Skiers have a (snow) ball

On Saturday evening, two football fans (Nick and Gilles) joined three other eager skiers (Cait, Ruffina and Dan) after the Man Utd-Chelsea game for a race at Hillingdon ski centre. This was the final stage of the Huskis race series, and the evening started with individual racing.

Gilles (Ginardelli’s fellow countryman) had a quiet start as it was his first race since his accident. An excellent second run placed him tenth in his age group.

After a storming first run provisionally placed her first in her group, Ruffina had a bit of bad luck in the second and fell due to going into her inside edge. This also scuppered her chances of a high placing in the individual tables.

This wasn’t to be the last of our bad luck. Cait, our star racer and favourite in the overall girls event, clipped a gate in her first run, spinning her through 180 degrees and destroying her chances. She however proved she was the best in her second run as she finished it in 13.49 secs, some 0.55 ahead of the next competitor. Nick finished two good runs with a total time of 29.04, putting him second in his age group and ninth overall. Finally Dan had a good run with two of his best runs this season - his aggregate time of 29.26 placing him third in his group and fifth overall.

These results put IC in second place, behind Holloway. In the final event of the day, our true potential finally showed by winning the dual team slalom. Even though we had a tough draw we beat Holloway in the quarter-finals, leaving us Hillingdon in the semis. With a bit of luck and good planning we pressured one of their racers to miss a gate and qualified for the final.

In the final we triumphed gloriously due to the collective effort of the team, with some outstanding starting and racing by Gilles and from Cait who withstood the pressure of having the second best racer of the day on her tail.

The only thing left to say is that we truly kicked some butt!