The Olympic Experience
As you can see I've moved over from my blog on Tumblr; I thought it would be a lot easier for all of you to follow me on my own website. Big thanks to my friend Patrick for helping me put it together.
I'm just back up in Dublin after a fantastic weekend down in Kerry. It was amazing to celebrate my 21st birthday, as well as my homecoming, with all my family and friends.
I haven't written a blog since just before my first event in Sochi, the Giant Slalom race, so I'll give you an update of how the last couple days of the Olympics went.
As you knew beforehand, I injured my shoulder the day after the Opening Ceremony. I was lucky; it ended up being a non-displaced fracture of the top of the humerus. However, it would have been a lot handier not having a cracked shoulder before I competed in the Games. I was feeling good on my GS skis the days before the race, the shoulder was just slightly painful to raise, so I had to really focus on staying on my outside ski on my right-footed turns. Race day came, and I felt like I was ready to attack the Giant Slalom course. Whether it was in the back of my mind or not, I think the shoulder played more on my confidence than anything else. I was skiing ok down the top section, although I was quite slow on the first split compared to the skiers around me. I came over the first steep pitch and nailed the first turn, the most important one on the course. I came onto the second gate and got a bit late, then got bumped around on the third, which lead to me getting twisted and eventually crashing into the barriers on the side. I was extremely disappointed with myself for not finishing the race. However, after first thinking I was never going to compete after my shoulder injury, I was proud of myself for staying level and making it to the starting gate.
After that day, I had to move on and focus on the slalom event, which would prove to be more difficult with my shoulder, as I would have to raise it to hit every gate on the way down. I worked with the Irish physio over the next couple of days and got my range of motion back to almost 100%. The day before the race I tried some gates, and it felt quite good. The only thing that was bothering me was the vibration of hitting the gates, as it travelled up my bones into the shoulder, causing me to go back-seat after my left-footed turns. The day of the race I tried them again and was feeling much better.
The conditions were quite soft sliding down inspection, and they had all of the gates cornered off at the apex so we wouldn't create a rut. That didn't do much though, and by the time I went down at bib 107 it resembled a mogul course, not a slalom. I did however make it down first run, with some of the worst skiing I've ever done. I was quite disappointed with my skiing that run, as I put the idea of finishing into the back of my mind. I decided I was going to attack the second run, regardless of a finish or not. If you were watching the event on television, you remember seeing the most ridiculous course set ever. So many top World Cup athletes blew out, mostly on that vertical to vertical turn on the top section. I pushed out of the gate and gave it my all, almost going out on that exact gate, but I pushed back in and made it down. For that run, I was pleased, and happy overall that I finished an Olympic event.
The next day was kind of hard. I knew that I had a great experience at the Olympics, the best experience of my life so far, but now it was ending. I couldn't believe it went by that fast. It was a bit hectic getting home, as I lost some of my bags in on the Sochi to Zurich flight, but once I arrived back into Dublin it felt so good to be back. Team Ireland was greeted by members of OCI and SAI in Dublin airport, and I was greeted my Uncle Mike and my three cousins Eoghan, Eabha, and Siobhan. It was a good welcome home.
I just want to give a big thanks to all of you who made this experience possible. Everyone in Utah who has supported me throughout the years, particularly Ignacio Birkner, the man who put me in that starting gate, and Beaver Mountain, who gave both me and Ignacio the opportunity to train. Thanks to Kevin Chaffee and the rest of the Snowbird group for helping me out while in university, it would have been tough to manage skiing and school without you. And last but not least, thank you to my family for making this dream possible. Everyone in Ireland, and particularly my mom & dad, and my brother Sean. You've been behind me from the very beginning.
I'm back up in Dublin now trying to sort things out for the summer and for the coming seasons; there are some new plans in the making. Talk to you all soon.
/CL