There were a couple of things I saw yesterday that did not suck.

One of them was Will Brandenburg in his first Olympic event. He did not race the DH or the SG, but did in fact start in the Super-Combined. I watched him speed by us in the Downhill portion in the morning, but then also watched him smoke the Slalom in the afternoon sun. I was standing on the last pitch before the finish, and when he crossed the finish line, ten billion people roared and he had blown the field away by about 1.3 seconds. He was able to hold his position here for a little while, until, of course, Bode and the gang came. But watching a guy who I grew up racing with and made the call to pursue a racing career like this just ski his ass off and finish well was a treat, to say the least.

The other was the actual setting of the Slalom course after the DH run was over. I ended up being the main gate shagger for the Croatian coach who set the course, Ante Kostelic. The day before, they had set the SL and chalked the holes of the turning gates (and outsides, I think) to facilitate a quick set right after the DH run so athletes could spin around and inspect. There was only an hour or so between runs, so tension was high. Before I knew it, I had five or six people slipping down above me throwing me reds and blues out of their large bundles while I maintained a sustainable inventory of three or four of each at the most. Kostelic would yell "Vred!!" "Blue!!" "Two vred, von blue!" And it was all I could do to keep caught up to him. FIS guys were all around measuring and drilling and shouting and in no longer than I would say twelve minutes, we had 800m of course set and race-ready. Holy ba-geezus.

I was released early yesterday and skied over to Whistler base, hoofed it home, changed clothes, and ran back to the village to catch Sam Roberts Band at 3pm. Later on...ended up at Creekside for a gin party. I drank about four different kinds of gin, diligently fed to me by Julie Lemieux, a tougher-than-nails French-Canadian who just gets work done up on that course. If anyone is reading from Montana (the Loves?), there were a group of 22-24 year old ex-racers from Calgary who know Kyle Taylor, Kate Jordan, and some other racers from PNSA...small world. It's amazing to meet such a concentration of Canadians who've gone to race in college...seems like a lot of that is happening.

Being the only American in that condo in Creekside was a frightening experience last night considering the hockey game...