Mega Sleepover 6: Winter Collection. Sue Mongredien

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СКАЧАТЬ know – after all that fuss I made and everything. But in my head, I’d imagined us all on the main slope pretty much straightaway, cruising down dead fast, just like Nick had told me he’d done, and learning all these ace tricks.

      Instead, we were on this baby slope – and even worse, Suzi told us there was no way we could go on the main slope until we’d had a few lessons and knew what we were doing. Doh! So much for my big ideas, eh?

      Suzi caught sight of my disappointed face and laughed. “Can you imagine if we just let anyone on the main slopes?” she said, shaking her head at the thought. “There would be all sorts of crashes and injuries – it would be very dangerous. Before you can go on, you have to prove you can control your speed, know how to stop and make turns properly. It’s only fair on everyone else, don’t you think?”

      “Yeah,” everyone said.

      “I suppose so,” I said grudgingly.

      But I soon cheered up once the lesson got underway. It was such fun! And then I started to feel really glad we weren’t on the main slopes, as one by one, we wobbled, fell down and knocked someone else over. It was really difficult – almost as tricky as skateboarding down the stairs had been!!

      First of all, we had to get our boards securely fastened to our feet. It had been easy when Nick had done it all for me as I’d just stood there and let him do everything – but now it was down to us to do it ourselves.

      “Make sure your board is facing across the hill,” called Suzi, checking we were all in a good position. “We don’t want you shooting off without being properly fastened in, do we? Now, put your front foot in while you’re standing up. These boards have step-in bindings, so step the toe in first, and push the heel down until you hear a click. Got it?”

      A series of clicks from along the line confirmed that we’d all managed it so far.

      “Now put on your safety leash,” Suzi said. “It goes on your front leg.”

      “What’s it for?” asked Frankie.

      “Well, if you fall over – which I’m pretty sure most of you will do – it stops the board from running away,” Suzi explained. “OK. All ready?”

      We were.

      “Now, you always have to sit down to put your back foot in. Make sure there’s no snow in the binding or on the bottom of your boot. Step the back foot in just like you did with the front.” She waited until she’d heard all of our bindings click in place. “Now comes the fun part,” she said with a grin. “Standing up!”

      I bet you never thought standing up would be difficult, did you? You have to try this, then! Standing up when your feet are fastened to a bit of wood is reeeeallly tricky!! Take it from someone who knows.

      “The main thing to remember is, always put the same weight on both feet,” Suzi told us. “Have a go. If you get really stuck, roll over on to your knees and then stand up that way.”

      Well, one by one we just about managed to get up and stand there in a line on our boards. But then Lyndz started wobbling, made a grab for Rosie – and the pair of them collapsed down face first into the snow! I found myself giggling so much I thought I was going to go the same way and had to clutch at Frankie to keep myself vertical. This was going to be a lot harder than I’d thought!

      Once we’d got used to standing up on the boards without wobbling off, we started going down the baby slope – or bunny slope, as Suzi called it. She pushed herself off and showed us how it was done – making it look like the easiest thing in the world, of course!

      I went down next. WHHHEEEEEE! It was brilliant!! I stuck my arms out to the sides for balance, gritted my teeth and went down in a dead straight line, all the way to the bottom. As soon as I’d made it safely down, I promptly fell over on my bum. All the others cheered their heads off from the top.

      “Way to go, girl!” yelled Frankie, punching the air.

      She went next, and was just about to push herself off when Carli gave her a shove from behind…

      “Wooooaaahhhhh!” Frankie shouted as she shot down the slope. She recovered her balance a bit, but was going so fast, she had to windmill her arms about to keep herself upright. “Heeeeeeellllp!” she screamed as she wobbled over and then tumbled down the hill. Bump! She landed in a heap at the bottom.

      “Are you OK?” I called, scrabbling to undo my bindings. I rushed over to her – and heard Molly and Carli sniggering from the top.

      Frankie struggled to her feet Tm gonna get you for that!” she yelled to Carli. Then she rubbed her bum where she’d landed on it. “Ouch,” she moaned. “This snow feels more like rock!”

      Suzi rushed over. “All right there?” she asked. “You did very well, considering that blonde girl pushed you like that. If she does that again, she’ll have to sit the lesson out.”

      She looked up at Carli with a frown. “You there,” she shouted. “Let’s have less of the pushing, or your lesson ends right here. Got that?”

      Me and Frankie smirked at each other and pulled horrible faces at Carli behind Suzi’s back. Always good to see the enemy getting a ticking off!

      Fliss was next. She looked very nervous about the whole thing, and stood there for ages, fiddling about with her bindings as if they were going to pop undone any second.

      “Come on! Give it a go!” Suzi called encouragingly.

      Fliss looked warily over her shoulder to check Carli and Molly were out of pushing distance. Fliss hates people doing things like that. She either gets dead cross about it or bursts into tears. When she was sure she was safe, she stood up very stiff and straight and pushed herself off, arms rigidly out to the sides, as if she were made of wood.

      “Very good,” Suzi shouted as Fliss came down the slope. “Try and relax your body a bit!”

      Fliss wasn’t about to relax anything for fear of toppling over. She came all the way down in the same stiff way, coming neatly to a stop at the bottom. Only then did she allow her arms to relax. She had this tiny chuffed smile and her cheeks were flushed pink.

      “That was very good,” Suzi said warmly. “Your balance was excellent!”

      Fliss went even pinker. “Thank you,” she said, struggling to undo her feet from the board. Her eyes were shining. “That was fun!”

      Soon we’d all been down a few times and were starting to get a feel for it. Suzi taught us how to come to a clean stop by digging our back foot right into the board and leaning all our weight on to it, and then taught us how to do left and right turns on the slope. It was just so much fun, whizzing down one by one – but then when Suzi told us that our time was almost up, I nearly cried. I couldn’t believe the time had flown by so quickly!

      “We’ll have one more go each, and then that’s about it for your first lesson,” she said.

      “Ohhhh!” I moaned. “Already?”

      She smiled at me. “Afraid so. You’ve done very well though. I think you’re a bit of a natural, Kenny!”

      I glowed with pride. I was practically radioactive with glowing! СКАЧАТЬ