Wilderness reset

It dawned on me that it's been too long since my last blog post. Three-and-a-half months of training, sickness, adventure, training, and racing have come and gone, all of a sudden fall is upon us and I have yet to scribble a post this training year!

My priorities in training this year have been progression and execution- My goal has been to execute every workout exactly as it is intended so that I progress continually and reach my peak fitness come winter. I want to make the easy days easy so that I can bring my best physical and mental intensity to the hard days and make them count! Last year I hit a rut in the fall- I was ready to race in August and early September, then I plateaued. I didn't carry the same mental edge into every workout. I wasn't treating each and every day as a chance to learn something new. At times, I was going through the motions, just set in a routine that helped me get out of bed in the morning but stifled my mind's ability to refocus when I needed it. I failed to progress from September to December, and when IBU Cup trials came in December it was too late.

Paul Schommer leading on a training run in the Adirondacks back in June. Wowser.

This year would be different, I promised myself in May. This year I will rest when I need it. This year, I won't get sick. This year, come fall, I'll be ready and focused and will bring a fresh and engaged mentality to every workout. This year I will intentionally seek to improve every single day. No exceptions. In order to make this happen I decided it was important for me to escape from the training center for a while during the summer. Whereas last year I stayed in Lake Placid all summer but itched to get out during the fall, this year I flipped it: I made an effort to get away in the summer so that I'd be itching to make big gains while in Lake Placid this fall. With the approval of my coach Jean Paquet, I planned to return to the midwest for two weeks in July. For the first week I helped coach a group of motivated Loppet Nordic Racing juniors on the North Shore of Lake Superior (in Tofte, MN) with coach Piotr Bednarski. I love coaching and training with the juniors at these camps; Piotr's energy and passion for training is contagious, and it ignites the juniors (I also learned the hard way that I shouldn't be Piotr's partner for greco-roman wrestling). Their youthful exuberance and energy is contagious, too- it wasn't long before I was playing endless games of lightning in the gym and caring more about a soccer game than I have since middle school gym class. Games aside, it was great to see a lot of these kids break down the mental barriers of fatigue and go beyond their perceived limits in both interval workouts and a 5-hour "eco-challenge" workout (although maybe we didn't push them hard enough- by week's end a somewhat serious prank war was escalating). You can tell a lot of them want it, and many have the work ethic to go get it. I'm excited to see what they'll do this winter and beyond.

Minnesota Mountains?

Gus from Prior Lake checking out the view in the final hour of the 5-hour multi-sport workout, which included classic and skate rollerskiing, log carries, running, and a van-push. Just the descent down to Lake Superior to go!

Loppet Nordic Racing juniors hanging out in Grand Marais after the eco-challenge.

Charlie from Mound Westonka living the Superior life

I then drove 8 hours to the other side of the same lake, stopping in Duluth and Hayward on my way to get in a few biathlon workouts. Special thanks to Andy Kreyer and Phil Rodgers for setting up their homemade biathlon ranges for me to get a workout in (Phil also gave me a city-slicker's course on bailing hay, which I was sorry to admit I'd never done before- If you need a hand hay-bailing and you're in the Adirondacks, hit me up and I'll catch some bails). And of course I stopped by The River's Eatery in Cable, WI to grab a pizza and chat with the owners Mick and Beth Endersbe! Finally I made it to Marquette, MI on the South Shore of Lake Superior where I trained with the boys of the Marquette Training Group (better known as MTG) for a week. I don't know what was more energizing, rooming with the energizer bunny himself under the disguise of Ian Torchia or dunking my body into the waters of Gitchie Gummie twice each day!

The generosity, passion, and dedication I witnessed and experienced during my time in northern MN, WI, and MI is a testament to the character of our nation's ski-racing community.

After diving into the depths of Lake Superior, I returned to Lake Placid ready to dive back into the depths of biathlon. Our team had a time trial and I was happy with my effort- I believed my ski-fitness was improving and my shooting speed was for sure the fastest it had ever been. An then... and then we went to Jericho... and the walls came tumbling down.

"Jericho" camp is the end-of-the-summer biathlon pow-wow for most US biathlon clubs (those that attend are mostly based in the Northeast, plus a large contingent from Minnesota) and a few Canadian clubs from Quebec, eastern Ontario, and PEI. The camp takes place at Camp Ethan Allen, a military base for the 10th Mountain Division and the home of the National Guard Biathlon Team. The week in Jericho is spent training and gearing up for the weekend races, which serve as the North American Rollerski Biathlon Championships and the first World Cup Trials for the US Biathlon Team... dun dun dunnn.

I don't really know what happened in Jericho. I felt fairly strong going into the camp but posted poor performances in both races. After finishing third in the 10km sprint last year, this year I finished 14th, and then 16th in the 15km mass start the following day. Normally relying on my ski speed to contend, I had one of the slowest ski times in the senior men's field. The only positive I drew from my racing was my shooting speed; not that I'm proud of my shooting since I didn't hit many targets. Even in a fatigued state I would've expected more out of myself. I left Jericho disappointed and disheartened.

I spent a good amount of time out in the wilderness, er, the penalty loop, in Jericho. Photo by Liam John

I'm motivated by this race to improve everything: technique, fitness, and shooting. The finish line for Jericho is past; the finish line I'm working toward is a long way forward. Photo by Liam John.

I left Jericho motivated. I got a glimpse of where I was as a biathlete, and I didn't like it. I know there is work to be done. Serious work to be done. And, as much as I got down about my performance, I know that God has a plan for me even if I don't excel in biathlon. To remember that my identity is found in Jesus Christ and not in my biathlon results, that is grounding. I felt ashamed after my poor efforts, but then I read Psalm 34 which says "Those who look to Him are radiant, and their faces shall never be ashamed." I felt the Holy Spirit telling me that if I'm ashamed, I'm not looking where I need to be looking. I was staring at my result on a yellow slip of paper instead of staring at the glory of the one who made me. Reading this Psalm a day after the races helped reshape my perspective on Jericho. I threw discouragement under the bridge and said screw it. There is no reason to be ashamed. Joy and hope can be found at all times. And so I continue in pursuit, with hope: I will progress in my training, I will progress in my faith.

I also left Jericho tired. Not just tired. I left Jericho mentally and physically exhausted. I knew that I needed to get work done, but in order to make it quality work, in order to execute and progress in my training, I needed to refocus and reset. I needed something like the medicine of the wild waters of Lake Superior, or as close to it as I could get without traveling. So my brother Luke, my friend Liam John and his brother Ethan, their grandmother, Grandma Alice, and I set off into the St. Regis Canoe Area Wilderness to do just that- refocus, reset, and forget about biathlon (in my case), college (in Luke and Ethan's cases), medical school applications (in Liam's case - perhaps the most daunting), and assisted living (in Grandma Alice's case - certainly the most impressive). Many, many thanks to Grandma Alice for outfitting us with drybags and Mary Jean and Jack Burke for generously letting us use their boats!

Photo by Liam John

Sometimes we get way too caught up in sports, school, or our job. These things matter, but they're not everything. Taking a trip into the wilderness, away from phones, email, and rollerskis, hit the reset button for me. For others it might be something else. When I was in school, ski racing on the weekends (especially Birkie weekend) helped keep me leveled and reminded me that my grades weren't everything. This week's canoe trip, though, had a special component: Liam's grandma Alice, who is 87 and has Alzheimer's. Alice has some incredible paddling journeys through Nunavut and Quebec under her belt, but struggles to recall them. Her talent for canoeing is evident when she paddles- though she isn't totally sure what she is supposed to be doing, she paddles with a perfect stroke and uses steering techniques (ones beyond my level) as if they are a part of her nature. Between doing yoga with Alice in the morning ("Alice, you can touch the ground!" - "Oh wow yes well how about that!") and listening to her flowing, piecewise stories, it was as if we weren't just paddling to escape our own everyday life but adventuring with Alice in a journey along the boundary between this life and the next. I do hope we helped give Alice a trip to remember, but in reality I think she gave us a greater gift, and one that I needed after Jericho. Life isn't about biathlon results. It's about a whole lot more. A whole lot more.