Steamboat Springs 4th of July

If I had to guess I'd say that I've spent the last 7 years in Steamboat Springs, CO on the 4th of July. As an athlete, you become very accustomed to traveling and spending time away from home, but luckily since I've spent so much time in Steamboat over the years it almost feels natural to be there, especially on the 4th of July. This year was no different. My teammates and I put in a pretty productive few days of training and had a blast with the competitions that the Steamboat Springs Winter Sports Club puts on every year. 
Perhaps the most valuable part of our annual camp in Steamboat is the Fish Creek Time Trial that the US Nordic combined team has done every year since 2007 (before I even knew what Nordic combined was).  Since we do it every year, it is super easy to track progression in our fitness and see how much we improve each year. We started the TT this year super early, mostly because of the heavy traffic on the road and partially so that we can finish early before it is too hot. We started this year at 7am and follow a reverse-order start list with the younger, less experienced athletes going first and working backwards until the top level national team athletes. I was seeded at 2nd to last, just in front of Taylor Fletcher who has put up the fastest time for 9 of the last 10 years. I felt like I started well, but at about the halfway point of the course there are two super steep hills that we refer to as "the wall". I hit the wall and had a very pukey feeling in my stomach, and had to slow my pace a bit to keep me from blowing up super hard before the finish. Even with the pukey stomach feeling, I was able to finish in 24:43, the second fastest time of the day and only 4 seconds slower than last year. Taylor put up the fastest time at 23:50 and my teammate Stephen had the 3rd fastest time of the day at 25:32.
What was more impressive than our team's results was all the up-and-comers that did the time trial this year! We had 11 athletes from the Junior National Team and Fly Guys camp participate which is a huge step in helping make these kids faster!