New PB!!! part 2

On Monday whilst I was enjoying the clinic given by Ryan Dodd, I had to take a quick trip to the fysio as well. I had to get my shoulder thoroughly checked to know for sure that I wasn't doing anything that would lead to permanent damage. His conclusion was an infection of some sort in my shoulder which was caused by the hit and swelling afterwards. In order to let this heal, I would have to rest for 5 days. If the infection got out of hand, it could take up to 12 weeks to heal... enough motivation to get some rest. However I could not let one more day of training with Ryan Dodd just slip away, so I did three sets on my jumpers, in which my shoulder would not be exhausted too much, since that arm is in a sling. On the second day of Ryan's clinic, I learned many exercises to help in strength and position when jumping. One of these was to cut through the wakes with the boat going as slow as 18 km/h, even though I would usually jump at 51 or 54 km/h! With the boat going so slow, it is a really tough exercise on your legs, but I'm certain that this exercise will help me get further.

After Tuesday it was really time to take some rest. I had a competition in Belgium this weekend and a couple more competitions coming up, so I don't want to risk not being able to participate because of my shoulder. On Saturday was the first time I skied again since Tuesday. Usually I like to be able to check out the water of the competition site and train a bit before a competition, but I couldn't do that this weekend. My slalom on Saturday morning was very disappointing as I missed the end gate on my first pass! This means you get a score on the minimum speed of your age group, which was 43 km/h even though I should have passed 55km/h. There was not a lot of time to be upset about this mistake, because there were two rounds of tricks coming up after lunch. I was nervous for this because I hadn't tricked for about 10 days, and in order to feel safe and fast in my runs I like to be able to do them a lot before competition. Despite the lack of training and thus confidence I was able to do well in my hands pass. Afterwards, in my toe pass, I fell on the first trick, which gave me flashbacks to Europeans. Luckily, there were two rounds of tricks, this time I had confidence for my hands run and I knew where my mistake was in my toes run. I set up a good hands run, even though I almost fell on my 3rd trick, which would have been too early. I practised for this moment in training for Europeans a lot, I almost fell on my trick but I held on to the handle, rebalanced and continued my run, missing one trick and probably some time at the end. I passed this run all the way to the end, which was better than in the first round. In toes I got past my first trick all the way to the last, where I fell. I was hoping for a good score, but as predicted, my last hands trick was out of time. Also, unexpectedly, two of my safest toe tricks were 'no credit', costing me a lot of points. My score ended up being 2340, which is 320 under my PB, so not too bad, but not what I wanted. Finally the last event of the Saturday, and also the event I did a PB in. It was time for jumping! After a two-day clinic with the world champion in jump and a whole summer of jumping more than I ever did before, this could only be good. The first jump I planned to feel the water and the ramp, so take it easy. When cutting for the ramp I got distracted by a slalom bouy that was right in my way, since my focus was off, I decided not to take the jump. The second jump was now to get a feel of the ramp, so still not too much risk. I jumped 21.4 meters, which was decent for a new ramp. On the third one it was time to get more speed into the ramp, I cut a bit later and took more angle on the ramp. Something was wrong with the timing and scoring, so I didn't know how far the jump was. Though the scores didn't give me much confidence for the second round of jump, I did feel safe on the water and the ramp, so I discussed with the driver and judges that I would do my last jump at 54km/h rather than 51km/h. My first jump I got a score of 24.7, which was a new PB, 1.7 meters further than my previous one! When the boat judge was signing my score, I had to double check that she really meant a 4 after the 2. I was already really happy with my score, but still tried to get more. The second jump was 24.1, still better than my previous PB, so I had consistently improved on that. Now the final jump of the set and the competition. I raised the boat speed now and re-focussed. I landed the jump on 54km/h, which was the first time in competition. The score was not yet given to me when I cut back to

the dock, but a gut feeling said I might have crossed the 25 meter barrier finally. When I was skiing to the dock my dad signed to me 2 5 point 1! I'm happy with my new PB and hopefully will add some meters when I start doing 3/4 cuts. To top off the weekend, I ended in second place overall, behind the Belgian talent Ibe Beckers!

Next weekend I have a competition at home. Finally one  where I don't have to drive 4 hours, like this weekend (though it was worth it). I will be defending my title as club champion. Though I am happy that my under 17 titles will for sure be taken over by some other talented skiers!