Last weekend I spent in Bourg St Maurice, running gates with international paddlers. It was the second competition in the Alps cup, slalom, and the second World Ranking race for slalom as well. This is actually where I first tried a slalomboat, one year ago, when I went to France and joined the La Plagne club, training with Nouria Newman. The lower course is really fun, but challenging, and in the pre-lims I could not get one of the gates. My second attempt I actually had a good plan b, but abondoned it on the starting line due to pure over-confidence: “No, I CAN make that gate forwards, I do not want to spin on the eddy-line like a beginner to catch it….” Oops… Ok, time to admit that yes, I am still a beginner in slalom.. That day left me sitting in last position, but since we all moved into the semis the next day I didnt really stress it. For me, that was a training day. The semis and finals were held on the upper section, which is quite funny. I had been doing laps there earlier, and as warm up for my race on saturday, without realizing that it was actually the section set for finals. And even funnier did I find it that some of the girls had never ever paddled down it before, due to them being intimidated by the whitewater.. It is fairly steep, especially for a slalom course, but again only around the class 3-4 mark, with no nasty holes, just waves, curlers and some pushiness. I made a gameplan with french/irish Ciaran Mcardle-Heartau, which worked great. The masterplan: Take my time down the course, but catch all the gates. So I did. In the end I got fifth in the semis, and fift in the finals, and improved my time by 13 seconds from semis to finals. I was stoked, though of course I realize it was more my whitewaterskills, not my slalomskills that earned me that spot. Nevertheless, it just proves again that being able to switch in between disciplines is not a bad thing at all.
Next on the agenda was the freestyle World Cup in Plattling, bue due to heavy rain, Germany flooded and the event got cancelled. So I am back in Norway for a few days, studying for my last two exams on tuesday, then off to the mighty island of Iceland for a well-earned vacation. Lavafields, geysirs, 4×4 (oh god, how will I survive the backcountry I have no idea..), hot-springs, volcano eruption, and yeah, some waterfalling. Sweeeeeeet…
See u guys on the water!
Mariann