Meribel Diary Week 9 & 10

Wow so that went quickly and we’ve now sadly finished the Basecamp program in Meribel. The last two weeks have been busy on all fronts wit loads of skiing. BASI 2 Assessments, a couple of awesome BBQs and some retro antics. We have now settled down slightly into our post Basecamp week where the guys are getting some chilled out skiing and socialising along with Element Service and Food.

So over the last two weeks some of the Basecampers have been doing their BASI 2 Assessments. Training and Assessing them have been Pete who teaches in Scotland and Ben from Courchevel. Everyone has been working hard and unfortunately a couple of people haven’t achieved the result they wanted. Well done to those who are now Ski Instructors and commiseration’s to those who will need to re-sit.

Despite the snow conditions not being as good as they have been the performance groups have been finding all the best places in the 3 Valleys. Having skied with them a couple of times I was surprised to find that there was still powder available in the 3 Valleys and some of the spots we were skiing took your breath away.

From the Wednesday to the Sunday the Meribel hosted the Coupe du Monde FIS World Cup Finals where the best skiers in the World competed for the biggest race of the season. Many Basecampers were lucky enough to witness some incredible skiing with Downhill, Super G, GS, Team Slalom and Slalom for men and women.

The middle weekend of these two weeks saw a social Sunday with quite a number of Basecampers organising retro onesies and skiing like they were in the 80’s. This was followed by a banging BBQ on the terrace of Chalet Leopold. Nice work Liz, Max and Olivia (except BBQ smoke will make my hair smell!) for some excellent food and good work to the Leopold Crew for organising the after dinner entertainment.

So following this after a hard final week we had another BBQ this time at Chalet Les Matines with some truly tantalising options. This was followed by an awards ceremony with prizes from Basecamp and BASS hosted by the author and martin Jeffers from BASS. Some startling revelations came out in this ceremony, some to explicit to mention. Amongst others well done to Tom Dickerson for Best Attitude, Eleanor Wellesley for Most Improved and Ed Taylor for Best Sports Personality.

So after such a busy 2 weeks it all settled down a little for a post Basecamp week in Chalet Les Matines. The guys are now enjoying Element Ski Travel Food and wine with afternoon tea and 4 course dinner. Especially for BASI they are enjoying a more relaxed week with a couple of hours of skiing. Some of the other Basecampers have taken the longer seasonaire accommodation option and are staying out until the end of the season.

So following 10 Weeks of great Basecamp times I must bid you adieu, stay classy Meribel and the author will see you next season.