Green grass carpets the ski slopes at the bottom of Blackcomb Mountain and tourists sip drinks while relaxing on bar patios.
But up above the clouds on the mountain's glacier, a cold, biting wind numbs your fingers and blowing snow scratches your face like sandpaper.
While it's easy to forget its summer on a day like this, members of the Canadian freestyle ski team remember why they are here. The moguls skiers wipe sleet from their goggles and bash down a course carved out of the ice.
With the Vancouver 2010 Winter Games on the horizon, this summer's training has taken on special meaning for many of Canada's Olympic medal hopefuls.
"Summer training is actually more important than the training we do in winter,'' Jennifer Heil, an Olympic gold medallist in moguls, said in a recent interview.
"We're building our strength, our speed, our agility.''
Later in the day, skiers swap parkas for wetsuits and launch themselves off a ramp, twisting and twirling in the air before splashing down in a pond of cold, glacier water.
For someone like moguls skier Vincent Marquis, polishing his tricks under the summer sun on the water ramp at Blackcomb could be the edge he needs to be on the podium this winter.
"It's a good training for us,'' said Marquis, who won a World Cup event in Mont Gabriel, Que., last winter and finished third at the world championships. "We can work on our jump skills and make sure they are ready for the time we do it on snow.
"It's the small details that are hard to do on snow. It's more dangerous on snow. Here, we can try pretty much everything. It's good to learn new tricks.''
Summer training can be long and tedious. It usually means hours in the gym lifting weights or riding hundreds of kilometres on a bike. It also means planning out a new routine or staying home to rest while friends go out to party.
Short-track speedskater Charles Hamelin grimaced when describing the summer.
"Pain,'' he said.” It’s not easy at all.''
While it may be lonely and frustrating, athletes agree summer training is absolutely essential.
Downhill skier Kelly VanderBeek said the work she did in the gym last off-season improved her strength and was one reason she wasn't badly hurt in some bruising falls on the World Cup circuit.
"I has some massive crashes (but) I still made it through the season,'' said VanderBeek, who just missed the podium in super-giant slalom at the 2006 Turin Games.” That’s a huge testament to my fitness and my ability to bounce back from injury and react to treatment.
"There is a lot of power in our sport, where you are resisting G-forces. Our summer training has a huge and very direct impact on our winters.''
The gym can become second home during the summer.
A typical day for slalom skier Michael Janyk starts with four hours in the gym during the morning. He'll lift weights, do squats and work on his upper body.
After lunch and a nap, he's back at the gym around 3 p.m. for two hours of cardiovascular work and drills to improve his quickness and agility.
"I always prided myself as an athlete that works that little bit extra harder than anyone else,'' said Janyk, who won a bronze medal at last winter's world championships in Val d'Isere, France.
"There is a lot of work and a lot of sacrifices that go into being an athlete. At the end of the day it makes it all worth while when you can have a result like I did this year.''
Long-track speedskater Jeremy Wotherspoon said a large component of his summer work is harnessing balance and power.
"I do a lot of training down in a speedskating position, working on those muscles and those specific body positions where you have to be in control and have good balance,'' said Wotherspoon, who hopes to erase the frustration he's experienced at the last two Games.
"It's doing weights to build power and strength in those skating muscles, but also a lot of upper body and core, to keep that connection from shoulder to hip, and keep that balance you need to have between your upper and lower body.''
While some athletes strive for raw power, figure skaters must meld muscles with artistry. They need the strength to make something hard look easy.
Michael Slipchuck, high performance director for Skate Canada, said his athletes do yoga, ride the bike and spend a lot of time working on core-strength exercises.
"A four-minute program is a tough haul for these skaters,'' said Slipchuck, a former Canadian champion who competed at the 1992 Winter Games.” Most athletes have strength either aerobically or anaerobically. They have to spend time developing the weaker element to get that even keel.
"There is a lot of core stability, a lot of power work, flexibility, strength, balance. They have to spend a lot of time on these aspects to be able to do the elements that are out there.''
Summer training does have some perks.
This year, some of the freestyle skiers spent time surfing at Tofino on Vancouver Island.
Adrian King, the freestyle team's strength and conditioning coach, said surfing is physically demanding and is a new challenge for the athletes.
Several alpine skiers were in Magog, Que., where they skated with former NHL players Felix Potvin and Yannick Perreault.
Both the snowboard and alpine ski teams travelled to Australia and New Zealand for on-snow training.
The biathlon team spent a week in July roller-skiing on the paved ski trails at Whistler Olympic Park, which will host cross-country skiing, biathlon and ski jumping during the Games.
"It's as close as you can get to regular skiing in the summer time,'' said Megan Tandy.” It works all the same muscles as skiing.''
The team also spent hours on the target range, firing up to 150 rounds each a day. One of the most difficult aspects of the sport - which combines cross-country skiing with target shooting - is relaxing your body after the exertion of skiing for the precision of shooting.
"That is why we wanted a camp out here, to do as much high-intensity training with shooting as possible,'' said Tandy.” It mimics what we are going to be doing here in the winter.
"It often comes down to how mentally strong you are, or your ability to focus when you need to.''
Summer training is about building muscles and honing skills. But it's also a time to focus and visualize goals.
"I spent a lot of time thinking,'' said bobsledder Helen Upperton.” In the winter, you don't have a lot of time to think and plan and prepare.
"In the summer, you are thinking about the Olympics, the first World Cup race.''
Wotherspoon won't get a chance to race for an Olympic medal until February, but the first steps toward the podium were taken over the summer.
"This is the part where you make your habits and develop your work ethic and mental ability to focus, no mater how tired you are, how much pain you are in,'' he said. "It's making sure I do the little things right.''
Downhill skier Britt Janyk said that extra time in the gym during summer pays rewards on the ski hill.
"It's not so much the physical outcome you get from that, it's the mental toughness,'' she said.
"When you've had a tough weekend, or you have a injury or an illness and you still have to race the next day, pushing through that last squat or that last mile on the bike has given you that mental toughness to know you can push through that.''
SOURCE: http://www.ctvolympics.ca
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