Alice Mckennis

It’s almost time! I’m counting down the days till ski season really gets going in a couple weeks. I cannot wait to just ski. ALL.THE.TIME.  I haven’t been this excited for winter since I was little. I guess missing most of last season will do that to you!

I had a really good camp in Chile in September, even got to run some Super-G! I also trained some Giant Slalom, pretty cool too just not quite as fun as running Super-G. It was so thrilling for me to get back into
the gates, even sectioning was awesome. I may have even done some fist pumping after my first run in gates…

Psyched after a day of skiing in Portillo

For the most part my leg felt good in Chile which was very reassuring for me. To be honest I have had my doubts at times that everything was going to be good and that I would be back as soon as I have been. Thinking back to when I was first injured and hearing that I would be back on snow in six to nine months it didn’t seem so bad, I was a little naïve in my assumption that once I was back on snow it would be like I had never even broken my tibia plateau. Now that my bones are healed, I’m strong and back on snow I am still learning that there are still some things I’m going to have to figure out. Some days my leg will feel great and other days are going to be tough. I’m learning patience, and a lot of it! It can be frustrating when I have to call it a day at 10am while my teammates train till noon. I want to hammer out as many runs as I can and ski all day but right now for my training and health I have to be smarter than that. Or least TRY to listen to my coaches when they tell me to stop…because let’s be honest ski racers are really not the brightest crayons in the box. Seriously looking at what we do it doesn’t take much to understand that there might be a few screws loose…

My technician Miha and I

Since I have been back from Chile I have spent most of my time in Park City training or on various camping trips to southern Utah.  Last weekend I was in Moab and competed in the 24 Hours of Moab mountain bike race in order to raise funds for World Cup Dreams Foundation. It was killer! Really, really tough but fun at the same time. Never having competed in a mountain bike race before I did not know what to expect but much like in a ski race I found myself pushing myself way harder than I would normally ride. I was pretty sketchy at times, but didn’t crash! The night riding was especially sketchy, my light started to go out about five miles from the finish so that was good. I luckily had a really lame light on my handlebars that barely showed anything past my front wheel till I caught up to another rider and followed them through the most technical parts. Then I just sent if for the last two miles and prayed I didn’t beat it in… I was on a team
with Eric Scholpy and a few of his buddies from Park City, I raced three 15-mile laps and our team ended up third in the coed division. I was exhausted after but I will for sure be back next year! A huge THANK YOU to all those that donated and supported World Cup Dreams at this last event. We raised over $20,000! So Thank you, thank you, thank you! Your support really helps!

The World Cup Dreams Team!

Keely and I before my first lap!

I have about another week in Park City for a dryland camp with the rest of the team then back to Colorado! I can’t wait to get back to my home state, I have missed it dearly. Then onto Copper early November for some speed training on our new trail! Can’t wait to get out there and get extreme….

Whew… already more half way through my trip to New Zealand! The skiing has been good down here and I am so psyched to back on skis. Going over six months without skiing is far too long! I have been skiing two days on snow followed by a rest day. We have been sticking to this plan to make sure the stress of skiing isn’t too much for my leg and so far it is working! I have had four days on snow and plan to get another four or five days before I leave.

My leg hasn’t bothered me too much which is really encouraging to me, it has been a lot of work to make it back on snow and it feels great to see my hard work pay off. Each day I am on snow my leg feels better, just taking it a few days to get back in the swing of it! I have been doing a ton drills down here trying to find my balance and a solid body position again. Not gonna lie, I felt like a total dork the first day back on snow, just struggling all day to figure things out but the drills have been very productive and yesterday I was even carving one ski turns on slalom skis! I know what everyone is thinking, slalom skis and I normally don’t get along but I promise that I was totally ripping on them! I really want to take off and go fast, and maybe get a little out of control… but that will have to wait till next camp I suppose. Dang.  Skiing here is not without its challenges, there have been a few crazy out of control people skiing around that have tried to T-bone me at least ten times, I’m not worried about my leg anymore it’s the other people around that make me nervous. I may not be running Downhill right now but I’m still livin on the edge…

Aside from skiing I have partaken in the normal activities around Queenstown, on our arrival day we made the customary visit to Fergburger (THE best burger joint ever. I highly recommend it to everyone that visits Queenstown) and each had a burger the size of my head. I’m not kidding; it’s pretty intense to eat a whole Fergburger. They are HUGE, but so tasty. I have been going for a lot of walks and may even try to get into some golf today. My golfing skills are minimal but I like to try and channel my inner Rickie Fowler and see what happens, which usually isn’t much more than me whiffing and missing the ball completely.

For now I will be keeping it in control and pretty casual on the hill to get my ski legs back, but just wait…I’ll be back soon enough!

Cheers!

Skiing again!

So I have been pretty bad about updating my blog and letting everyone know what I have been up to… so here is a quick post before I fly to New Zealand this evening!

I was cleared to ski about ten days ago so I headed up to Mt. Hood last weekend to get in a couple of days of skiing to make sure everything felt ok before I flew all the way to New Zealand. Everything felt great! No pain or swelling or anything bad! It felt a little strange to be on skis again, first run or so I was a total gaper. But my balance and everything came back pretty fast and I was totally ripping. Well, besides the fact that I am not supposed to arc my turns yet, but I had a killer stivot going at least!

I will be down in New Zealand till August 7th. The plan is for me to two ski two days on, one day off the whole camp focusing on GS freesking and a ton of drills. If things are going well I might even progress to some brush courses at the end. Wahoo! New Zealand is such a cool place and I am so pumped I get to go this year.

It has been a real push for me to make it to this camp but spending the past four and half months training in Park City has been key for me. I could not have done it without all the great people supporting and helping me in the COE. THANK YOU, THANK YOU!  Ernie and Jess, you guys are the best!

Thats all I have time for now, but I will be updating throughout New Zealand!

It’s crazy how fast things happen in ski racing. One second you can be a bit late for a gate training SG, make a move to make that gate and then the next second you are in a heap with your equipment strewn about the hill and your knee is in horrible pain.  That’s ski racing for ya and that’s what happened to me last weekend while I was training Super-G at Saalbach, Austria just after the New Year.  On January 2nd I basically crossed my tips at high-speed, crashed and broke my left tibia plateau. Luckily I did not injure anything else, we all know how bad you can get injured in ski racing and I am lucky nothing else happened.

I came home and had surgery last Thursday in Vail at the Steadman-Hawkins Clinic. Dr. Sterett did the surgery and he said it could not have gone any better! My tibia plateau had a big crack in it and had been depressed almost a full centimeter. Dr. Sterett was able to raise the depression back up and fix the crack with a plate and five screws.

I will be non-weight bearing for six to eight weeks then, if everything is going well I can began to strengthen again. I will be home in Colorado while I’m on crutches doing rehab as much as I can in Vail and shortly after I get off crutches I plan on moving out to Park City to work on getting my legs back!  I am looking at being back on snow in six to nine months, so I am hoping for Chile camp in September if everything goes ok.

I’m totally bummed about this setback but injuries happen a lot in ski racing and it is something that I can work through and just have to take day by day. I just need to have patience, work hard, stay positive and most of all have faith.  Faith in myself is what has gotten my this far in my career and faith is what is going to bring me back!

For the time being while I am off my leg and have a lot of spare time I am going to read some good books, watch a substantial amount of TV and movies, and take some online classes. I am not sure what I am going to study but whatever it is it will keep me occupied and give me something else to think about.  I already feel myself getting a bit stir crazy so I need something to learn about quick! haha!

Anyway I want to thank everyone for the support I have gotten, it means so much to have my friends and fans behind me. Also need to thank Dr. Sterett, his staff and the Vail Valley Medical Center for taking such good care of me! My nurses and care staff were so nice!

AND of course my family. It is really hard for me to need help with every little thing, I am normally very self reliant and it is hard to ask for help. But they are putting up with me and taking care of me. They really couldn’t do anything better! I love you guys, thank you.

I will update my blog when something new and exciting happens with my knee, like when I can bend it to 125 degrees or something!

My leg post operation...ouchy!!

Double ouchy!

Today we had our first training run in Lake Louise. Not my best performance…. lets just say I had some issues.  I could make a million excuses but basically I did not ski the way I know how and had issues. So I will just leave it at that and fix things for the next two training runs! The very first training run of the season is tough, there is a lot of nerves and tons of anxiety so it is nice to get it over with! 

 We finished up last week after training for two weeks at Copper. It was a really good camp to end on. We had decent snow conditions (it was a bit soft sometimes) and got in quite a few days of early morning speed training.  Giant Slalom and Slalom training was good, actually it was a lot of fun! I generally have a good time skiing Giant Slalom but to the shock of many people, I had a good time skiing Slalom as well, ok, not every day, but some days were fun!  Slalom isn’t so bad when you actually carve some of your turns…..wow can’t believe I just said that. No worries though, I have no intention of trading in Downhill skis for Slalom skis. NO WAY!

 Lake Louise will actually be the second race of the season for me; a small invite Giant Slalom race was held at Copper during our camp. I had a pretty good race that day. I didn’t score a huge result but after starting second to last I ended up in the top 15. It felt really good to put two Giant Slalom runs together, it has been a couple years since I have done that.

After Copper camp I headed home to New Castle for a few days of rest and for the Thanksgiving holiday. It was nice to spend some time with my family but like always it went by fast. Since I have the good fortune to be born and raised in Colorado it was only a short drive for me to go watch the World Cup in Aspen this past weekend. I love being able to cheer on my teammates at the big races! Of course racing in Aspen is a goal of mine but for now I don’t mind being cheerleader. It is especially nice to be in USA for one race. Sadly for only one race…. It was sooooooo exciting to see Julia lay down an awesome first run in the Giant Slalom, we all knew she could do it but when the world sees her do it, it is pretty cool. I was also so pumped to see Resi do well in the Slalom. It has been a long, tough recovery for her, but she has done it! And in her first World Cup race back is even more impressive! Good job girls!

I have made a few changes coming into this season that I hope will make the difference. I feel confident in my physical fitness this year, before this season I was normally the one who lagged behind the group in dryland but now I have caught up to everyone for the most part. It was a lot of hard work this summer, but I think it will be worth it. I still have a ways to go to reach the peak of fitness but at least I have started the climb! I think the biggest changes I made this prep- period in my skiing is that I have learned how to keep my feet under me and flex my ankles. This sounds basic I know, but it seriously has changed my skiing so much! I look back on video from Portillo last summer and I can’t believe the changes I have made. It is incredible to me!

Mentally I am in a better place than I was last year at this point. My confidence was not too high coming into these races last year. I think the only thing that really held it together for me before this race last year was hearing from my old coach John Hale, that I was still a good skier and deserved my place on the World Cup. I guess I believed in myself enough last year to score an 18th and 10^th place! It is amazing how hearing from someone you trust and respect that you are actually ok at your job can help pull things together, sometimes all it takes is a little encouragement.  I now know I really do deserve my spot on the World Cup, it all really comes down to trusting myself and going out and doing the simple things that work like flexing my ankles!

I am looking forward to this season; I can’t wait to shralp some sick turns! On course and hopefully (fingers crossed) some powder!  We are going to a few new venues for me this season so that should give me an opportunity to free-ski some. Perhaps I will get crazy and drop some cliffs, or hit the park and do some really cool spread eagles (with a grab maybe??).  Who knows?! Things could get insane!

Anyway, we have a Downhill training runs Tuesday through Thursday with our first Downhill race on Friday with more Downhill on Saturday and finally Super-G on Sunday. So if you can watch us on www.universalsports.com  or wherever you can!

Whoop, whoop, can’t wait!!!!!

After three weeks of training in Chile we are done! Even with minimal snow; the coaches really pulled together and made it work. I don’t know how many rocks they covered each day after training, but I know it was many more than they wanted to count! Thank you coaches, you guys are the best!  

It has been a very good camp and I have improved on a lot of things, there is still a long ways to go but I am happy with the changes I have made. There were some good days, great days and bad days of course, but all in all I am really psyched about the camp and I am ready for it to be over. I am ready to have a few more exciting off  hill activities in my life other than recovery, nap time, video and tea time(tea time is pretty much the highlight of my afternoons in Chile). I am not complaining, but I could use a little variety (and some clean clothes) right about now!

  We got in a ton of great speed training in Portillo and we also got in a lot of tech training during our second training sessions in Portillo and Valle Nevado. Unfortunately my GS was not as ripping as it was in New Zealand and this is SO frustrating to me, I can not wrap my brain around how you can learn a skill one day and then not have it the next. I know I can ski fast GS but for some reason it was not happening here. Hopefully in this next break before our training camp in November I can figure out where I put my fast GS skiing and bring it out!  

 On the other side of tech skiing my slalom was the best I have ever skied. EVER. I have had moments of slalom brilliance before (J3 Junior Olympic Slalom Champion…..) but this was really something down here. I guess I finally figured out how to carve slalom turns, lets hope this is a skill that I will have the next day! Levi here I come!!! HAHA, funny joke. No way… speed for life! Perhaps I will get to race some Super-Combined this year if there are any extra spots, I will be keeping my fingers crossed!  

I am pretty exhausted after skiing at 10,000ft for three weeks and I am looking forward to getting a little break before I have to hit the gym again. Instead of going home and becoming one with the couch, I get to go on a trip to Ecuador with my some of my family and see the countryside and culture of Ecuador riding horses! I am so excited to get to do a little extra traveling outside skiing, and get to see something new and different. It is really hard sometimes to find the time to sneak in a cool trip without having to worry about going to the gym or skiing, I am looking forward to letting my body and mind take a break from it all.  

After ten days in Ecuador I will be back in the gym for five weeks and then we head to one last ski camp in Colorado in November to prepare for the season. I can not believe how fast the summer and prep period has gone by! It always does, but I know when Lake Louise rolls around I will be ready to shralp some sick tuuuuuuurns!  

Adios,  

Look for my next post telling everyone about my adventure in Ecuedor!  

After five days of intense training since our last day off we get today to rest our bodies and minds and prepare for the final week of our camp. It feels goooood to rest, let me tell you! We have had some great Downhill training the past few days getting six to seven runs a day usually followed by a second session of GS and even some slalom! That’s right people, I have been skiing  slalom! I think it might actually being helping my speed skiing as well, but don’t expect to see me racing it anytime soon…. it’s more of a training tool for me. Like a drill really.

The Downhill training has been very challenging but it went really well for me; I started the training here being one of the slowest on the tough, steep, turny section (up on the Roca Jack for those that are familiar with Portillo) to actually winning some splits in that section! This is huge for me since I am known as a glider and it is really cool to be kicking some butt on such a technical part of the course. I’m actually learning how to turn…haha!! We had a few days of challenging weather with fog and flat light but we only missed one day and the weather for the rest of our camp looks good. While many teams bailed on coming to Portillo, I am really glad we stuck to our plan and decided to make the trip south.  We have two more days here and then we make the journey to Valle Nevado to get some training with the tech team. I am really excited to train with the tech girls; they are a fun group of people and of course awesome skiers! It is fun to try to keep up with them training GS and SL and be able to watch them and hopefully get a few insider tips on how to ski the technical events!

Sometimes I can’t belive how lucky I am to be able to live out my dream and persue ski racing as my career. It has been a lot of hard work with much more to come but it has all been worth it. I get to ski in the most incredible places, meet new people, experience different cultures and countries and most of  all, do what I love.  I wish I could explain how I feel sometimes when I am out skiing, it is hard to describe, but I can say that it is a feeling of extreme happiness.

Then there are the many tough days that come along. Yesterday was one of those for me. We had a great day of Downhill training the day before with the sun shinning and a course that was challenging yet fun at the same time.  We had very flat light yesterday but we decided to stick it out and get one last day of DH training in. I psyched and ready to go and then for no reason my ski fell off at the third gate. Normally it isn’t a big deal because your equipment is bound to malfunction at times but something about the way it happened, the lack of visibility and my fear that I would smash into one of the many rocks on the side of the course when I was falling, put me in a weird funk for the rest of the training. I lost confidence in my equipment and myself over nothing. I struggled for a few runs and then decided to call it quits, my ankle was hurting from my fall and I had no faith in my ability. I stomped my way back to the octagon (I was a little frustrated…) and tried to figure out what was going on in my mind. It was lack of faith in myself. I wanted to pretend that I was scared my skis were going to fall off and that is was freaking me out but really, out of the hundreds of runs I have taken this has happened to me probably six or seven times.  Not likely to happen again in the same day. All that was holding me back was myself. I decided I would not have it! I called back on the radio and told my coaches I was not going to finish like this; I went back to the start, shoved my fear deep, down inside of myself, toughened up and took one last run. It was all fine, I skied well and finished on a good note. Sometimes you need to dig deep and vanquish your inner demons whatever they are. They are bound to come back but if you beat them once you can beat them again! So that is my story of personal struggle recently, though not much compared to many I have had before and many that are sure to come OR compared to the much larger struggles of many people around the world; I can at least take confidence once again in myself and have a little faith…

Adios my friends! Check out the sideshow of Portillo below!

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After a two-week break from skiing we are back at it in Portillo,Chile. I have to say Portillo is one of my favorite places to ski. The scenery is unbelievable, skiing is AWESOME, we can get whatever kind of training we want, people are really nice here, and we have good food! I can’t tell you how important it is to have yummy, healthy food, there are many times during the winter where we deal with very, very, unfortunate types of food….. yuck!

During my two-week break back it the US, I hit the gym for about a week and also took a family house-boating trip to Lake Powell. It was a great way to end the summer! I got to spend some time out in the sun, do a few beach workouts, and enjoy spending time with my family. I do not get to see enough of my family, it was really great to have a vaction with them in such a beatiful place like Lake Powell.  I also turned 21! Kind of a big deal… I had a great time with my friends in Park City, and they made SURE I had a good time as well. Lets just say the day after my birthday I wasn’t feeling so good….

Now I am back working on my skiing so I can hopefully get on the podium this season!  We have had two days of training so far and it has been very challenging. Due to lack of snow, the trail we are training on is dotted with rocks that are marked with stubby gates, and grooming parts of the hill is not an option. The courses have been very bumpy and the snow has been freezing hard at night so we have had some pretty fast snow in the mornings. We have pretty much gone from one of the easier Super-G training sessions in New Zealand to one of the toughest in one session. At the same time it is awesome that it is so tough, it really challenges me and forces me to become a better skier. So overall I am pretty psyched about being down here! Couldn’t ask for much more…. well, perhaps a little more snow on the track would be nice, but you can’t have everything!

Rainbow Bridge, Lake Powell!

Awesome B-day cake my teammate Megan Mcjames made me!