SUMMER CAMP-WHY DO IT? WHAT TO DO?

There are a lot of reasons to do a summer camp, and there are definitely different ways to get it done. As you will see below, I am a big proponent of skiing with your home coaches during the summer for many reasons and hope you will all choose to do at least one summer session with us this year.

REASONS TO DO A SUMMER CAMP.

1.       It is absolutely the best opportunity to develop and reinforce fundamental skills without the pressure of an upcoming race and the preparation for a race. You have time to focus on these skills and the repetition is provided to make those skills your own.

2.       It creates the opportunity to bond with teammates and coaches. To build trust, credibility and teamwork. The living situations, ability to spend time on video, conditioning and other bonding activities is present throughout a summer camp.

3.       The opportunity to try equipment, whether that is a different product line or different sizes and flexes, is there daily. With input from coaches and video.

4.       Develop consistency in an approach to improvement. Learning to take advantage of the terrain and mileage available. To execute drills and directed free skiing that are progression oriented and taught by the coaches you are going to work with in the winter.

5.       Doing a camp with your home coaches allows you to continue your conditioning with coaches who know what you have been doing and who have developed a program for you to succeed with conditioning throughout the summer.

In addition to that, I think it is very important to do a summer camp with your home club and avoid commercial camp products. Private camps run by your home club are usually cheaper than the commercial counterpart. In our case, our home camp is not a business and has tax exempt status so costs are down. And the club is not in it to make profits, only to safely cover the cost of operation. And, as mentioned above, it helps develop a relationship with your club staff that will optimize your time on snow. Your home coaches care about you and your long term development as a ski racer and more importantly, as a person. Last, the private club camp normally has a better athlete to coach ratio and are smaller camps in general.

Depending on what we can provide and how much interest we might have, AVSC Alpine is looking to provide something like this during the summer:

JUNE: This camp will either be in Mt Hood, Oregon or in Bend, Oregon. At this point we are leaning toward Hood and doing it immediately after school lets out. We will provide a longer camp for the J3 and older group (10 days on snow) and a shorter camp within a camp for J4 athletes (6 on snow) during the first part of the longer camp. The camp costs will be posted on-line soon. Tentative dates are: June 11-21 on snow. We would leave on the 9^th, driving from Aspen and arriving back in town on the 22^nd.  The J4 camp would leave on the same date and ski 6 days, returning on the 18^th.

STAFF: Greg Needell,AVSC  Alpine Director. Kent Towlerton, AVSC Head Ability Coach. 1 or 2 Age Class coaches depending on numbers.

JULY/AUGUST: New Zealand. This camp is in the works and will likely be a partnership with Mammoth Mountain Ski Team. It will likely be for a small group of ability athletes who need to be on winter snow and are looking for FIS racing opportunities. The calendar window for this camp will be July 20-August 18. The camp will likely last 2-3 weeks inside that window depending on many variables like cost and schedules.

STAFF: Probably 1 coach, likely to be Kent Towlerton working in with Mammoth. If we have the numbers, Greg will join the group as a second coach.

AUGUST: Slalom Camp at Mt Hood. Dates TBA. Usually it is best to do this camp in mid to late August as the nights begin to cool in the Pacific Northwest and snow stays hard during the day. As the summer wears on, Mt. Hood will lose a lot of the natural snow that has fallen during the winter and terrain gets limited, making it a great opportunity to work on slalom specific development. We can get a lot of volume that time of year as well, as the crowds tend to diminish. This will be a shorter camp with 6 days on snow.

STAFF: Greg Needell, Kent Towlerton. More coaches will be added if necessary, depending on numbers.

We will be posting specifics on-line as we get the financial numbers from our housing and ski area partners.

LONG TERM DEVELOPMENT IN SPORT

That was a title of a book I had in my Sport Science classes years ago in college. It was a pretty simple thesis comparing the long-term participation and growth, and therefore success, of programs that are patient with success and even re-define success to meet their own definitions rather than accelerating specific training and increasing volume to achieve short-term success on paper. In our world of I Phones and instant-gratification, we almost always ignore the long-term benefits of sport. We don’t appreciate what is waiting for us down the road if we do our work now. We want results now. The problem with that model is that there are only 24 hours in each day, 7 days in a week, etc. So if we calculate in planned rest, which is a non-negotiable entity, then we come up with the amount of time we can specifically train for alpine skiing.

So, take way 8 hours a day for sleep minimum. Take away the school day mid-week, meal times and travel, we are left with a model that is really quite effective. We have T, W, Th afternoons, Saturday and Sunday all day. We take Monday and Friday off because we have a nice training block in the middle of the week when there are other responsibilities like school and homework. And skiing 6 to 7 hours a day in a training environment over the weekend is tough on young athletes. Because they need to rest, eat well and grow and have a well-rounded life. It has a nice rhythm to it and it works very well.

We also get obsessed with others who seem to burst on the scene. The phrase “overnight success” is a positive one in our society. I would challenge that it not only should be scorned as a positive phrase but is also a myth. We tend to think someone who bursts on the scene as automatically being an overnight success. Most recently we have seen Jeremy Lin of the NY Knicks be dubbed as such. But really, what got him to where he is? It is as basic as it gets:  hard work, time management, education, planning, fundamentals and most of all, perseverance.

Our problem is we cannot just open up a gym and turn on the lights and work on our game. We need money, cold weather, snow, lift rides, travel to camps and many other things to come together for us to be able to train. Then we need to take advantage of every minute we have to progress. The athletes need to use all the real-estate available to them to get the job done and the coaches need to set up scenarios to get that done. As a result of all this, it is not an even playing field. Some people have more money, some have colder weather, and some have snowmaking in their back yards. Some have a drive and determination to work endlessly to get the job done. Some are just bigger and stronger at a younger age. Some have all of those things.

We, at Aspen, have a lot of this at our disposal. And while we often have to travel a lot in November to get on snow, we still can get a lot done. But because we cannot start walking out the door for training time in November, we need to budget time on the hill in Loveland and other ski areas and make decisions on what curriculum will create the best skiers we can make, over the long haul. That formula is in place and is primarily based in fundamental skill development before we move to gate training and tactical development. And because of that, we might be a little behind some other groups that run more gates sooner in the winter. But I believe that we will get more out of it later in the season because we are more prepared to get what we need out of that training. Even better, we will have a better retention rate as skiers age and better success down the road when it really matters. An old saying we all have heard is that “practice does not make perfect, only perfect practice makes perfect.” We all know there is no perfect, only the attempt to be perfect. But the point is clear. Even if you ski relatively poorly, and train a lot of gates while your competitors are not, you will be faster than your opponents. At that point in time, you are more prepared. But the athlete who has been working on basics, laying a ground-work, is patient with results and evaluates their performance internally will eventually pass the person who only runs gates.

BURNOUT

I hate that word. I don’t think it is a good thing to say. Because it is a negative term and the opposite of it is everything I have talked about above. Burnout is the result of bad planning, too much specific volume at a young age and unrealistic expectations put on athletes by themselves, programs, parents and peers.  As a result, 2 main things happen:

1. The athlete is very successful (winning) at a young age because of size, natural talent and/or training volume. But cannot find the ability to work or re-connect with fundamentals and patience because their self-image is connected to winning. Not hard work, not fundamentals, not consistency and NOT REST. Therefore, the athlete becomes confused or even depressed when athletes he used to beat are now competing closely with him or beating him. We have all met young athletes who went through this or are going through it. And the only answer to it is patience and to re-direct the program back to where it should have been when he was doing all that winning as a J4 or J3.

2. The athlete is not allowed or encouraged to free-ski for fun and therefore loses the love of the sport. I remember a young female athlete I coached in Vermont who made it to the National Team at a very young age. She became “professional” by assignment rather than by choice. She achieved what she wanted but did not know how to balance it with life in all its intricacies. I went on a trip with her training group to Europe one fall and we were snowed out several days in a row. And while the coaches were trying to get the group ready for the World Cup and worrying about how to have training happen. We were out free skiing powder every day. We skied 6 or 7 days of powder in a row before heading back to the States, by the estimation of the US Ski Team staff, the camp was a bust, a waste of money. To the athletes, they were not sure, but the girl I knew turned to me on the plane and said, “I need to remember this and free ski more often, it makes me happy.” But even that epiphany came too late for her. She was trapped in a system that did not allow that fun element to exist and she lost touch with it at 16.

SOLUTIONS

We only have so much time to use, so we need to make the most of our time. That is a simple statement. Our staff has been at this a very long time collectively and we have seen most everything happen in our careers. We have seen the Mikaela Shiffrin phenomenon and the Julia Mancuso story. And while both of those women had incredible success at a young age, Julia is a gold medalist and Mikaela has a World Cup podium already in her young careers, they are by far in the minority. Yes, of course, Lindsey Vonn was a phenom with Juila when they were young and had each other to push each other to great heights. But for each of them there are hundreds who had similar results as J4 and J3 athletes who did not make it. I can name them all if you want but there is not enough time and it really would not be nice. Every generation has their stories of kids who were dominant at the J4 or J3 age and did not fulfill their dreams. And I would argue, in most cases, it was not their natural talent that failed. It was the inability to couple that talent with the physical and mental skills they will need to succeed on the bigger stages. They were encouraged and even taught to believe they were special and were entitled to the accolades they were getting. And as a result, they focus on what got them to that particular point, tons of gate training. Their programs are likely not balanced with directed free skiing, free skiing for fun, and drills outside of gates, section courses, and tactical challenges in gates. So often, the formula was simply volume in gates that earned that short term success. So when they wanted more results, they ran more gates. There is so much more that needs to be taught and the prize needs to be reaching their highest potential over time, not the singular event on the nearest horizon.

I would like to relate a quick experience I had while coaching the National Team. I was there for 7 years which were likely the most successful in the history of the Men’s team. We were winning races, medals, earning top ten finishes and tons of World Cup points from as many as 16 different guys one season. On the SL/GS group we had exactly 1 athlete who made the team before his 19^th birthday and stayed on the team. 2 others made it early, were cut and then came back to the team after failing and needing to go back to the development level and work on their fundamentals. And of that group, our best of the best, our globe winners, made it after their 19^th birthday but were ready to move into the big time once they made the team. 

NO SNOW, SUCCESSFUL TRAINING AND LOOKING DOWN THE ROAD

We have headed into January with very little snow to speak of, obviously. And while that puts some stress on skis, Ski Co. and staff, it also provides great training surfaces on which to train. Strawpile continues to be our main venue for Ability Class and will be the home for the J3 group until after Wilder Dwight. Most of the J4/5 groups have been training on Thunderbowl after school. And while the snow is great on the lower half, getting down to the venue can be difficult to do without hitting rocks. As a result of all this great training snow, it is very easy to get fatigued, especially during that 5 day period between Christmas and New Year. As a result, everyone needs to be very aware of their fatigue level at training and at home as well as eating properly and hydrating regularly. Our biggest challenge once the training ramps up like this is dealing with dehydration and minor health issues like: minor colds, back pain, muscle fatigue and soreness, sore shins (if you flex your boots!) and bruising. All of this stuff needs to be managed through volume adjustment and adding some free skiing to the regimen on a daily basis. Just banging gates can sometimes feel like banging your head against a wall. If you feel that way at training sometimes, it is important to talk to your coaches and possibly take a free run or a drill run.  Quality training and quality volume is really all that matters. And making good choices regarding volume becomes most important.

As we look down the road, the races begin to stack up. From Age Class Opens to J3 qualifiers, to FIS races and FISU races and Nor Ams, the calendar is super busy. It is extremely important for staff and athletes to manage this time accordingly. The season is very long and by the time we get to April races like the Derby and Spring Series, everyone still needs to be performing at their highest levels. So managing all the things mentioned above needs to be in the back of everyone’s minds. Just because you “feel fine” now, does not mean you will still feel that way at championship races or excellent opportunities come spring time. The cumulative effect of all the training we do all year catches up to everyone if it is not managed well.

REST AND RECOVERY

So, all of that being said, the key is rest and recovery. When rest days are scheduled, or even a week off at times, it is important to recharge the batteries by doing things that are fun for you and athletic. It gives you the mental time away from the grind of daily training, racing and travel. Doing different sports just for the fun of it also gives your body some different stimulus and allows recovery for over-used muscles and joints. And on top of that, daily recovery is extremely important and it often gets overlooked. We have 10 spin bikes in the basement of AVSC that should be put to use after skiing for 20-25 minutes of a “pulsed recovery” routine. Any of the staff are happy to walk you through the routine but it is relatively simple. 5 minutes of easy warm-up, 10-15 minutes of pulses, and 5 minutes cool down. The pulses in the middle are 10-15 minutes of sprinting or grinding in a hard gear for 5 seconds of each minute. The pulses allow you to dig deep into the muscle fiber to pull lactic acid or “blood lactate” out and remove that waste product from your system. All the time on the bike, you should be drinking water to rehydrate. Another method that works is pool recovery which includes some running, kicking, swimming and jumping in warm pool water. Yet another way to do it is a “hot-cold” treatment, which can be getting in and out of a hot tub and rolling in the snow and repeating this a few times. You can also do it in a shower by alternating hot and very cold water with the faucet. This method can be very unpleasant and takes some guts. But hot-cold is really not a regular replacement for spinning or pool work.

Last, but not least. We are offering Yoga and Stretching at AVSC with Melissa Aviram every Friday afternoon from 4-5 PM for J3 and older athletes. This is a great opportunity to learn a new skill and make your body feel better on a day when we rarely train on snow.

AJAX CUP

The Ajax Cup was a very successful event again for AVSC and promises to be better in future years. We will work hard to make this event the premier event of the Christmas season in the future and hope for similar participation levels with a higher level of production and attention to detail. Thank you to everyone who helped and participated, the AVSC presence went a long way toward raising a lot of money and having a lot of fun.

DEALING WITH LOW SNOW

Just some background on what we are dealing with in our daily attempt to train and provide a quality training program. Or as I sometimes call it, “sharing my pain.” Every week, we go over our training plans for the following ten days. I take that information and confirm our training needs for the week with the various mountains and try to dole out space to the different groups. We also decide on athletes who will train with older groups, etc. We are constantly shifting space around and compromising because of the lack of available space and even more so, available space for the skiing public. We need to be very appreciative to Aspen Skiing Company who have been more than accommodating to our needs so far and who are our biggest sponsors. As well, being respectful and kind to the skiing public when we are out skiing also becomes an issue of paramount importance. Please be polite in the lift lines and restaurants and leave plenty of room for everyone when overtaking someone on the hill. Remember, slow to you is often very fast to them. And they pay the bills around here!

Last, if anyone gets the chance to speak to or contact Peter King, Steve Fischer, Kevin Hagerty or Scott Nichols. Please give them a heartfelt thank you for meeting our needs as best they can on a daily basis. We cannot do it without them and they have been extremely helpful so far.

See you on the hill!

Greg

THE SEASON IS UPON US

Over the last 2 weeks, the AVSC staff members along with some athletes have been burning up the highways between Aspen and Silverthorne, taking advantage of the excellent training conditions at the Loveland Pass ski areas. Kent Towlerton and the ability staff and athletes have skied 10 days at Loveland, training gates and free skiing every day. The same group will return to Loveland next week for 5 more days on snow after a few of them race in some very early season GS races at Vail this week. Some of the age class kids have also started skiing over there, logging 4 days of free skiing and drills so far this month.

We spent 2 days on-hill with almost the entire alpine coaching group going through drill progressions. We also did an education session each evening using FIS World Cup video and did a training session with the Sprongo representative. Sprongo is an online video service we use to post video on our own AVSC page. Each age group has their own page and can post video, comment on it, draw, and even chat live with the athletes about what they are seeing. It is a great tool and everyone should take advantage of it. The ability class page already has over 200 video uploads! Most of the staff will also attended USSA referee updates and officials clinics this weekend in Silverthorne.

But the really big news around town is that Snowmass will open on the 19^th! That will allow for the age class groups to stay home and get more free-skiing done without traveling and spending money. The ability group, as mentioned above, needs to keep getting training volume to be ready as their race season kicks into full-gear in December. We are hoping to get some gates in the ground early over here if we can, too.

I also had the opportunity to sit in on the World Cup Organizing Committee meeting on Thursday. The enthusiasm was excellent as all the reports from the Aspen Mountain crews was that the race hill is truly ready to go if we had to race this week. But they will continue to blow snow and push piles and make the race hill as good as it possibly can be. They will even have enough time to create more skiing than normal for this time of year. And with another 6 inches expected in town over the weekend, it seems we are headed for some excellent early season skiing and racing in Aspen!

You can also expect the US Ski Team women to be in town on the 18^th and 19^th, getting some training on the race hill. Lindsey Vonn, Julia Mancuso, Resi Steigler, Sarah Schleper, Mikaela Shiffrin and probably Megan McJames and Hailey Duke will all be here getting ready for the big show!  Then we shut the hill down and get back to work. It will be time to water the hill, put up B Net and slip the hill smooth between the 20^th and the 25^th. The World Cup girls will do their free-ski on the race hill on the 25th in preparation for the weekend of racing.

It’s a busy time here at AVSC and at Aspen Mountain getting ready for the big show. And all of Europe will see Aspen on TV, in prime time, with snow on the ground! Great news for everyone involved. But it doesn’t end there. Most of the top GS men in the world will roll into town at the end of the World Cup to race 2 Nor AM GS races on the same hill the World Cup women race on. AVSC skier Bobby Moyer has qualified for the races GS Nor Ams in Aspen. Devon Cardamone and Kevin Hartmann are also all entered in the races. And if they make it in on the quota will be able to compare themselves against some of the best in the world. And if they do not qualify for the race, they will at least get to fore-run the events and get some excellent race-preparation training. And then, many of the women will return to Aspen for Nor Ams accompanied by many junior women racers, including locals Katie Ryan and Julia Mueller-Ristine.

It will be a very busy 2 weeks for all of us involved and we are ready for it. The snow is in the air, the guns are going full-on and there is snow in the forecast. The calendar is full and by December 1, the town of Aspen and all of the Roaring Fork Valley will have experienced 6 days of some of the best slalom and GS racing on the planet.

SEPTEMBER 23, 2011

AVSC Alpine Director’ Blog

CONSISTENCY IS KEY

Think about what you expect from yourself. In ski racing it is likely that you expect speed. You expect to ski faster than many if not all of the other people in the race. But there is one main problem with that expectation; there are probably 140 or so people in the race also expecting the same thing of them. So the question of expectation turns to something else. And that something else is consistency. The person who wins races is not always the person who chooses to go fastest, who takes the greatest risk. It is usually the person who is consistently fast. Who minimizes risk while maximizing speed?  Who is the fastest on each of the 40 or turns in a GS race. Think about it in simple math. If you are .01 seconds faster on each turn for 40 turns, you are .4 seconds faster at the bottom. If you can be .1 faster per turn, you are 4 seconds faster at the bottom. And .1 seconds is a blink of an eye, literally. So then the question becomes what do I do to be .1 faster on each turn? Remembering that risk on one turn can cause trouble on the next turn, dumping far more than the gain in the gate above. The tactical risk can also be an end to your day of racing if you are not consistent from turn to turn. So the decision to risk is really about where on the hill to take the risk and where to ski solidly without taking line and terrain risk. Where is the maximum reward to propel me through the flat and carry the most speed?

So if consistency is key, how do I develop it? Some of the answer is or should be obvious. Repetition of quality technique using conservative tactics and course setting that allows for the development of consistent technique. Using hills that allow for consistent technique development also needs to be part of the approach.  I once did a study when I was with our Men’s World Cup team about race splits and where the races were won. It was a pretty revealing statistic. That season, the average qualifying time in men’s World Cup GS for the second run was 2.6 seconds out from first place. Of that time, the flat splits accounted for 2 seconds of the differential! In every case, at every hill, the winners were fastest on the flat. Whether it was from a dead start or on a flat after a pitch, the flats were the difference.

But anyway, how do you get there aside from repetition of quality training? What other factors would become important in the search for consistent speed? Understanding turn shape and its relationship to the fall line obviously is important. Shaping the turn more above the gate than below is where the speed is. So you can switch more in the fall-line than across it under the gate. And it takes the gravity factor to a minimum resistance which allows for greater consistency in repeating turn quality and shape.

Consistency also applies to your approach to training. Someone who cleanly completes many runs clearly skis more gates, so therefore gets more repetition, so therefore develops better consistency at speed. Also, setting shorter sections that are easier to finish and stacking sections on each run increases quality repetition and therefore, your consistency. But even more than that, as an athlete, the approach you take should be consistent every day. You should have a plan, a focus on your skiing. Understand your use of fundamental skills and whether you are executing them. One of the most basic needs for consistency that is often not paid attention to is simply being there for all the sessions your coaches schedule with a solid focus. When you can get to the point where you are correcting problems on the fly, during the course of a run, or even during a turn, you are far ahead of the pace for creating consistency at speed than someone who only relies on input from run to run or from video at the end of the day. When you can feel things happening that you like and dislike, and fix them while skiing, your training quality and increase in consistency rate is much higher. So your improvement accelerates beyond good or normal.  That is why we so often see these huge breakthroughs in rankings and results. It is usually from someone who has done the homework. Who has worked extremely hard on fundamentals and has the base from which to grow. And when all the pieces come together, you can make the leap. It is not about the magic race or the magic training scenario. It is always about solid fundamentals, consistent input, daily focus and plain old hard work.

ALPINE DIRECTOR’S BLOG-SEPTEMBER 13, 2011

 MOVING, LEARNING, CONDITIONING, PURCHASING AND HIRING.

Those 5 words have dominated my time and thoughts since accepting the offer from Mark Cole to become AVSC’s next Alpine Director. And as I convinced my family we should move here, flew here once to find a house and then drove here twice from central Washington while moving our belongings, I have to say that I questioned myself more than once. I think mostly because spending 2 full days in a car alone, twice, will do that to you. Those doubts are no longer there. The AVSC staff has been very welcoming and the valley has been as well. My son Coen, is a Freshman at Aspen High and seems to be enjoying life. Shannon and I have been doing a ton of cycling and hiking. More than we’ve done all summer prior to arriving here I think. At any rate, it has been a tiring and busy time. It was stressful on all of us, including the dogs and Shannon has flown to her parents’ ranch in Montana to get 2 of our 3 horses to complete the family. I am sure once those two are here Shannon will settle in to the “horsey” people and be totally relaxed. All of us could use a little relax time about now.  Moving is a hard thing, but I feel like we have completed it now and it’s time to move on with life and work.

 To me, life is about learning. Whether it is learning to talk, walk, ski or something a little more complex, it is what we do from beginning to end. One quote that hangs on my office wall is from Malcolm Forbes: “The dumbest people I have ever met were those who knew it all.” That one always sticks with me. Especially since I have spent most of my adult life working with teenagers! Aside from that, I try to live by a simple motto. I try to learn something every day. And if I did, it was a good day. But since I arrived here in early August (the first time)and then re-arrived on August 19^th, I have done nothing but learn. I have learned about 500 new names. I learned I have more than a handful of long-lost friends here.  I learned that the kids in the program I have met so far are cool. I have learned that Aspen has tremendous pride. That the Roaring Fork Valley has more going for it than anywhere else I have lived. And I have learned that I have a lot to learn. Going to bed exhausted and fulfilled every day will be an easy accomplishment for a long time to come.

And the flip-side to learning is teaching. My first task is to share what I know and have learned with the staff. And then to help Kent teach the kids how to lift weights with good technique so they minimize their chances of being injured in and out of the gym and so they have a chance to maximize their talent.

Conditioning training is such an important part of life and ski racing. Think about it. If we can teach kids a skill like training for skiing through weight training, aerobic training, anaerobic training, explosive training and relaxation, then they will have acquired skills they can apply to their entire lives. They can train for cycling races, or marathons, or just train to be healthy. We can use the vehicle of ski racing to apply those concepts to all of life. And then, on top of it, we get a huge performance benefit on the hill immediately with improved performance and a greatly reduced risk of injury. I have been teaching kids to lift weights since 1987 and I have never stopped. I believe in it as a tool for improvement and as a tool to increase confidence. Think about training well all summer and fall, getting stronger than you have ever been, then getting on snow in late October or early November. And at that time feeling the strength you have built. And suddenly being able to do the tasks on snow that Kent or Pat or Alice have been begging you to do for years? How confident do you think you become? And how sure of yourself will you be when you slide into the gate at the first race? It is an awesome feeling to know you’ve done the job, that you have done the groundwork to get the job done on the hill. Where it really matters!

 And what, you might ask, is purchasing doing on the list? Purchasing a new, portable timing system for the ability class group so they can time whenever they need to. Purchasing new video cameras. New mounting jigs for bindings and plates. A computer for the J5s. There have been a lot of purchases. But more importantly, on Friday, September 16^th, at 5 PM, we will host our AVSC Fit Night. The race service representatives from all the companies that supply AVSC will be at the High School to provide equipment purchase opportunities to all of our registered athletes.  We will see a great representation from all the hard-goods companies as well as some helmet and goggles groups. We will also see Fuxi and SRD there selling suits and other goodies. It is a great opportunity to get outfitted for the season. And I have one piece of advice for Mom and Dad. Do not skimp on equipment. Get what your young athletes need to do their jobs. If you need to save money (don’t we all?) then skip a race at sometime in the season. That money is much better spent on good quality equipment. The other thing I would suggest is that you get your new stuff prepped by a quality technician unless you know how to do it yourself. And I do not mean a shop guy. I mean someone knowledgeable about modern skis and proficient with a file and stone. Those people are not that easy to find sometimes but I can help you. I am in discussions with a current men’s World Cup Service Man to come to AVSC and set up a prep station. He will charge a set fee (in cash) per pair of skis and will set them up for the beginning of the season. So your first day is “scrape and go” as he says.  When I get this opportunity set up, I will be emailing everyone with details. He will pull sidewall, set the edge and base bevels and wax. Don’t miss these opportunities as we move ahead.

 And finally, what I have been spending most of my time on lately is replacing some of the quality staff that we lost due to Jeff’s departure and just through the natural attrition of alpine coaching. It is not an easy life and it is not for everyone. So we often lose promising young coaches to other professions.

 We have some very strong returning staff members: Kent Towlerton will head the ability group and Alice Black the age class programs. Pat Callahan (2011 USSA Coach of the Year) returns as the J3 Head Coach. Willie Volckhausen rounds out the Head Coach staff as the J5 boss. Torey Greenwood will return to work with the ability group with Kent. Ramsay Hill will return part-time with the J3s and Lindsay Mann will move from the ability group to a part-time role with pretty much anywhere we need her. Of course, Fordy Sinkinson will be a leadership force within the J4 program. Sean Thomas remains on staff as well as Toby Lamar.

 The new hiring process has been laborious but I think it has been very productive. I am very happy with our hires. With the ability class, we have increased our staff by 1 member and have hired Austin Nevins and Joe Downing. Austin comes to us from New Hampshire out of Plymouth State College where he raced for four years. He also boasts a family construction background so I assume he brings with him a strong back and stronger work ethic.

We were also fortunate to land Joe Downing with the ability class. Joe is from Puyallup, Washington and was an athlete both Kent and I worked with as a junior in the West Region program. Joe skied for Western State in Gunnison before the budget cuts hit the team there and then moved on to coach at Loveland for several years. He most recently worked at Schweitzer Alpine Racing School in Sandpoint, Idaho with their FIS group and spent a great deal of time on the FIS and NorAm circuits. Joe is a great hire for us. I have told a handful of people about the hire and every single response has been, “Wow, nice work.”

In the J3 group we will add full-time coach Brian Buell. Brian comes from Eldora and brings a multi-talented background including being a professional DH mountain biker! The J4s will see newcomer Kate Anderson who is joining us from New Hampshire. Kate skied out of Breckenridge when she was skiing in Colorado and brings a strong family racing background. Her Dad is a successful professional coach and her brother coaches with the USST women’s team. I am very happy to have her join us this winter. And last, and certainly not least, Aspenite Gillian Hearn will assist Willie with the J5 group in a full-time capacity. I hope all those kids can deal with the energy level Willie and Gill will bring to the group!

 I am very proud of everything we have accomplished so far and I truly believe we are headed toward something special. Please feel free to call, write or just drop by to chat at any time. My door is open.

Greg

I will be posting a blog here as often as possible, hopefully at the minimum it will be monthly. I will also link it to my “World Cup According to Grande” blog at www.alpineraceconsulting.com. Look for it!

Greg