. But it left absolutely no room for pilot error. After watching how several of the top racers handled the most technical sections of the course, I convinced myself I could do this. But after a good strong start, I must admit I was pretty well throttled-back to flight idle for the rest of my decent all the way to the finish line. I never actually hit the brakes, but every turn was about carefully trying to make it a clean one while making sure I was in the right position for the next one without missing any gates. It was pretty chattery, but mostly a stable run from start to finish, but truth be told I skied it like the first training run of a downhill race course I had never skied before rather than a national championship ski race. I realized after passing through the finish line I could have gone after it a lot more aggressively as I left at least five seconds out on the race course from what I was truly capable of. I'd like to say I gave it my all, but that wasn't exactly true as there were several spots where I now know I could have safely gunned it for more speed. That's what makes super G such a great test... Unlike downhill, you don't actually get to ski the course until you do so under race conditions.
Most of those who either failed to finish or were DQ'd did so because they missed gates. Thankfully, there was no major carnage to speak of. But things just came at you so fast, if you were just the slightest bit out of position, it was over. It was a great test for some of the best skiers in our sport, and it gave me a real appreciation of just how good some of those guys really are! It was a humbling experience for me as I now realize how far my skiing skills still need to advance in order to be really competitive against them in testing conditions like this. This experience also taught me some great lessons in overcoming fear... I shall never look at the fear of an intimidating tee shot or an important putt in a golf tournament the same way again!
So the end results are that I was one of only four survivors out of nine scheduled starters in my age class, and one of only 66 survivors out of 97 scheduled starters overall, out of which I placed 55th finishing just over ten seconds out from the fastest time on a course that was a little over one minute long. So a podium finish eluded me at this national championship, but 4th in class was good enough to further pad my overall results in the 2007 National Speed Series, for which I claimed the overall masters national speed champion for Men's Class three (35-39 years old). But Richard Bradsby was really close, and had he not crashed in the Aspen Super G and I not claimed 2nd place in that same event, or had I not done as well as I did in the Soldier Mountain downhills, the outcome would have been different. Pasted below is a link to the USSA web page that contains all the final results for both nationals and the speed series, some of which are still being updated.
So now I am just over halfway home staying at a friend's house in Park City, and expect to be back in the office in Aspen by late-afternoon. And at this point I'm happy to say I will be competing in no more speed events until next winter. Maybe the giant, giant slalom finale to the Aspen town race series at Highlands on March 24. But otherwise, it's springtime in the western U.S. and now I'm really ready to start playing some golf, and after all that happened this past week at Big Sky, I'm really happy all my limbs are intact to be able to do so!
- Bill
Bill Tomcich
President, Stay Aspen Snowmass
425 Rio Grande Place
Aspen, CO 81611
970-920-7120
For more information on Aspen-Snowmass, go to www.stayaspensnowmass.com
Posted by Dina at March 16, 2007 08:10 AM
