Kelly VanderBeek top Canadian on second training day in Whistler
VanderBeek 14th as Italy’s Fanchini posts best time of TELUS Whistler Ladies DH training run

Kelly VanderBeek (Kitchener, ON) was the top Canadian on the second day of training for Friday’s Ladies TELUS Whistler Downhill, finishing 14th in a time of one minute 48.21 seconds.

US Ski Team sees strength in numbers
Vanderbeek, who has two World Cup downhill podiums already this season, was undeterred despite actually breaking one of her poles during today’s run.
Whether you count Bode Miller as a US Ski Team member – he spent a decade on the team, wears a US uniform, and, if he wants, will surely be a US Olympian in 2010 – these are very good days for the team and the man at the helm, Bill Marolt.

Laid-back Canuck can turn it on
Manuel Osborne-Paradis is the surfer dude of the Canadian men’s alpine team, a laid-back sort always in search of a good time and the big wave.

As the 24-year-old North Vancouver native puts it: “I’m just a go-with-the-flow kind of dude.”
He started out on these slopes as a toddler on skis featuring images of Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck, but today will be competing against the big boys of ski racing in a men’s World Cup super-G on the hill where skiing at the 2010 Winter Olympics will be contested.