Our First New Recruit

One of the goals of the Federation is to expand its athlete base.  Although it's great to have even one athlete competing in Skeleton for any nation, The Israeli federation is not going to content itself with just that.  The goal is to build a team and to build a team you need people.  To this end the entire federation spent the summer looking for more athletes to come up and try out for the team.  

One of the people I suggested is my good friend from college, Mere Martin.  Mere is a great athlete, and in addition to being a gymnast in college was also a volleyball player in the team USA program (as a set-woman).  After some persuasion by myself and her new husband of about 3 weeks (who is one of my fraternity brothers) she decided to come up and give Skeleton a try.  I picked her up from the airport on Wednesday and she has been here in Lake Placid seeing what she can see about the sport.

Now obviously it's still September so there is no ice.  However there is still a lot that you can learn when you don't know anything about the sport just by virtue of being in Lake Placid.  Not the least important of which was just to go and see the track.  Even though there is no ice on it, it's very helpful to walk down it and talk about the sport with her.  We call this a "track-walk" (very original, I know) and it is one of the most important things you can do as a Slider, since it gives you the opportunity to really study the track (which is difficult when everything is going by you at 75mph when you compete). For Mere, it was just a chance to actually SEE what it is exactly that we do up here.  She is understandably nervous about the whole thing, and I think seeing what it is just takes it a little bit out of the shadows in your mind's eye.

In addition to the actual "Pipe" I got to show her the "push-track" which is a little wheeled track we have behind the horse show grounds to simulate the start.  She really enjoyed this.  I figured she would, since at bottom Skeleton is FUN -- like going sledding as a child.  The first time I pushed her down she yelled "WHEEEEEE" the whole way down.  We went back yesterday though and actually did some work.  I'm happy to report that not only did she do very well for her first time but she got her first skeleton bruise.  

It's been a great first recruiting tour for the IBSF.  We are excited to have Mere up here, and think she will do very well if she decides to take to the sport.  The Corporation has offered to pay her way to a training camp and the first race of the season in Park City, Utah this November.  We are hopeful that she will accept.  We know that she will represent Israel very well.   

I've uploaded some of her training video's to the team's YouTube channel, so be sure to check that out too.  

First day of on-ice training is October 10.....

-Bradley