(Editor’s note: Times that Erik mentions are Sochi times. Sochi is nine hours ahead of us.)
SOCHI, Russia — The day has finally arrived. Tomorrow morning, I will accompany Winchester’s Julia Marino to the top of the mountain and she will officially compete in the first slopestyle skiing competition of the Olympics.
Today was Julia’s last practice run before the big day. Julia had a great day and is right on schedule for where we hoped she would be prior to the event itself.
Julia is definitely a silent but fierce competitor and in terms of her mental state of mind, she is ready to go. Today she did a great job of forgetting she was at the Olympics and put herself in a mental state of mind like she was skiing for fun. That’s important as the magnitude of this stage is massive, and only those who are capable of being mentally strong will survive. And right now Julia is doing a great job of that.
Here’s how the day will progress: We are all set for a wakeup call tomorrow morning at 6:30 (Sochi time) and will get to the mountain by 8 a.m. Inspection is at 8:40, and then there is about a 50-minute practice period before qualifiers kick off at 10 a.m. Julia is slated to go 18th, so she will have a great idea of what score will be needed to get her to advance and will be able to adjust her routine if necessary to do so.
The top 12 skiers will advance to the finals, which take place at 2 p.m., so, God willing, we will stay on the mountain for lunch, and continue to mentally prepare for the finals.
I will be at the starting gate with her, talking to her and keeping her focused and calm before her race. Like most skiers, Julia listens to music before she competes, and sometimes even when she’s skiing. I will be making sure that she believes in the plan and commits to it, because if she is able to do so, she will do very well.
Today’s practice session proved to be very unique as the temperature outside was so warm it definitely had an effect on the speed of the course, which, despite still being very fast, caused for many interruptions for course maintenance. However, tonight we are due to get a mixture of rain and snow and that is supposed to last until midday tomorrow, meaning the actual qualifiers will be under very different weather conditions than they were for the last practice run.
It will be very interesting to see how people react to the precipitation tomorrow, as this will be the first time since arriving in Sochi that weather has been an issue. The weather could slow the course down, or speed it up, depending on if it freezes on top of the existing snow.
With regards to who is favored to win this event, there are a lot of really good skiers out there, but one thing that stands out to me in slopestyle skiing over the course of this year is that every podium has been different, meaning this event is wide open and is ripe for anyone to take advantage of a great run and get onto the podium.
As for Julia, she’s used to skiing in bad weather so this could actually work to her advantage.
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