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BRAZILIAN MTN BIKER AT THE WINTER OLYMPICS? Training on a mountain bike in Brazil, is kind of like playing Russian roulette. You never known if there is somebody with a weapon who is waiting behind the next corner to rob your mountain bike... or your life! We thus decided to spend the 2005-06 Winter in Quebec and do the 2006 MTB racing season physical preparation using snowshoes and cross-country skis.
Although I tried to convince her to take her time and wait until 2010, we began intense training last September, after the last MTB race. Roller Skiing, Skiing on sand, Ski videos, Skiing on 1 inch of snow, Skiing on ice, Skiing in a snowstorm, Snow-ploughing on Skis, crossing Skis, Skiing in a tree, wanting to break her Ski poles on the head of her Ski coach, Skiing at -15 ºC for the first time of her life... on race day, first XC Ski European Cup after only 30 days of XC Skiing on snow and seen snow for the first time at the age of 26 years old! For three months, I tried to show her all aspects of skiing, like no one else can. Since last Saturday, we can start to believe that Jaqueline Mourão will be the first ever Brazilian athlete (male or female) to qualify for Summer and Winter Olympics. Even though the Olympic selection period ends officially on January 15, Jaqueline is already very far ahead of her Brazilian rivals in the FIS ranking used as selection criteria for the Brazil Olympic XC Ski Team. Thanks to all our XC Ski sponsors who are helping Jaqueline reach another first in Brazilian sports history: Rossignol skis, boots
and bindings |
Last
spring, we were welcomed by the last snowstorm of the winter on
our arrival in Canada. So I brought my wife for six hours of XC
Ski touring out in the backwoods of Mount-Sainte-Anne Provincial
Park on May 1st, 2005 (...it was indeed in may!). From this moment
on, instead of wanting to divorce me, she went ski-crazy and she
contacted the Brazilian Snow Sports Federation in order to know
how she could represent her country at the next Winter Olympic
Games... in XC Skiing!
