Where are you now during the time of COVID?

I’m at home in Thunder Bay with my family. We live out in the country a bit outside of town so it is pretty quiet and we’re just making one trip a week into town to get groceries.

What are you doing in these times of social distancing?

I have a couple meetings a week with Nordiq Canada. The end of the season is busy as people start to pick teams and make plans for next season. I’m also working on figuring out what I personally will be doing next season.  In the short term I’m trying to find some projects to keep me busy.

Are you training? How?

I’ve been keeping some structured training going for the last few weeks. In a normal season I would still be training into early April, and we’ll probably be social distancing for a while, so I’m going to try to train farther into April and maybe take my rest a little bit later into the spring.

 Since this is kind of a weird situation, I’m trying to have fun with it and try some different things that I wouldn’t normally do in the training season. I’m lucky that we have a set of weights and a bench at my house, so I’m doing strength 4 times a week. I’m still trying to get in one long workout a week (a run or ride on our exercise bike), but the rest of the time I’m going for shorter, harder runs. I also ordered a skipping rope and have been doing some strength/cardio workouts on the deck on nice days. 

How are you staying sane? 

For a while I was going through my days without much of a routine, but now I’m trying now to schedule out my days like I normally would. I’m setting aside blocks of time for training, desk work, and then giving myself free time where I can do whatever I feel like. Every day I’m making sure I’m doing the things that I need to do first and pick a couple of extra things to work on with the free time. And then making sure that I’m always taking time to do something that I want to do, which lately has been a lot of cooking and baking.

Are there things you are struggling with that you don’t mind sharing?  Impacts on you, your  family, your life plans….

April is usually when skiers take their time off and relax after a long hard season. I would usually want to be out spending time with friends, going out on the weekends and doing fun stuff to relax and take a break. I had to realize that our time off this season will have to look different, and that we’ll get a chance to do the fun stuff with friends down the road.

Other inspirational thoughts, strategies, tips to share?  

I’ve been doing yoga every day and planning out my training for the week like I normally would, so that I have some structure and some time every day to get moving.