by Peter Mertz
COPPER MOUNTAIN, United States, Nov. 30 (Xinhua) -- It's just before dinner on Sunday night, and Copper Mountain's normally bustling Center Village is quiet, with not a soul in sight.
That's because the 60-some Olympic caliber athletes who train here each day are already tucked away in their condos, preparing dinner, with an evening of instruction and videos ahead before going to bed.
Copper, an iconic ski resort at 2,946 meters, located about 125 kilometers west of Denver, capital city of Colorado, is where the U.S. Ski and Snowboard teams have been hunkered down since October, getting ready for the 2022 Beijing Olympic Winter Games, now just two months away.
And for Team USA, it's all business.
"They are definitely out training hard, I see them out running and doing exercises every morning because I live on the mountain," said Hannah McGerty, the hostess at 10 Mile Tavern.
Even their daily lunch, held at the popular Center Village venue 10 Mile Tavern, is a subdued event, where athletes and coaches huddle around tables eating grilled cheese sandwiches, burgers, and chicken tenders, to discuss strategy.
"It's pretty standard, they come in, they eat their food, and then they go back to athletics," McGerty told Xinhua Tuesday.
Other local Copper Mountain residents note a heightened sense of professionalism and urgency about this year's American squad, led by a number of Olympic veterans who take training extremely seriously.
"One coach set up cones right outside the door of the restaurant," McGerty pointed outside the tavern.
"I looked outside and the skiers were running between them and doing taps...I'm not even sure what that is," McGerty said with a smile.
SETTING THE STANDARD
Mikaela Shiffrin knows about taps.
In 2011, Shiffrin was only 15 when she made her World Cup debut, and at the 2014 Sochi Olympic Games, became the youngest slalom champion in Olympic Alpine skiing history, at the age of 18.
Today, Shiffrin, born and raised in Vail, Colorado, 35 kilometers west of Copper, is the top skier of the American squad for the Beijing 2022 Olympic Games, and the biggest name in women's Alpine skiing since Lindsey Vonn.
Taps, a high-speed reaction drill, similar to what professional football players do, is one of dozens of exercises the Colorado native does daily in a training routine that has drawn attention from all quarters.
"The daily routine for Mikaela Shiffrin is to wake up between 4-5 am for warm-ups, or in her case, recently, physical therapy for 45 minutes prior to training, then on hill training starts with free ski, then into gates, then in a double session, slalom second session, then go home and have lunch," said Megan Harrod, U.S. Alpine Ski Team Communications Manager.
All of this activity happens before lunch. The afternoon features "strength conditioning, activation, core development, watching videos, going to bed...getting up and doing it again," Harrod said.
Harrod added that "this is the mentality that these athletes carry throughout the Olympic cycle, specifically the Alpine group."
In an article last year, Sports Illustrated (SI) also nailed the secret to her success: sleep.
"Sleeping is my meditation," Shiffrin was quoted as saying in that article. "It's the only time you can recover, physically and emotionally, at the same time."
With a World Cup schedule that features some 80 events a year and took her to Finland just two weeks ago, Shiffrin needs all the sleep she can snag.
On Monday, Shiffrin got back to Copper after another epic World Cup weekend, this time from 3,200 kilometers away at Vermont's Killington resort, where the 26-year-old won for the fifth straight time and notched her 46th slalom victory, which tied legendary Swede Ingemar Stenmark's record for most career World Cup wins in a single Alpine skiing discipline.
"She's just amazing...unstoppable," Harrod added. Enditem
