“Coming,” I say. I hit send, slide the phone back into my pocket, and stand up. The Ganslern can have my head for the next hour. But somewhere in Pec, my golden girl is also between runs, and that thought settles under my ribs like an extra layer of armor.
***
I’m in the start tent, skis on, bib crackling, pretending I’m listening to split calls and not replaying one stupid line of text in my head. GS dinosaur / multi-discipline king. It had pinged in between runs while I was still sweating through my suit; I’d read it once, twice, then shoved the phone away before it could turn into a conversation. Now, under the flapping red canvas, I feel the ghost of that grin in my cheeks. My shoulders loosenhalf a centimeter. Even if I ski safe now, I deserve whatever she sends back.
Skis on the rack, tips resting on the wet rubber, I rock from foot to foot while the starter drones numbers. The snow here is a scraped-down, polished lane through chop, the blue dye already half-washed away by the drizzle. Higher up, it’s still firm, injected from the week and chewed by a whole field. B-net flaps, flags slap, the crowd down at the finish is a low roar that comes and goes with each intermediate time. Someone ahead of me gets a split: green, then red. The coach next to me swears under his breath. I roll my shoulders once, feel the plastic bite around my shins, the familiar cuff pressure locking me in.
“Thirty seconds,” the starter barks for the guy in front. I slide closer, click my poles into my hands, and give my gloves one last tug. Adelboden, I remind myself. You went, you didn’t die. Better to attack and miss than baby this thing into an anonymous fifth place. The thought lands clean. No static, no what-ifs. Just the course in my head, gate by gate, the one correction from the first run burned in. Stay over it. No checking in the middle.
“Five.” I plant my poles. The wand is a white bar in front of me, a simple line between waiting and doing.
“Three. Two. One.”
Beep.
I punch through. The world snaps into a tunnel: first gate already in my face, skis biting as they load and release. The pitch here drops away immediately—no gentle start, just a bang, and you’re in. First run, I’d come out tentatively, feeling for grip. Now I let the skis run, ankles soft, hips forward. The edges hookinto the injected surface, and the noise hits—scrape, hiss, the hollow smack when I slam over a small rut.
Top flats are nothing fancy: four, five turns to build speed before the first offset. I push harder between them, no safety margin, skating each rise. The first steep pitch comes, a gate set over a small roll. And I set up earlier this time, line a touch higher, so I can get across it faster instead of dropping down and climbing back up. The gates snap against my boots, one, two, three, rhythm sliding into place.
Into the first combination. A corridor of red and blue, rhythm change in the middle. I’d checked here before, stuck a half-turn in to feel safe. Now I stay tall, let the ski cross under me. Pressure builds in my outside leg; I ride it rather than jab at it. The gates flick past my shins, plastic thudding against plastic, and I hear one coach yell something in a dialect that’s probably encouraging and completely unintelligible.
Course drops over a blind roll. I know the next blue is hanging out to the right, just enough to catch anyone who’s late. First run I’d come up the back of it, inside ski light, correction eating meters. Not now. I trust the inspection image, throw my body where the gate should be, not where I see it. For a split second, there’s nothing but grey air and the feeling of falling, then the ski engages, the gate appears exactly where it should, and I’m already carving past it. Perfect. Don’t admire it. Next.
Middle section: where the set starts to work on you. Double gate, hairpin, delay. I drive my hands forward before the combination, upper body quiet, and let my legs do the ugly work. The hairpin wants to suck you low; I attack the entry, quick feet,punch the second gate away with my shin, and shoot out with just enough height to catch the delay without scrambling.
The course swings back toward the fall line, a brief straight where you can either breathe or push. I tuck for three gates, chin down, hands twitching to get back up. The noise from the finish jumps a level. Doesn’t matter. The real fight is still below me. Compression coming.
I’ve been looking at this compression from the lift all week. A nasty little dip where the piste drops into a hollow, kicks you into the next pitch. The hit comes like a punch—snow slams up at my feet, the whole setup wants to fold—but my legs are ready, and I ride the force instead of letting it throw me in the back seat. Skis chatter once, twice, then bite again and shoot me down the last pitch with the tips still pointing where they should: straight at the finish.
I cross the line in a low tuck and only then straighten, chest heaving, snow dusting my goggles.
I look up. The board flips.
My name goes to the top, green by more than a handful of hundredths. The roar from the stands hits a different pitch, that animal sound Kitz makes when it likes what it sees. For a second, I just stand there, poles hanging, trying not to grin like an idiot. Podium, minimum. Breathing hurts in a good way. Somewhere in the back of my head, a quiet, satisfied voice notes that I didn’t ski like an old man today.
I watch Paco, the Swiss guy who beat me in the first run, and don’t really want him to fail, even if skiing out or straddling would make me the winner of the Hahnenkamm slalom. No, I want him to give it all, and if he’s slower, I’ll take my win.But he isn’t. He delivers as expected and builds on his lead to the loud disappointment of the Austrian fans, who forget their sportsmanship when their hero could win at home.
Paco crosses the finish line; I hug him and congratulate him, more than happy with my second place. We’re both still breathing hard when we head toward the makeshift podium where they announce the results before the fans disperse to pubs or snow-covered slopes.
The mixed zone is a carousel after that: TV cameras, microphones, the usual questions about risk and lines, and the big Gams. I tell them the truth in simpler words: I attacked, I fixed my mistake in the first run, and I’m happy with the second run. They ask if I was thinking about the overall. I shrug and say something about one race at a time. What I don’t say is that in the one quiet corner of my brain where numbers live, I’m already adding points, seeing how far today stretches the lead.
Later, when the podium is packed away, and the race has shifted downhill into the village, the day keeps rolling: official prize-giving, more photos against branded backdrops, a tight knot of fans squeezed behind barriers near the fan shop. I sign hats and race bibs and one bare belly, pose for selfies, and feel my jaw do the familiar interview smile. It all feels a fraction easier, like the volume has turned down from the white noise of the last weeks. Three beers with the team help: cold, foamy, the exact right amount to smooth the edges without tipping me into stupid. And the delicious Race Suite dinner they prepared for us, the dinner that probably cost more than our van.
Thomas Kern is holding court at the bar, eyes bright, voice already too loud, still riding the weekend high even though heonly watched today. Two of the young tech guys orbit him, waving their phones, laughing too hard at nothing.
I watch them for a moment, leaning on the counter, and I can’t decide if I’m nostalgic or just tired. Did I ever have that much energy? Probably. Will the young guy ever learn where the line is? Maybe. I feel half amused, half like the old dog watching the puppies chase their tails too close to the road.
When the coach finally decides he’s had enough, I help herd the rookies out, collect stray helmets and forgotten gloves, and make sure nobody argues too much. The speed group piles into the van in a tumble of bags and yawns, off to Garmisch and another set of start lists. I slap the side of the door as it slides shut, a small ritual, and step back into the cold air of the Kitzbühel evening.
I’m staying. One more night in the hotel bed, one morning without a transfer. Tomorrow I’ll point the car toward Reiteralm and a training lane instead of a finish corral. Different hill, same game. As I walk up through the noisy streets—cowbells still clanking, fans already turning race day into party night—I feel the buzz of my phone against my hip. I don’t take it out yet. I know exactly whose words are already burned into my brain.
Back in the room, I’ll scroll through her photos again, let myself smile like an idiot, then do what I always do: physio first, a proper massage to chase the fire out of my thighs, maybe an hour in the quiet spa downstairs while the rest of Kitzbühel shouts itself hoarse. And later, in my bed, with the legs finally loose and the noise shut out, I’ll let my brain fog on purpose—with split times, tomorrow’s gates, and the memory of my golden girl.
Chapter 11
The Other Circus
Pec pod Snežkou, Krkonoše, Czechia, the same day 5:57
