“If you’re lucky enough to be in the mountains, you’re lucky enough.”
Twenty-one racers, four coaches and one sharp dressed man had the privilege of reading this wood plank slogan while waiting in an early morning chow line. Breakfast on the mountain was the coveted conclusion to months of after school dryland training and weekend practices as the Summit Lake Ski Racers found themselves piling eggs and hash browns on top of pre-race butterflies in the Hudson’s Bay Lodge above the northern B.C. town of Smithers.
From March 4 to 6 our young athletes competed for the fastest downward decent in a pool of 42 female skiers, 50 male skiers, 30 female snowboarders, and 59 male snowboarders from high schools around the province. The B.C. School Sports Provincial Alpine Championships, hosted this year by Burns Lake School of the Lakes District, was a competition comprised of two Giant Salom courses for each discipline of racing culminating on the third day with a Terrain Cross for both boarders and skiers.
Athletes competed as individuals with each performance ranked according to a combined time from both courses, but also earned points for their team based on a seeding system that made the competition a little more interesting than just ordering racers from first to last.
“We’ve taken individual performance and made it into a team sport,” quipped the race commissioner during the coaches AGM, and the Summit Lake Racers embodied the spirited enthusiasm of teamwork admirably; no other group of racers on the top of the mountain acted more as a team then our young athletes. Nakusp cheered and supported Nakusp, making unabashed spectacles of ourselves in the thick of the carnival-like atmosphere around the starting gate, with enough sportsmanship left over to encourage other team racers as well. We were also undoubtedly the best dressed, despite the colourful array of spandex being sported by some of the other racers.
As individuals the Summit Lake Ski Team performed competitively at the slalom with Taylor Aeichele earning a seventh place finish and Angus Jackson achieving a well earned seventeenth spot. Even though our racers didn’t metal as individuals, our team managed to edge out enough points to make it to the podium on Tuesday night proudly earning a silver finish for combined team effort in the girls ski category. The relative quiet of the ceremony was shattered by Nakusp enthusiasm as our female athletes charged the stage to collect their hardware.
The scene was soon echoed as the awards shifted disciplines and the Summit Lake Ski Racers erupted for a second time with a third place team finish in the girls snowboard category. Amy Surina’s eighth place individual finish along with her teammates strong over-all finish contributed to the bronze metal reward.
The final day of racing was a technical quagmire as the entire racing company was faced with the tricky Terrain Cross punctuated by a challenging Wu Tang hump at the top of the racecourse. This tricky pile of snow was nothing to mess with, as it either launched inexperienced racers into the air for a speed eating flat-landing, or psyched out the athlete’s momentum entirely.
The sunny bluebird day was abuzz with the background chatter of how to handle the technical puzzle of the Wu Tang, as teams traded ideas and solutions. The rest of the Terrain Cross was a mash up of banked corners, rollers and breakaway dips that dared the racers to check their courage and the conviction of their top speed. All of the racers had one chance to try their hand in the course, and their time would be added to their Giant Slalom results for an overall placing.
The majority of the Summit Lake Ski Racers managed to improve their standing, but the stand out finish was Taylor Aeichele’s amazing third place time of 00:50.97. Taylor simply owned the Wu Tang, crushed the course and launched her combined results earning her a bronze medal for the week.
The racers from Naksup were lucky enough to find themselves in the mountains last week, but luck had nothing to do with their outstanding performance. Congratulations to all of the racers.