About Me

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Boulder, CO, United States
From Minnesota to Maine to the sunny land of Boulder, CO, I have been competing as an athlete all my life and been working as massage therapist for six years now. Helping athletes with greater recovery, bounce back from injury faster, and helping one's body perform at it's best is what I aim to do. My love for sport, training and helping a body feel good and perform at it's best has driven me into a career in massage therapy. I strive for nothing less than the best...let me help you reach greater heights.

Friday, March 25, 2011

A new kind of Batmobile


Yesterday I finally made what felt like a very long trip back to Northern Maine. After Nationals at Mount Itasca, I stayed put for a few extra days to spend some time with my family there. But with more snow hitting Minnesota midweek and some crazy winds, I was held back by another day. Not the end of the world and I enjoyed my extra day in Duluth.
Due to my arrival time in Bangor changing I had to take the bus up North. I first took the Bat Bus from the airport to the bus station. The Bat Bus is the local transit opporation that drives folks around Bangor. I was able to hitch a ride, luggage and all, for a mear $1.25. Since I had about six hours to kill, I didn't mind the few extra mintues it took to taking the bus verse a taxi. Where does the name come from? It is an acronim for something, perhaps Bangor Area Transit. The greatest part about the entire opperation is the enormous bat painted on the side of the bus!
This is taking me a bit of course the happenings of last week at U.S. Nationals. Three races in four days is the normal set up for such an event, but left me feeling pretty spent by Sunday afternoon.
After a ruff start in Thursday's sprint race I was ready to put together a couple great races during the weekend. Saturday's pursuit race went fairly smoothly. Except for my two misses in my last standing stage, things went fairly smooth for the day. My fifth place finish on the day wasn't quite where I had hoped to be but I wasn't far out of the top three so I felt good about that.
My last biathlon race of the 2010/11 season unfortunatly turned into quite a struggle. I felt close to the worst I have all year skiing and couldn't get the targets to fall in my favor. It was a ruff race to get through.
Overall I came up a bit short from where I wanted to be at Nationals and overall this year. I did have great races scatered throughout the season but wasn't as consistent as I needed and wanted to be to get the results I was working towards.
I have spent a great amount of time this past week evaluating training, racing and other obsticals I faced this year. I feel that I have a good idea where I stand and have already started the process of creating my plan of attack for the up coming season. I think I have finally collected all the pieces and ready to start putting them all into place. It's the start of some really great things to come....stay tuned!
-BA




Friday, March 18, 2011

Back to my roots


It is hard to believe that the end of the 2010/11 season is so near. It has been a turbulent one for many reasons, but one that has given me a lot a great experiences and challenged me in ways that will help me become stronger down the road.
I am happy to be back in my hometown of Grand Rapids, MN, to finish off the year. The Mount Itasca Biathlon Club is hosting the 2011 U.S. Biathlon Nationals. It is no suprise that they are doing a great job of keep the course in tip top shape and running the event smoothly. Now if someone could just get a hold of whoever is in charge of the weather and put in a request for cold nights and bright blue, sunny skis during the day, we would be all set!
No matter the weather the show will go on, which I am happy about. Every biathlon race presents a new challenge unique to itself. While we have a small field, it is a competitive one. Amongst the many familiar faces here, we have a great deal of fresh new ones as well. There was a camp for athletes coming fresh out of competitions at the Junior Olympics, which were held in Minneapolis last week. These athletes got a chance to dive into the sport of biathlon with a few days of training and a couple races to top it off this coming weekend. We also have a tremendous showing of master biathletes, who are great to have around as well.
In addition to the competing athletes, we also have a member of the Para-biathlon World Championship team training here for the week. If you want to see some inspiring work, come out to the venue and watch Dan double pole around like crazy and then turn over to shoot while still in his sit ski. It is a pretty cool sight to see. He is off to Russia in a couple weeks here for there Para World Championships. Best of luck to him and the rest of the team!
I am looking forward to our two, four stage races coming up with weekend. I have put countless hours into preparing for opportunities like this and am now ready to put all that practice into action. I have been competing in running or ski events for a long time and ever since the start of all those competitions my dad has told me one thing, "Let the tail go with the hide". So that is I plan to do.

Again, I'd like to also send out my thanks to all the folks that have put this event on. I know putting together events like this takes a lot of time and man power and is done mostly with all volunteer hours. We couldn't do this without all these folks help, so I want to make sure they know their work does not go unappreciated!

More to come after the weekend.
cheers, BethAnn

Monday, March 7, 2011

Rockin' with my socks on!


Early this winter I had the honor of testing out some compression wear products from the company Zensah. Zensah makes a variety of compression sportswear along with recovery wear. After wearing the recovery socks and 3/4 length tights during workouts, after workouts, while traveling and during the many hours I am standing while working, I am totally sold.
It is one of those things that you might have to experience to believe. After doing a hard workout in the morning, taking a short break and heading over to work where I stand for a few hours at a time massaging, I couldn't believe how much lighter and better my legs felt when I was wearing my Zensah compression wear.
And whether you are an athlete or not, if you travel, especially if you are flying, you need to buy a pair of these socks. They make all the difference in the world. I continuly wear my Dankso clogs when I travel and constantly have trouble squeezing my swollen foot back into my shoe after a long flight, (yes I take my shoes off while flying. I may be sitting in small quarters but I still like to be comfortable). Zensah's socks will keep your blood moving and help lymph from pooling and your feel feeling light and far less fat during and after you flight. Take my word for it. But remember, compression socks or not, it is always good to get up and move your muscle a little bit during any long flight.

I am excited to be working with such a great company and feel honored to do so. My praise to their products comes honestly, as I really have been amazed by how much their compression wear helps me recover, feel better and more ready for the next task on my daily to-do list.
Check out their website for more information about the company and view all their many great products. http://www.zensah.com
Here's to no more swollen flight feet! :)
BethAnn

A tough day on the Birkie trail


It's been over a week since I had hoped to have my Birkie report but but am just now getting into it. A little over a week ago I jumped into my second ever American Birkiebeiner. My first was last year and I was pleasantly surprised with how it all went. I finished last year in 11th place, and less than a minute out of the top eight. This was all news to me when I finished, since I was clueless on where I was at through most of the race.
Going into this years race I had high expectations for myself. Going into the race I was feeling pretty good and felt recovered from my fight with the flu. (By the time the race ended I am not so sure I would have agreed with that statement however.)
The Birkie is an intense scene. I believe every Nordic skier, especially North Americans that enjoy skiing longer distances, should at some point make their way over to Hayward, WI and join in the festivities. There were over 11,000 entries in the weekends events. In addition to the skate and classic 50km races this is a 23km Kortielopet and another Prince Haakon 12km race. The excitement the day before, morning of and of course hours afterwards is pretty spectacular.
My 2011 Birkie started off well. I was surprised at how easy it was to stay with the lead pack of women for the first 20km of the race. This was a change from last year, when I was a bit intimidated by the pace right out of the start.
Somewhere around the 20km mark I was caught off guard by a cramping pain in my legs towards the top of an easy hill. Knowing that I had quite a few kilometers left to go, I decided I should back off a bit and keep my legs from becoming very angry at me while still having over 25k's to go.
My race continued on like this for sometime, feeling good and then getting cramps that would last a kilometer or two, just long enough for me to fear that I wouldn't be able to finish. In the end I did of course finish but it was a bit of a crawl the last few kilometers. Skiing across the lake and onto the main street in Hayward for the finish, was the hardest thing I have ever done. I can honestly say that I left NOTHING out on the course, having put every last ounce of energy into my race. I had to be happy with that. I ended up 15th in the women, not a bad result but not quite where I had hoped.
After blacking out at the finish I recieved an IV of fluids for the second time that week, my first was during my battle with the flu earlier in the week. I can now honestly stay I have experienced bonking in a race and hope that I never have to go to that very bad place again. Something tells me that odds of that happening are not very likely. For now I will try to forget the pain and just remember the good stuff. That is why we all keep racing right, because of our amazing ability to forget about the bad and keep feeding off the good. Sounds about right to me.
Can't say for sure if I will make it out to Hayward for next year's Bikrie Fest but I know at some point I will. Hope to see you all there when that day arrives!
cheers,
BethAnn