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LAKE PLACID, N.Y. (Sept. 25) – An expanded program, fresh coaching staff and an all-new approach to training is propelling the U.S. Cross Country Ski Team toward completion of another successful training camp in the 1932 and 1980 Olympic Village. "This camp is all about training hard, doing a lot of intensity and a lot of intervals," said two–time Olympian Andrew Johnson (Greensboro, VT). "In a two–week block, we'll do between 16 and 18 interval sessions and a couple of time trials. This is a slight variation on what we've done the last few years, it's a little more intensity, but it's also a little more controlled and monitored more closely, so it's less risky."
The training design, built by Head Coach Pete Vordenberg, Sprint Coach Chris Grover and the newest addition to the U.S. staff, Justin Wadsworth, a three–time Olympian turned World Cup coach, is focused on individual programs for each athlete. To do this, the team adapted the methods of Norwegian Jan Helgerud, who is world renown for his research on distance versus intensity training. "Basically, we're going to use the intensity to build capacity through interval blocks," said Wadsworth, who used Helgerud's methods to help train 2002 Canadian Olympic gold medalist and wife Beckie Scott. "We developed some training methodology from his studies that he even thought was pretty cool.In my career, I probably over trained a little bit, but I've always thought that I did the best I could with technique, and I feel like I really want to help the athletes with any of that and I'm really fired up to do it." At the helm was Vordenberg, a two–time Olympian, who stepped up from World Cup coach to head coaching in the spring then promptly re–signed Grover and sought out Wadsworth, then hired development coaches Matt Whitcomb and Pat Casey to lead the pipeline. The key is "Good staff," said Vordenberg. "The guys who I hired, I'm so happy with because we can take care of everybody as they need to be taken care. That's what makes it possible. Every camp, I've said the same thing and that is, so far, it (the team) looks really good. I started saying that in May and now I'm saying that in September. The summer has flown passed and every camp, I've said we're looking awesome." With nearly the entire national team in Lake Placid, coaches and athletes took full advantage of the varied, "low altitude" terrain. Two–time Olympian Kris Freeman (Andover, NH) centered on putting in the Adirondack miles, while Johnson and sprinters Torin Koos (Leavenworth, WA), Chris Cook (Rhinelander, WI) and Andy Newell (Shaftsbury, VT), who last season nailed the first American World Cup podium since 1983, focused mostly on interval training. "Lake Placid is definitely ideal for what we need to do," said Vordenberg, "we wouldn't come here if it wasn't good for what we need to do. The athletes need good steep uphills and rolling ski–like terrain and there's a lot of that around here." He also added that being able to sleep, work out and eat at the Olympic Training Center makes the training so much easier for the athletes. Johnson, who grew up in neighboring Vermont agreed, "Lake Placid provides the perfect setting for the kind of ‘good pain' we're after. As a little kid we used to come over here and hike around the mountains so it's like home in a way. Plus, fall is a great time of the year to be training here, the views are always good, and strange as it may sound, it's nice to be in some rain and colder weather." As a culmination of the two–week camp, athletes competed in a rollerski time trial on Sept. 23 with the men skiing 9k, while the women skied 7k. Freeman topped the men's mass start race with a time of 26:09, followed by Newell in 26:25. Morgan Arritola (Fairfield, ID) and teammate Liz Stephen (Montpelier, VT) tied to win in the women's race in 24:52. Next stop for the U.S. Cross Country Team is a Sports Science camp slated for mid October in Park City, Utah. |
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