Sport through the lens

This is definitely crazy month. It’s only 11th of January, and tomorrow will be 6th FIS alpine skiing World cup race we covered already, and it will be in third different place.

Having fun with coach of Finnish women team, Janez Slivnik during first run of women Snow queen trophy slalom

Year started with Women slalom race in Zagreb, Croatia, on 3rd of January. After race, we popped home for day, and on Tuesday we were back in Zagreb, for men’s slalom race. There was much better party on Tuesday as it was on Saturday, but this has a lot to do with few Canadian servicemen and coaches with who I was “traveling” around Zagreb. Race by itself was “standard” one. As in Schladming, Austria, standard weather is obviously heavy snowfall, in Zagreb fog is our enemy. It has been second or third year in a raw, that there was whole bunch of fog.

Fourth placed after first run, Sandrine Aubert of France skiing in first run of women Snow queen trophy slalom World Cup race in Zagreb

Fourth placed Maria Riesch of Germany reacts in finish of second run of women Snow queen trophy slalom

It’s pretty hard to do something good in conditions where you hardly see gate you are shooting. But it’s outside sport, so we do what we have to. Zagreb races were also first races, I have been shooting with new Canon 1dmk4. When I was getting it, I was a bit afraid mk3 story will play all over again. But luckily it’s not, so mk4 was good investment… especially after I figured out proper color settings, which are a whole lot different then on cameras I have been using until now (1dmk2).

Second placed Kathrin Zettel of Austria celebrates her medal

Fifth placed after first run Tanja Poutiainen of Finland skiing in first run of women Snow queen trophy slalom

Winner Sandrine Aubert of France reacts in finish of second run of women Snow queen trophy slalom

On Wednesday, straight after race, we hit the road, and went home for a day, and Friday, during really bad snowstorm, we were on road again, heading for women speed weekend in Haus im Ennstal in Austria, with 2 DH races and one SG. Road was crappy, but once we passed by biggest “stau”, we were passing annoyingly slow driving cars with 160km/h :) So we were in Haus pretty fast :)

Leader after first run, Reinfried Herbst of Austria skiing in first run of men Snow queen trophy slalom

Akira Sasaki of Japan skiing in first run of men Snow queen trophy slalom World Cup race in Zagreb

Second placed Manfred Moelgg of Italy reacts in finish of second run of men Snow queen trophy slalom

Saturday women downhill race of FIS alpine skiing WC in Haus started pretty bad. I was heading up to hill, leaving camera backpack with all the gear on top station of ski lift, and I went skiing down. First half of course felt like I’m skiing blind. It was so fogy, I hardly saw tips of my skis. It was impossible to find good spot, since I didn’t even see anything, so I settled down on spot, just above finish line on one of last corners of the course.

Winner Giuliano Razzoli of Italy (M), second placed Manfred Moelgg of Italy (L) and third placed Julien Lizeroux of France (R) celebrate their medals

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Fog on higher parts of course was delaying start of women downhill race of Audi FIS alpine skiing World Cup in Haus im Ennstal

And then it started…. half hour before first start we got info, start is postponed for half hour. Then another half hour, and another half hour. At that time, story of last year’s Garmisch men DH race started to play infront of my eyes. That Saturday, we were standing on hill for more then 6 hours, for race to be canceled on the end.

Winner Lindsey Vonn of USA skiing during women downhill race of Audi FIS alpine skiing World Cup in Haus

This time, things weren’t so bad, so after hour and half of waiting (plus hour and something before original start time), everything started. Position was not really perfect, but there were only two normal positions on the course, so you take what you got and you are happy with that.

Winner Lindsey Vonn of USA celebrates her medal won in women Super-G race of Audi FIS alpine skiing World Cup in Haus im Ennstal (Photo: Leena Jeroncic/PhotoSI)

Race went by fast, photos were sent even faster, and before I knew, we were heading out for dinner with AFP guys. It’s been first race since last season where both of us were present, so it was pretty cool thing to see my Slovakian friend again, go to get something to eat and grab a beer or two.

Winner Lindsey Vonn of USA skiing during women downhill race of Audi FIS alpine skiing World Cup in Haus

Sunday’s super-g race is something I want to forget as fast as possible. I skied down the course 3 times, and more I was looking, less I saw. On the end I picked position, for which I still don’t know how I managed to pick. With all these years in skiing, with all these years in shooting sports, I manage to pick total crap??!! It was totally blind, and skiers position was everything but super-g. If I would be shooting speed skiing, it would be ok, but not SG. Ok photos were ok on the end, but I was definitely not happy with that.

Winner Lindsey Vonn of USA reacts in finish of women Super-G race of Audi FIS alpine skiing World Cup in Haus im Ennstal (Photo: Leena Jeroncic/PhotoSI)

Only good thing with all this was, that Leena was doing finish, and if there were shit photos from course, at least those from finish were cool, with lot of emotions. So day wasn’t all that bad on the end. ;)

Fifth placed Andrea Fischbacher of Austria skiing during women Super-G race of Audi FIS alpine skiing World Cup in Haus im Ennstal

Now I’m back home, I will manage to catch both ice hockey times I have this week (playing not shooting :)), and then  tomorrow morning, I’m heading back to Austria to Flachau for women SL race. Since it’s night race, I will be actually getting some skiing on my own on morning, and then driving back like lunatic when we will be done around 11pm or midnight.

Winner Lindsey Vonn of USA skiing during women downhill race of Audi FIS alpine skiing World Cup in Haus

And on Friday, I’m off again to Maribor, Slovenia for women FIS World Cup GS and SL races of traditional Golden Fox trophy.

Kajsa Kling of Sweden skiing during women downhill race of Audi FIS alpine skiing World Cup in Haus

So with all this, you can decide on your own, if this is crazy month or not :)