Hello BSF fans, this is Finn O’Connell checking in from Sweden! I have been here for a full week with some of my teammates on the US Ski Team! Alongside me is my college teammate from the University of Vermont, Ben Ogden, and some close friends, JC Schoonmaker, Johnny Hagenbuch, Kevin Bolger, and Walker Hall. We are with head coach Matt Whitcomb, development coach, Greta Anderson and the newest member to the coaching staff, Kristin Bourne! We are also joined by Kevin's girlfriend and the 2021-22 Sprint Overall World Champion Maja Dahlqvist and her teammate Frida Karlsson, two of Sweden’s best nordic skiers.
So why Sweden? We are in a town called Torsby, and besides some beautiful landscape, Torsby is home to the longest ski tunnel in the world! That means that for the past seven days we have been off the wheels of the roller skis and back on the nordic skis! The tunnel is a 1.25 kilometer multi directional loop with some significant hills and when you ski it like a horseshoe, is 2.5 kilometers long! While this may not sound very long, the entire tunnel is like a massive freezer kept at 23 degrees fahrenheit. And to be able to ski year round here is a huge reason for the success of these Scandinavian countries. Unfortunately we are only here for a week.
After flying from the US to Oslo, we drove 1.5 hours to Torsby. We are staying at a sport hotel with a lot of other athletes from the different national teams in Europe. The hotel has breakfast, lunch and dinner which makes it very easy to train big hours! No energy is needed to shop, or cook meals, or clean up.
On a typical day here, we eat breakfast around 8am, which is very leisurely for me! We then try to be in the tunnel and on skis by 9am. Our sessions include 45 minutes of warm up, followed by lots of no pole, and one pole skiing. Then we will do some video and technique drills, and finally we will ski easy for however long our plan calls for. After this we head directly to lunch, and take a shower and relax for a few hours. We also have a PT on this trip who I try to spend 30 minutes a day with, either working on a nagging injury or getting a massage! He has been an awesome addition to the camp! We then head out for either a run, strength, or another ski in the tunnel. Then off to dinner and we end the night by watching technique video for the next morning's ski!
This week alone I have made some huge adjustments to my technique that have been incredibly helpful. With 3 coaches and only 6 athletes there is plenty of time for 1 on 1 conversations. Also we are skiing with the best athletes in the world here so to hop in behind them and learn one thing everyday adds up quickly! The amount of motivation and drive for success I have gained just from this week should be scary for all my competitors haha! I am really looking forward to getting back to Bozeman and sharing all I have learned with the pro team.
We are now off to Norway for another week of dryland training and ending the week with the 4 rollerski races that make up Toppidrettsveka. I am excited to see where my fitness is and how I stack up against some of the top skiers in the world! Stay tuned for another update from me!
