This fall was my first season racing the period one World Cup races. The World Cup venues for period one were: Ruka, FIN, Lillehammer, NOR, Beitostølen, NOR, and Davos, SUI. I left Anchorage November 12th and returned to Vermont on December 18th. Returning to Alaska will probably have to wait until April, but spending a few weeks in Vermont with family friends feels a little bit like being home.

The World Cup racing this November and December were really valuable to me. I don’t feel like I ever crushed a race or had a performance that was stellar, but I know I didn’t do horribly either. I set my goals higher than I achieved, but I am still feeling positive about my time racing in Europe this fall. I have seen places where I can improve and weaknesses I can strengthen.

Coming out of the fall World Cups my aim is to keep my confidence high and focus on US Nationals. I know I pursued better results than I produced this fall, but the only way to earn more chances on the World Cup to achieve those goals is to race fast at US Nationals, which takes place during the first week of January.

About 1.5km from the finish line pushing really hard.

In the final day of the mini tour in Lillehammer I caught this guy. I thought he was dying, but I could never drop him… He beat me across the line in the end.

I felt a lot of pressure drawing Sophie as my Secret Santa recipient, but I bought a pencil and got to work.

Switching it up- doing a distance workout with my new friend, Thomas Wick of the German team. He trained with the US team a bit during our pre-camp in Finland. Since then we have done a couple workouts together.

Working with a train of dudes in the Davos Skate 15km

I quite enjoy the cured meat offerings here in Europe