INZELL!

(Clockwise from left) walking to the oval, our hotel, the oval

Thank the Lord we arrived Monday in Inzell before the snowstorm that has lasted two days and is to continue for a couple more! All this snow is definitely making up for the lack of it back home in Wheaton, IL. Though we do have to walk to and from the rink everyday...sometimes twice a day. When the pathway has not been cleared, it definitely is like walking in sand for 15-20min.

Again, Jeffrey, who came from Calgary, literally walked in the Gästhaus/hotel on Monday just as Brian, Alex Ochowicz (his mother skated with our mom years ago here), mom coach, and I arrived...that was too cool. Monday evening, Alex and I jogged around the Falkenstein mountain (which hugs the ice rink) to get our legs moving after traveling all day. Jeffrey decided to nap...bad idea when jet lag is still fresh, haha. Waking Jeffrey up from that nap was painful for him...but the motivation? Dinner. :)

Weight lifting and our coach biking at the rink

Come Tuesday, we were back on the ice in the morning. Both Tuesday and today we've jumped back into some harder training in order to bring back some condition and it is all going very well although we're all pretty sore now. The ice conditions are faster than Hamar and it is pretty warm in the rink as well. The one thing, though, that we all look forward to after our workouts is the food! I really have to give a shout out to the owner and the staff here at the Alpenhotel Gastager. They've treated us so well and the food they've been serving us is absolutely delicious...I feel so spoiled coming in from a workout and being able to just sit down and have a meal served right away!

We are all loving it here in Inzell...Jeffrey, mom coach, and I were here this past July for a month training and to return to this place feels like home away from home. It is neat to see it in the winter now...snow covering everything and blanketing buildings so as to look like the idyllic pictures you usually see in magazines/books. Brian was here last March for the World Single Distance Championships and knows the area a little, but is having fun being able to explore more and definitely take advantage of the snow...tonight we had a little adventure with snow ball fights and sliding down huge banks of snow. Alex is the only one who has never been here and he is loving it more each day. Inzell is just so quaint, peaceful, convenient, and everyone is really nice. What speedskater wouldn't want to train here?

The video that is below is from this afternoon, walking to the rink amidst the most dense snow we had today...what is funny is the Kazakhstan speedskating team joined us along the journey and created this huge line of skaters bearing the wind and snow while walking to the rink... 

God Bless...Nancy Jr.

1 Corintians 9:25