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Perianne Jones: The Making of a Champion - Survival of the Fittest
By:  Perianne Jones   (2007/02/02)

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Perrianne Jones is a member of the National Ski Team. Peri is from Almonte and grew up skiing with the various local ski clubs. She is now living in Canmore (AB) where she shares a house with Olympic Gold medalist Chandra Crawford. They should be a deadly duo at Vancouver in 2010.

In this series of articles she shares some insight into her life for the Ottawa ski community on the Fresh Air Experience website, and reprinted here with their permission.

The Tour-De-Ski is finally over. Seventy percent of our team survived and had the once in a lifetime opportunity to race up a downhill ski run for the last stage. Yes, there will be at least one more Tour-De-Ski, but it is very unlikely that there will ever be a race quite like the last stage in Val Di Fiemme again.

My own personal Tour de ski was a great experience, the highlight was the sprint in Asiago where I finished 35th. All I need to find is another second somewhere to make it into the top 30 and race the heats! I learned a lot and I can't wait to race again! Our ski bags are still missing, and the last two races in Val Di Fiemme were pretty frustrating having people fly by on the downhills while I was willing my good ol' rock skis to glide just a little faster!

I've put together a few fun facts about the Tour for you, so here they are…

Tour De Ski by the Numbers:

# of women who started...... 60
# of women who finished..... 48
# of men who started.......... 88
# of men who finished......... 63
% grade of the final uphill..... 33
length of the final uphill ....... 3km
time it took to climb the hill... 30min
# of Canadians who completed the Tour without their own skis... 5
# of Canadians who haven't seen their skis since Dec. 18th........ 5

While the rest of the team hopped on a plane and headed home after the uphill grunt Amanda, our wax tech Matt and I drove to Ramsau, Austria to start preparations for U-23 World Championships. The first few days here were a little foggy, but the sun has emerged from behind the clouds, and we are enjoying the little break we have to rest and relax before the rest of the Jr/U23 team arrives.


Previous articles in this series...

 
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