click to enlarge Watch out, Kelly Slater.

The Coach in Summer: AG


Last night, when the temperature refused to drop to respectable sleeping digits, I headed out the door at 4 am for a walk through scenic Ripton. I longed for layers, both clothing and wax and as I sleepwalked, my head went to classic tracks of the extra blue variety. Everyone needs a place to get away: mine is parallel and extending off over rolling terrain in the far off months of winter.
NCAA rules conspire against college coaches being typical coaches: most of us can’t run training programs throughout the summer and there are times when that’s ok with me. I love the dynamic of leapfrogging over the summer months catching up at a few camps or hearing about the progress of the athletes from their club coaches. (The former was the case with Noah Brautigam a few weeks ago at the GMVS camp- I’ll see a few more of the team next week at the U23 camp happening at the OTC.) I also like the work I get to do in the summer.
“So do you work in the summer?” – a common question for sure. Yes. But it isn’t typical of ski coaching. This summer I’ve worked through a number of college grants on environmental projects, dialed in the logistics for camps, travel and budgets for next season, met with facilities regarding work at Breadloaf. I’ve walked those trails picking up sticks and avoiding English school students. There’s been a steady stream of recruits and I’ve caught up on training and technique theory with friends on (of course) online. It’s a slower schedule and I’ve filled the remaining time with a ton of bike racing, gardening, weddings, visits to family, and outreach work for the 350.org crew. I went surfing (badly) with Kate Barton & Matt Johnson in Maine and I hope to again when I return to Maine for Kate Newick’s (Ski team captain’04) wedding next week.
It is impossible to escape the ski world, however. It seeps in: a bike ride through Weybridge gets me noticing new spots for intervals out on the far end of that road, the woods at Breadloaf look remarkably similar in the summer in spots as they do in January and I think of mass start drills with the NCAA crew prior to Rumford last season. When the tragedy of Willie Neal’s death prompted a trip for his memorial service, there was a powerfully familiar feeling having the same coaches and athletes that line courses in the winter lining the rows of the Presbyterian church looking uncomfortable in formal clothing. It won’t be long before the rhythm of the year will scoop us up and we’ll be flowing through the Kelly Brush ride, October camp, Thanksgiving and through endless days at Breadloaf.
I’m excited for the changes. Our team will be smaller, tighter, more focused and with new leaders. It will be the first team that I’ll have recruited in its entirety and that’s exhilarating, scary and empowering. For now summer calls and there’s a month before the athletes come filtering back in, in that time, I’ll take back my office from the skis that are living in it- get those same skis stoneground and ski over and over the classic tracks that stick in my head. Best to you all.

click to enlarge McClelland meets Mark Twain

I have to agree with Taylor about rain in the east, especially lately since the forecast shows nothing but chances of showers and thunderstorms. Although sometimes there is nothing better on a rainy day than to be at a camp on the Upper Ausable Lake in the Keene Valley. This summer my cousin Megan and I were cooks for High Peaks Camp, a two week long outdoors camp.



We were responsible for feeding 25 kids at the camp, ranging between the ages of 11-15, along with 8 counselors. The camp was located in the Upper Ausable Lake that was only accessible by non-motorized boats. This meant that we had to transport all of the food in a guide boat across the lake, and then across a mile carry to the Upper Lake. After we rowed across the Lower Ausable Lake we would have to carry all of the food across a mile long carry till we reached the Upper Ausable Lake we have to get in a canoe again and finally we have to carry all of the food up to the camp. It is a trek that can range anywhere between 30 minutes to two hours depending on the weight load. It is a trip that can also be grueling at times, especially when we had to carry two 15 - 20 pound turkeys on top of the all other food, and when one person (myself) has a broken collarbone. The rain was a contributing factor as well, resulting in many soggy, broken boxes. However there is nothing more rewarding than a warm kitchen after such a trek.



The camp is located in the heart of the Adirondacks, surrounded by nothing but mountains and wilderness. It is beautiful. Megan and I got to watch the mist rise off of the lake as we cooked breakfast. In the afternoon, after we prepared lunch, we took the opportunity to run up some mountains directly from the camp. I have to say that being in such a location is one of the best parts of the job. The next best part is being able to torture the campers a little, and shoot them with a squirt gun when they entered the kitchen. The only hassle about the location is the only access the rest of civilization is through radio, meaning if you forget the lettuce you had to go to the main camp on the lake and radio a message to the Ausable Club asking them to call Tracy McClelland (my mom) asking her to grab the lettuce in the front hall that we forgot and find Gavin, who is rowing into the lakes the next day, to give him the lettuce, then tell him that the we will meet him at the main camp to pick up the lettuce. Luckily everything went well and we did not forget that much, besides the kids did not miss the lettuce for they did not touch their greens. We do owe special thanks to the Levin’s for donating this death by chocolate recipe. Let’s just say the banquet night with this desert was a bit like the scene from Matilda with the boy trying to finish off a chocolate cake.



About the broken collarbone that I mentioned above, that happened a little earlier in the summer during my trip out west. Around the beginning of June I decided to fly to Denver and then drive with Lani to Lake Tahoe, where she has an internship for the summer. I was excited to explore Lake Tahoe and take on some adventures. My second day there I was mountain biking with some of the guys that Lani was living with, and got in a little accident. I was making my way down a hill and hit a ditch flipping over the front of my handles onto my side. I went directly to the hospital where examined me for any signs of a concussion. I was complained of shoulder pain so they x-rayed my shoulder as well, and it appeared to be that I had fractured the very tip of my collarbone n the joint. I was shocked and disappointed by the news, but surprisingly the doctor was not concerned about it at all. He said that it was not a bad break and that it would heal in no time. However he was more concerned about the cut on my ear that required five stitches. During my fall I hit the side of my head and my hearing aid broke slicing open my ear. For some time being I did not want to tell anyone about my accident because I feel like I have broken every part of my body, and I am somewhat embarrassed by my tendency to get injured often. But rumors spread fast and there was no way to keep it a secret especially when I had to walk around in a brace for time being.



As for the rest of the summer I will be working that Mountaineer Garage Sale with my two cousins. We transformed what used to be a garage into a discounted clothing store for The Mountaineer. It took hours of cleaning, painting, and repairing to get the store in shape, but the store is now up and running for the rest of the summer. If anyone is in the area be sure to stop by and check it out.



In my spare time I will also be helping my brothers create their masterpiece. By masterpiece I mean their glorious Huckleberry Finn style log raft. The plan is to build a log raft using just timber and rope that will be floated down the Ausable. It will be designed to support three people. My designated job so far is to be the photography because they think that I will break anything that I touch, and do not trust me. The picture posted is the first unsuccessful attempt to float the raft (could only hold two people above water).

click to enlarge

Here is what I was doing for the month of June. There are lots of pictures at: http://picasaweb.google.com/lubyx010

The rainforest is kind of creepy at night. You can’t see anything outside of the circle of light shining from your headlamp, vines appear out of no where and seem rather snakelike in the dark, and then there are real snakes too. If you don’t think about it, it seems as though everything is quite. But, if you actually start to listen, you hear all the bugs and frogs calling and the occasional crunch or skittering of some small animal. And when you turn off your head lamp, everything is pitch black except for the blinking of a few fireflies.

I have spent the month of June in Xishuangbanna in southwest Yunnan province, China working at a tropical botanic garden affiliated with the Chinese Academy of Science. Imagine a tropical scene, with tall palms, bright sunshine, birds singing and bugs humming. You can buy a coconut (or just about any other kind of tropicalish fruit you can think of) off the street for absurdly cheap. A lot of local people are actually dressed in colorful, what you might call ethnic, outfits. And then add in the fact that you are continually pouring sweat, that there are ants absolutely everywhere (I swear I could write a research paper on ant behavior without having to leave my desk), that I share my shower with a few little geckos, and that it may start pouring rain at any moment (although umbrellas are actually quite useful for shade as well so you can’t really go anywhere without one), and you would have a pretty good picture of where I spent the month of June.

Xishuangbanna is full of ethnic minorities, the most prominent of which are the Dai people. The Dai are the people who colonized Thailand. Thus, if I did not still have to deal with the Chinese bureaucracy to get anything done and did not live with Han Chinese people, I would probably feel like I was in Southeast Asia. The garden is located on an island near the town of Meng Lun. Meng Lun is a colorful, laid back little town that takes a siesta from about 12-5 every day. I don’t blame them really; the heat from noon to 5 is oppressive. Everything seems to slow down 10 fold. It is nearly impossible to do anything more than amble along, because if you do every fiber of your body is fighting it. The birds stop chirping, there is no wind, everything is still and give up trying to go shopping in town. The shop owners are asleep at their stalls, although they will grudgingly wake up from their heat induced stupor to sell you something if provoked enough. At night everything comes alive though and places stay open late for such a small town. There are stalls with skewers of all sorts of things from stuffed fish to garlic greens to chicken innards all lined up in piles, waiting to be selected and grilled. And on weekends there is even a makeshift outdoor movie theater.

In other words, it is a much more relaxed part of China. And also a much poorer one. There are not too many signs of the newly prosperous middle class that there are all over the East coast. Most people make their living by tapping rubber trees. Which is part of what I was studying- the transformation of a lush and highly biodiverse tropical rain forest to essentially a desert of rubber plantations. At this point, nearly every piece of land that can be converted to rubber is. Even the community rain forests where it is believed that ancestors’ spirits live are being felled (“The ancestors will move” apparently).

The hiking in Xishuangbanna is quite good and a few weeks ago I went for a hike with a couple of people here. We literally hiked up through rubber plantations for about 3 hours before reaching some corn. Once we approached the top we finally made it to some secondary rain forest. This was probably only rain forest because it would involve scaling rock faces to get to rubber trees if they were planted here. There were some pretty interesting animals and plants in the actual rain forest and I narrowly avoided stepping on a bamboo viper. Good thing I looked down at the last second.

Some of my friends had their boat stolen and decided to try out the local method of finding things. When you lose something here, you go to a diviner who is usually surprisingly accurate as to where your lost possessions are. One of the locals told me a story about how she had lost some money and this lady knew exactly who had taken it and where to find them. The process involved wearing the clothes they had worn the day before and bringing two raw eggs. The diviner did some sort of ritual involving potassium and told them where they would find their boat. The guy decided that it would be a good idea to bike from our botanic garden, along the Luo Suo River to where it meets the Mekong River about 40 miles away and look for the boat along the way. I, anxious for a mountain bike ride, decided to go along. Finding a boat is a bit of a difficult task as there are a lot of boats on the river and they all look pretty much the same. And going down river first is not necessarily advisable because you then have 30 miles up hill on the way back. We weren’t really sure whether there was road along the river or not and we ended up taking a detour up a mountain before realizing that this was probably not following the river anymore. The day we chose for this endeavor was about 95 degrees, about 100% humidity and sunny. All I can say is thank god all the people who lived along the road/path we were on were happy to give us water because I am pretty sure we would have shriveled up if they hadn’t. In return, we probably provided the entertainment for the month as we were pretty far off the beaten path and ended up about a mile from Myanmar. We never did end up finding the boat but it was a beautiful bike ride (looking back on it).

I found it pretty interesting working at a Chinese institution. Things are run a bit differently than in the US. First of all, every one has a job, and if your request does not fall into their job title, they are unable/ unwilling to help. Not much creative problem solving going on. Actually creativity is not really encouraged. I also learned this at the University in Hangzhou. Secondly, plagiarism is rampant in China, widely accepted even in articles meant for publishing, and done by everyone here from students to professors. I guess that you could guess copyrighting and plagiarism aren’t really regulated well from the number of knockoffs on the streets. But the fact that it is so present even in academic institutions surprises me. They would not get so far at Middlebury, I guess. Thirdly, at one of the best conservation biology centers in China, they destroy rain forest to make a flower garden complete with invasive species. I’m not sure that I consider that a good conservation technique. Especially since the rainforest in the region is disappearing at such an astonishing rate. There is also a very stark difference between the highly manicured gardens of the botanic garden and the town of Meng Lun. I guess you could say that town/ gown relations aren’t so great. Although the garden does employ a number of local people, I get the sense that there is still some resentment. And there is certainly a view by most of the Han Chinese that work here that the local people don’t deserve much of their attention. For example, I am pretty sure that my roommate left the garden maybe twice in the month that I was there. On the other hand, one of the girls in the lab I worked for is from just down the road and is a local celebrity for being the first Dai woman PhD candidate so maybe progress is being made.

So that is what I was doing for the month of June. Hope all is well wherever you are and I can't wait to see everyone again in the fall,

click to enlarge

yo team and followers of team,
My summer has been pretty busy. I have been working at Hedberg maps, which is a small cartography company in Northeast Minneapolis. Most of my work consists of tracing out buildings from satellite images into adobe illustrator. Or updating huge out of date databases. First job ever. Have you guys ever noticed that pandora stations keep playing the same songs over and over again? I have a Nirvana station at work that only plays 8 songs. Besides work I have been training a lot. After a spring of setbacks (back injury, bahamas, springtime for nordic skier) I started summer extremely out of shape. The gains in my strength in the weight room has made me very happy. I am feeling pretty okay on the rollerskis, but still have a ways to go. 6 months until december, and I will be more than ready.

This past thursday I went to Afton Minnesota, which is in the along the St. Croix river, and has some big nicely paved roads. The group I was training with included Middlebury's Doug DeBolD and Matt Liebsch of CXC ski team. We hammered 6 intervals on a super steep climb that takes about 8 minutes. at the top of each interval a coach would drive us down. Pretty sweet workout.

I really miss the team a lot. The only contact I have had is an occasional call with Graham Egan, who comes to Minnesota to visit me today. And seeing Doug Debold training. And sending Elise Moody-Roberts my mullet.

love always,

Mike Mommsen

attached is a picture of me from ski season. i couldn't find anything better on this computer.

click to enlarge

Much love and respect to the family of Willie Neal. We will miss him on the ski team at Middlebury, but the world will miss him more.

Fasterskier: Willie Neal

Links and Resources

Head Nordic Coach

Andrew Gardner

Gardner enters his fourth season at the helm of the men's and women's nordic ski teams. He came to Middlebury from Colorado Rocky Mountain School (CRMS) in Carbondale, Colo where he was Nordic Program Director. Since coming to New England, he acted as the wax tech for the 2008 Junior National Team, a coach at regional development camps and serves on the U23 NENSA board. Gardner is the coordinator for sustainability in athletics, serving on the college's environmental council. In the summer he enjoys road racing for the MetLife cycling team.

agardner@middlebury.edu

o: 802.443.5963

Assistant Nordic Coach

Patty Ross

Now entering her 23rd year as a full-time coach of Middlebury nordic skiing, Patty came to the College after four years of world-class competition. She was one of five American women nordic skiers to compete in the Sarajevo Olympics in 1984; she also competed internationally with the U.S. national team from 1983 to 1986. Patty graduated from the University of New Hampshire, where she was an All-East collegiate skier and captain of the Wildcat team. While at UNH, Patty competed in the World University Games in Sofia, Bulgaria. As a coach for the International Special Olympic Games, Patty received a Distinguished Service Award in 1984. She acted as a coach for the U23/ World Junior Championships in Italy in 2008.

o: 802.443.5006

Team Archives