My blog works!!!!!

after months of contacting blogger, searching their help pages, and scratching my head as to why my blog would not work, I deleted the longest html link on my side board, and it looks like it worked!!!!!

it's snowing

Winter arrived, we had 15cm of snow in the garden yesterday, the pass to Christchurch is still closed, there is crazy heavy snow fall in the south, a tornado hit Invercargill and the supermarket has run out of bread!!! I’m keeping warm by the fire, and keeping the mini off the road tucked up safely in the garage, luckily the gym is walking (or slipping and skidding) distance from home.

P.S. for all you Europeans and North Americans: Kiwi towns are not equipped for dealing with a bit of snow, schools close, roads close, supermarkets run out of bread, the news paper does not get through and the post is not delivered if the foot path is slippery, oh and planes don’t fly either! Snow is meant to fall in the mountains not the towns.

Well I have had a very busy week, I have been flying lots; 2 flights a day when weather allows, and weights and sprints in between. Working on sponsorship and fundraising, and planning for the race season, studying for my Basic Gas Turbine exam and trying to avoid the cold out side (which is impossible when your at 2000ft agl, it is -3 degrees, flying with the doors off and you need to stick you head outside to check the load your carrying) brrrr.

trainings good, flyings good and exam passed.

Training is going great, and I have found a new sponsor, Getstrength.com the makers of the front squat harness, well they also make a back squat bar that I can use with out stressing out my shoulders, it is brilliant and they have given me one, THANK YOU. Flying is just awesome. I passed my Nav exam, that's all my compulsory exams done. I'm now starting my sling training and soon I'll be flying the Robinson 44.

Training, exams and my new wee Niece.

I’m back up in Christchurch to sit my navigation exam, it went well, I am confident that I passed but I used every minute of time to get through it, which worries me as I was told that by others who sat it recently that there was heaps of time left at the end, I have to wait 10 days for the results. I also came up here to catch up with my trainer Ashley, I’ve been following his program for 5 weeks now and I’ve been getting stronger and stronger and the front squat harness is just brilliant. I have found a few things that my new shoulders don’t like, dead lifts, and incline bench press, but I don’t have to do them to become strong and powerful, they are certainly not a prerequisite for skeleton so they are off the program.

I caught up with Ashley in the gym at Rugby Park in Christchurch, the sacred home of the Canterbury Crusaders, my 16yr old brother and my 5 year old sister (who knows the names and faces of more crusaders and All Blacks than I do) are jealous that I (I don’t even understand the rules of rugby) get to be in the gym while these international rugby legends are training. My dad and brother are both Crusaders fans and were very keen to know who I saw and met, and they find my ‘I don’t know’s very entertaining and frustrating. some rather good looking, fit athletes is not what they wanted to hear…at least my step Mum could appreciate what I had to say ;)

I also got to meet my new little niece Breanna Louise Corcoran. She was just gorgeous, a placid chilled out baby. Guy and Dani are handling the task of being Mum and Dad just fine.

Air borne adventures

My flying is going great with two flights a day, I hope to take my brother for a flight next week, he’ll be my first real passenger!

I got to go exploring in the helicopter, my instructor circled all the little huts in the shotover/skippers/mototapu area and sent me and another instructor out to find them, I haven’t flown navigating off a tramping topographical map before, there is a lot more detail, neither myself or the instructor who came with me had ever flown in the area we were headed to and it was rainy with low cloud, so it was challenging and exciting conditions to fly it – but as a commercial pilot I wont be able to only fly on good weather days, so it was good experience. We found all the huts, even landed at one, there are some beautiful remote spots up there. We got to fly over Shania Twains mansion she is building, checked out the old chinese gold miners water tunnel they built to divert water into another river, and saw massive waterfalls with all the rivers in flood from the 3 inches of rain the night before. We flew home via Skippers Canion, and through the Queenstown control zone, it was very cool.

Back in Wanaka

I'm well into my new program, and now back in Wanaka and training is going great, the weight of my dead lifts, bench press and clean pulls are still limited by my right shoulder, but that is to be expected with surgery only 12 months ago, but the weights are going up and the box jumps and knees to feet jumps are getting easier, and the Turkish Get Ups are amazing for my shoulders. My front squat harness is a godsend, the strength and stability through my core that I used to have is finally returning. That painful, tired and achy body reminds me daily that I’m getting stronger and faster, the only problem in my training is that every time I decided to do a speed session it starts raining, I miss the athletics track in Timaru, it is much easier to train on than wet grass. But the big benefit of training here in Wanaka is the ice at the Southern Hemisphere Proving Ground, soon I’ll be back up there practicing my push starts on the ice high in the mountains. I cant wait.

A new trainer and a new program gets me moving forward.

I have a new trainer, Ashley Jones, he has been great and he is use to working with athletes who have shoulder issues. YAY. He has also arranged equipment support for me from www.speedpowerstability.com, THANK YOU!

Front Squat Harness

My first 12 weeks back in NZ were spent recovering from the injuries/illness I picked up on tour and sitting my 6 commercial pilots licence exams.

I knew that in order to get the amount of study required done I had to find a way to keep my head in the books every single day. I also needed to pay off my two credit cards that where fuller than they had ever been. Amazingly I found a way to do all of it! A free bed at my dads helped and after a short break to get healthy and fit, I started working 12 hour days, two jobs one at the reception at Tekapo Helicopters, and in the evenings a Kohan restaurant in Tekapo, the best Japanese restaurant in the country! With it being the quiet time of the year there was plenty of time for me to study for my exams while waiting for a keen tourist to walk in the door looking for a heli flight. Some how I also managed to find a way to get to Timaru 3 times a week to train at the gym and athletics track there too. After 7 weeks of way too much work, and way way to much study, and lots of yummy authentic Japanese dinners after work, I had done all my exams, and could start focusing on training.

My focus switched back to training and I started googling for ‘training tools dislocated shoulders’ as I knew that with all these rugby players that bust their shoulders there must be some kind of aids that would help me regain my strength in the gym with out pushing my shoulders past their limits…and I found the right site, www.getstrength.com makers of the front squat harness. Finally 2 years after I stupidly agreed to get on a trampoline for a ‘core conditioning session’ that became a ‘lets dislocate shoulders and screw up the next two years’ session, I was able to train properly and squat. The front squat harness is wicked and I recommend it to anyone who has suffered from dislocations, subluxations, or shoulder instability and finds it difficult or impossible to do back squats and front squats. Go the front squat harness!

Food Poisoning

The world championships was horrible, I got food poisoning. It really sucked, I spent 5 days lingering near by the closest WC, and only managed to do half of the official training, then on the first race day I got too sick and too weak and ended up in the local hospital 4 kg lighter. I was in hospital on a drip for 5 days. They think it may have been salmonella, but I'll have the test results sent to me in NZ. What ever little monster it was that I ate, I can say that was the sickest I have ever been. I am feeling much better now, just a bit too skinny. I am flying home today. No money left for racing. I'm going to miss 3 world cups, in 6 seasons I have only ever missed 2, so I am not too happy about having to head home and not race, but it has got to be done. The main goal of the season was achieved, that was to get the shoulders working and driving the sled after having surgery.

The shoulders are great and work properly on the sled now, and I was sliding extremely well in Igls before I hurt my ankle, I feel like I am getting close to being back on track after the shoulder/trampoline incident derailed me.

Homeward bound Hanover to Frankfurt to Hong Kong to Auckland to Queenstown (then a 3 hour drive to Burkes Pass), with a 10 hour stop in Hong Kong I am going to be a jet laggede wreck when I get there.