malibu trick tour

During the past week I have only focussed on tricks. I trained my runs a lot on Tuesday and Wednesday and tried to figure out the safest order to do my tricks. Originally I wanted to start with steps, because that way the time spent travelling towards the wake does not count for the 20 seconds you have to do the run. However, I was falling quite a bit on my step sequence, thus I tried to start with my wake 540 sequence and do the steps after. This was going really well and I had a lot of confidence in this run. In toes it wasn’t going too well, but I knew I could do the run I had in mind, as I had been doing it well the past weekend. 

On Thursday I didn’t ski, because I was travelling the country with my trick skis. I would go to a rookie competition, because this was at my friends’ club, and also it would be a good moment to time my runs and get used to a little competition pressure. There was a lot of wind at the competition site, but it went straight down the lake. This means that going one way there was head wind and the other way, tail wind. It is easier to do toeholds with tail wind, because in head wind you get blown away from the boat, and it’s hard to keep the line close to you with just 1 leg. However, there was tail wind on the first pass, which meant I had to start with toes, even though I have always done my hands run first in tournament. Even in training I prefer to do my hands before toes. I didn’t have much of a choice though, because there was a really strong wind, so there would be no point in doing toes with that head wind. It wasn’t such a big deal in the end to do toes first, so it was good to have experienced that. Still, my toe run didn’t go too well, I fell really early on, because I tried to start with my 540, which is relatively new. I didn’t fall on the 540, but I came out of it badly and so fell soon after, because I continued whilst I was unstable. It was because of this that I made the decision together with  Talisa to start with a 360 instead of the 540 so that I am sure I’ll finish the run, even though it will be 120 less points. My hands run went really well after, I liked the new order and did everything within the time. Though my 540s weren’t fully credit, they weren’t far off, and I got good tips from the judges on how to have them credit for the actual competition on Sunday. A good feeling before the competition!

Sadly I couldn’t end the competition with the same good feeling. There were only 2 rounds, instead of the 3 + final that we thought. In the first round I fell on my first 540, so no 540s, no step sequence, that’s a big hit in my score. Still, I wanted to perform on my toehold run, even if there was no way I would end with a good score. I hadn’t practised starting with a 360, but I knew that would be a safe option, since it was my run all of last year. I did do the 360 and came out more stable than I usually did out of my 540. I did my whole run except the last trick, which I was happy with. I wasn’t too happy with my score though, because I was missing a lot of points from my hands sequence. I decided not to change my run for the next round, because I had so much confidence in this run, I was determined to do both runs like I had in mind. I did my first 540 in hands, but fell on the second. Really frustrating, since in training they were going so well! I finished my toes run after, including the last trick that I fell on in the previous round. However, I decided not to go for my back to back reverse, because I didn’t feel stable coming out of the first back to back. This means I gained the amount of points that I lost compared to my toe run in the first round. Furthermore, my 540 in hands was not credit, so I didn’t get points there, leaving me with the same amount of points. For next week, I might try to change the order again and start with a step sequence, so this week I have to focus on getting that really safe.

Hopefully the score I had in mind will become reality in the next competition, because I had such confidence that I could ski a trick PB. Luckily every other  team member skied a PB, so many people qualified for the Europeans, which is amazing! I’m super happy for everyone else, and that I got to be in the boat for most of those wicked PBs!!! 

Bowling #teamNL

This weekend we were fortunate enough to have another team training with coach Coyotte. Sadly, on Saturday, after starting at 7 in the morning, the boat broke. There was a problem with the prop so skiing was out of the question, even though it was only 10 am, so everyone had skied just once. Luckily I did have a good set that first one, because I did 4 at 13, which is the best I’ve skied on this site. I was especially happy with how my technique felt, this has really improved lately. As for the boat, there were a couple of options, but none of them were really ideal.. By the time an agreeable solution was found for the prop, it was 13:00 and at that point we weren't allowed to ski. The national team was allowed to ski until 13:00 and after 18:00, so just as the boat was up and running, we had to stop skiing, after waiting for 3 hours! Since we wanted to get away from all the waiting and frustration for a bit, we went bowling with the team. It was a lot of fun, but let's just say that it's good we are the national team for waterski and not bowling… The youngest kids got side rails, but sadly for the others, including me, these were able to go up just for specific players, so a lot of gutter balls were thrown! In the end, Coyotte won, so he can teach us something here as well. However the most important thing is that we had a lot of fun, laughed a lot and were able to get our mind somewhere else. We then decided to get an early dinner, so we could ski without stopping after 18:00. We were able to get some more sets in, but not as many as we wanted, because there was a wedding at the ski club! This wasn't the ideal situation for a training weekend, but it was quite fun to see how they organised their beach wedding, including picking up the bride with our speed boat! The fun we had with the team that day is what I want to focus on, because the last 2 ski sets went far from great.

Luckily Sunday is a different day and I started full of fresh motivation. My slalom set didn't go as well as Saturday, but still better than a couple of weeks ago, so I won't let that bother me too much. As we had to stop at 13:00 and wouldn't continue after 18:00 because most people, including me have quite some time to travel after, we had to fit in everyone's 3 sets in the first 6 hours. We worked really efficiently and I felt as if every time I blinked it was time to warm up again! I much prefer that over the waiting from the day before, so I was more focussed each set. Since I have a trick competition coming up, I was working on runs that would be stable enough for next weekend. Also I discussed strategies, like setting a PB in the first round (sure would be great) so that I will be able to add more and more risky tricks the following rounds. I wanted to focus my sets on the least stable tricks that I want to do in my run. I feel like it went really well and this gives me some more confidence for the competition. I'm also happy that the tricks that I have to put in this season’s final run are already becoming stable. Especially a 540 turn in toe holds went really well. During the set we really moulded each part of the trick, I kept building the trick with the tips I was getting. Every time I used a tip, the turn went a bit better until finally I did a perfect fully credit 540 toe hold. This is great, because this has to be the first trick I do, so if I fall on it, I will lose all the points in that run! With the runs and strategies for next weekend and some more training at home, I hope to set a PB above the 3000 point mark at the competition. I'm excited, but nervous to work towards that, but I've seen what happened when I focused on just slalom, so I should be able to do the same focusing on just tricks!

National waterski day

Arms straight, knees towards your chest!

This weekend it wasn't only about the training I had with the national team, but also about all the new people we introduced to our great sport! On Saturday, we had a full day of training, but on Sunday only until 1 pm., because there was a nation wide open day for water-skiing. Everyone could ski at clubs around the Netherlands for only 10 euros and at the club we were skiing at with the Dutch team, kids skied for free on this day! This meant that there were loads of kids that we were able to get onto the water, hopefully they will continue to enjoy it and help grow the sport!

People of all ages were able to ski

First of all on Saturday I had my own training. It was a great day, we were able to ski efficiently and I was able to do 5 sets!! I started off with slalom, which was already much better than last time we skied on this lake with the team. In between, I had been skiing with Anthony, who helped me improve my style and technique a lot within that week. Still I was skeptical, because his water skies amazing, it's called magic lakes for a reason! Furthermore one of the issues I was having here was with the 8 buoy course, due to which I had some trouble with my gate. Still with my new technique, and also confidence after my PB's last weekend, I was able to ski really well. I haven't run a 13 meter pass again here, but my style is so much better and at least I was able to consistently get trough the 14 meter passes again! After not jumping or tricking for the past week, this took a little adjusting again, but I was able to get back quick. I made some great improvements in jump where I try to be more forward and on top of my ski's so that I don't take out all of my speed by putting my ski's in the air vertically. It was very weird at first to not be slowed down instantly, but this is of course much better for the distance, so that's the feeling I have to get used to. In trick I tried to work on a flip, because I want to stick to a deal I made recently, that I will land one this season. I didn't land a flip yet, but I didn't get hurt either, so I'll write that down as a win! Then the last set of the day, I skied purely to take some videos. Everyone had been playing around with cameras and go pros, so I couldn't resist to ski one more time. I had a team mate, Hugo, join me in tricking behind the boat, so he filmed me from the side. I love to see my tricks from this angle, because you can't get much closer!

On Sunday we continued taking some photos and I filmed Hugo's set from behind the boat. I also had the go pro on my back during jump, so I hope that this video turns out awesome! This also forced me to really try to be on my front foot more, so that I wouldn't fall back and land on the go pro, haha! Then after I was done with all my sets, another team mate, Pemm asked if I could also film her tricks, so I did one more set. Again 5 sets, so after 10 sets this weekend, I was pretty tired. However, it wasn't time to stop yet, because it was time to introduce the wonderful world of water-skiing to some new talent. It was worthwhile to turn all those excited, but slightly nervous faces into uncontrollably smiling and whooping! I absolutely love to get new people on the water and to see them succeed. Luckily there was an awesome boat crew, the team coach, Talisa was driving and I got everyone ready and coached them in the boat. Together we got everyone up beside the boat. Most people were able to ski on the short line, and some even got up on the full rope when we thought they were able to handle it. It was great to do together and so rewarding to hear that everyone truely enjoyed it and wanted to come back! Defintely a great 'pass the handle' moment!

PBs on PBs on PBs

As you can probably guess from the title, this week was filled with PBs. After last week, where I didn't ski too good, both in results as in style, it wasn't hard to redeem myself after a change of scenery. I drove down to Magic Lakes in Nemours to train with Anthony. Last year at the end of the season I also trained in here hoping that he could give me just the tips to run 14 in the competition I would ski after. However, there wasn't just 1 tip, I needed to change some things in my style, and that takes time. I've had time to work on having a better style and stance and Vincent already noticed a difference when I was skiing with him. Technically I had improved a lot and the bouys would come. With a better style, it was also easier to work with the tips Anthony was giving me troughout the week. When he told me to change the angle at which I tilt my head in my turns, I actually had the time in the turn to think about this and adjust accordingly. This helped me a lot and I was skiing really well. Looking at the videos of my sets, I was really happy with how it looked. Throughout the week, the main goal was to get 14 steady and be confident that I could run it. We did ski on 13 a couple of times, but I needed to get to trusting myself at 14 first. Then on Friday, we skied competition style, this means shortening the rope after each pass I run. I ran 18, 16, 14 and skied 3 at 13. Then we went back to 14 to get it in for the competition, and since I ran it we did 1 more 13. I was told to just turn 1 to go to 2 and then turn 2 to go to 3, etc. Because if I turn 1 to run it, I would most likely go too hard. To my surprise, I kept turning bouys to go to the next one, until I was turning 6 to get back through the gate. I couldn't believe it, but I had ran my first pass at 13! I had to tripple check the colour of the rope to see if it was really green, but I had really ran 13 and it felt good!! 

The post PB smile

Though I was super happy to have this new training PB, the ultimate goal for this week was to get a new competition PB. I had to run that 14, because it is becoming such an issue mentally as well. Luckily in my first tournament pass I was already able to do this. I got through 18 without any problems and this warmed me up for the 16 meter pass. I made a small mistake here, but told myself to stay calm and ski bouy after bouy and I would run it. After this pass I took a couple of deep breaths an remembered everything Anthony told me. The technical tips, but also to just go and ski like I would in training and not ski more reserved than usual. I wouldn't regret it if I missed it, but went for it 100%, but I would regret it if I skied reserved and missed it (true, because this is what happened in some competitions before...) I went out for the gate and committed fully, barely made any mistakes and ran 14 like I never did any different. I was super stoked but tried to stay calm for the 13 meter pass, because now it was PB time. I did 2 at 13, which I was really happy with, but also eager to ski more. The following 2 rounds I did 4 and 3.5 at 14, which was hard on my mindset. I had to talk myself out of it and go for it in the last set. Both other Dutch team skiers, Hugo and Klaske Julsing, skied a PB just before me in the last round, so I couldn't be the only one who didn't. Again 18 and 16 went smooth and warmed me up for the coming pass. However, I made a mistake on 14 and was really late. I told myself, it was the last set at this lake, last round of the competition, I had to run 14, no matter what. I just kept turning and skiing to the next bouy, no matter how late I arrived. I barely got through the end gate and neither me, the boat driver or the boat judge could believe I ran that pass. The boat driver said it doesn't matter how I did it, it was 6 bouys and the time was OK, we all laughed and I got ready to ski another PB. I had nothing to lose so skied with 110% commitment. I had a great gate, 1 and 2. Sadly I made a small mistake at 3, so I couldn't get to 5. My score was 4@13, which is almost an entire pass above my previous PB, so I can't be anything but happy with the results this week!