Our next state champion spotlight is Nathan Delmar of Maranacook who won the Class B Slalom title. We asked him about winning the state championship
and his favorite thing about ski racing.
1) What were your preparations leading up to the state meet?
To prepare for the State Meet I trained at Kent's Hill, as well as, at Black Mountain. Most weeks I would train for 5-6 days ensuring that by the time State Meet rolled around that there would be no chance of failure or mistakes. As well as improving my skiing, I really worked on improving my mental toughness because it's one of if not the most important things in ski racing. A racer that is not mentally strong will look only at the negatives instead of looking for the ways to win a race or to improve.
2) How did you deal with the pressure and emotions that come along with competing in a state meet?
I really just tried to think of the State Meet as a regular race and relax. After the Giant Slalom I was pretty disappoint in how I finished. I really tried to zone out all of my negative thoughts for the slalom in the afternoon because I knew that I could change my results. I think that if I hadn't done that then I might not of won the individual Slalom Title.
3) What is your favorite thing about ski racing?
My favorite thing about ski racing is how quickly things can change and also how technical the sport is; there will always be something that I can improve on and this makes the sport so interesting. I love that ski racing never gets old and that every run is something new.
4) What was it like winning both the Alpine state team championship and the Combined team championship?
Wining both events was incredible. Although we were State Champions last year, this year seemed much sweeter because we weren't necessarily the favorite to win the title.
5) Coming into the season, what were your goals and did you achieve them?
My goals at the beginning of the season were to win States as a team, the Class B Slalom title and also qualify for the Maine Team. I really choose to set my standard high because being on a team that was successfully last year really made me hungry for the same thing, a State Championship. As for the personal goals I knew that I would have to put the time in, in training to achieve them.