VIEWS FROM THE TOP

Press, 2 August 1979, Page 12

VIEWS FROM THE TOP

Tim Dunbar

The U.S. ski team down on the farm

Training camp bases for the top United States ski racers aren't usually very much like their latest one — a farm cottage at Mount Hutt Station'on the Rakaia Gorge road. Life down on the though, seems to have been a welcome change from the more intense atmosphere of hotels for the big American contingent which has been training at Mount Hutt and racing in the Europa F.I.S. series over the last fortnight. One skier who has found the experience “interesting" is the star downhiller, Andy Mill, a member of the United States A team since 1974. “It’s sort of like hunting camp,” says Mill. “Somebody does the cooking and everybody has the same food.” A ski-ing reporter’s trip to the camp early one evening this week found the whole team — the boys and the girls — in the vigorous pursuit of a soccer ball. One of the

girls was marvelling at the space available generally, and particularly for sporting activity on the paddock-cum-soccer pitch. Mill says that the farm living “really brings the team close together.” Apart from the soccer, other pursuits have included “horseback riding” and the odd trip into the little smoke, Methven — “It’s an interesting little town,” said Mill, who enthused about the “locals” and “going to city hall to see a movie.”

“I really like . the situation down below in the farm house,” said Mill when we chatted in the crowded Mount Hutt cafeteria one downhill traiing day. “You feel a bit more home then on the road, so to speak.” Normally the United States team trains in South America during their summer at Bariloche (Argentina) or Portillo (Chile) but opted for ■ something new in “winter conditions” when it was heard that two world- ■ ranked downhillers, Ken Read (Canada) and Erik Maker (Norway) had had “good training” at Mount Hutt last year. The trouble with Portillo, says Mill, is that “when it snows it gets too much and you miss a lot of training” while Bariloche tends to lose the bottom part of the mountain fairly early. Weather- conditions at Mount Hutt in the last week have hardlv been consistently tops but the American downhillers “have been able to get a few miles in. At least we’re training and running downhill. It's good just to be on the (winter) snow.” When the Americans arrived in Christchurch last month the men’s downhill coach, “Moose” Barrows, estimated that the trip was costing something like $60,000 or $70,000. Mill said later: “We’ve lost five days (training) and that’s a lot when we’re spending all that money.” The spectacular downhill event has both glamorous and painful sides as films such as “Downhill Racer” (starring Robert Redford as American ski racing hope), and “The Search for Speed” (Mill himself) have helped to show. On his debit side Mill, aged 26, can chalk up six knee operations, two broken legs and a broken arm. That’s the sort of thing a downhill specialist has to live with, it seems, if he wants to average the speeds of over U 0 km/h required to win big races. “I’ve been lucky,” joked (?) Mill, who certainly wouldn’t have felt that way after a bad crash during the last World Cup season. The thing now foremost on the minds of the American ski team is, of course, a Winter Olympics on home territory, at Lake Placid, New York, in February. Mill, a most creditable sixth at the 1976 Innsbruck Olympics (one place behind Read), is looking for a medal at Lake Placid although his build-up suffered a setback last year. He was, he said, "in the best shape I’ve ever been in and had a lot of confidence” at the start of the World Cup season. “I started off ski-ing really well but in the second race I had a really high speed fall' — and it scared me.” After that Mill lost his confidence and was unable to get it back all year. He says now' that “if you’ve never been hurt, you don’t know what to be afraid of.” For the next European season Mill says he is already ahead of his usual shape for this time of year because he “started bike racing earlier.” The downhill veteran races a 10-speed Alan and intends to do a left of it when he gets back home. “I’ll complem e n t that with weight-lifting and stretching.” As long as he doesn’t get hurt Mill is looking

with an optimistic eye towards Lake Placid. “Atrophy happens really fast,” he says.

Big-headedness is often associated here with both Americans and ski racers but there is no such feeling pervading when the winning Mill talks about his Olympic chances. “When I’m ski-ing to the best of my ability mentally and physically I can ski against anyone in the world,” he says. Timing was the all-im-portant thing when, looking forward to an Olympic event like this, he said. One problem about Lake Placid is that Mill tends to do well on more difficult courses. “From more than halfway to the finish Lake Placid is really, really flat,” he said. "Sometimes 1 don’t have the patience on the flat and am too hard on my skis. I’m better when it (a course) is exciting all the way.” But Mill added: “If it snows — — really cold and hard — the races at Lake Placid will be really good.” What racers does he respect most on the World Cup circuit? “A number of guys — a couple of the Canadian guys, a couple of the Austrians and a few Swiss guys.” The Canadians are a “small tight team” who have done well, Mill says. “When you get the snowball rolling it tends to get bigger and bigger.” Snow took a long time to get to the Porter Heights ski-field and the operators have been bemoaning , their bad luck with, in one instance, a strong southerly blowing 30-odd centimetres of new snow down the road. But at least the four Americans running the ski school this year have been kept happy. Al! have been Employed as instructors at rival field, Mount Hutt, for the last two weeks. It seems that the New Zealand Ski Instructors’ Alliance did a pretty good P.R. job in Japan early -this year when its- “demo” team attended the world event, Inter-ski, at Zao, and some members were employed dt various ski schools. One member, Fraser Skinner (Coronet Peak), worked at the Kamerad ski school in Shiga Kogen and its director, Tanaka, has just arrived at Mount Hutt with a party of 28 Japanese. And Hirasawa, the director of the Ishinoyo ski school where Tony Graham worked, is already involved in making a promotional movie about New Zealand ski-ing and New Zealanders to show in Japan. Mr Graham, who runs the Mount Hutt ski school, says that Hirasawa is “New Zealand’s greatest fan” —he shows New Zealand films three times a week in Japan. Both these- Japanese are going on to Coronet Peak, and Hirasawa wants to include that field plus Ruapehu and Tekapo in his film, the second he will have made here. The New Zealand champions of two years ago, ScOtt Kendall (Auckland) and Julia Allison (Rangiora), have taken an early points lead in the Reizenstein’s Cups for the national racing circuit. Kendall and Miss Allison both had wins in the first circuit race, the Air New Zealand Alpine Cup, 11 days ago. Leading points are:— Men: Kendall 50, Mark Vryenhoek (Canterbury) 35, Warwick Brown (Taranaki) 21, Stuart Blakely (Canterbury) 20. Women: Miss Allison 50, Claire Acton-Adams (Canterbury) 30, Amanda Vryenhoek and Anna Archibald (both Canterbury) 20. The next circuit races will be the Coronet Cup this week-end, and the circuit will end next month at Mount Ruapehu.

If the American downhill specialist, Andy Mill, got to hear about it then he was probably pretty sympathetic about, the pain suffered by New Zealand’s Anna Archibald this week when she had to coax her raw shins into ski boots and race downhill. Mill told me at Mount Hutt about the story behind his sixth place at the Innsbruck Winter Olympics back in 1976. He had hurt the back of his leg on the first day and missed all but one training run. Mill did know the course, though, and spent every training day watching the other skiers and envisaging himself doing it. Before the actual race he froze his leg with snow and ice “from ankle to knee —so much I cound't feel it.” By taping together two layers of cardboard the pressure on his leg was, distributed when he “sat back.” All that, he said, meant he' "couldn’t feel so much pain.”