Junior Nordic team hits West Yellowstone for annual festival

Tatonka

Crested Butte Junior Nordic Team coach Austin Ross took six of his athletes up to Montana Thanksgiving week for the annual West Yellowstone Ski Festival.

While Nordic conditions in Crested Butte are as good as they’ve been in a long time, Ross still likes to take his team to West Yellowstone and immerse them in the Nordic ski culture.
“It’s a cool way to be a part of a bigger Nordic community,” says Ross. “It’s a huge mix of people from juniors up to masters, including some Olympic hopefuls.”
Furthermore, Ross likes to engage his athletes in a more focused atmosphere with plenty of opportunity to ski. Ross had his athletes on the track twice a day—they competed in a biathlon, spent a day skiing into the national park and then closed out the week with a couple of races.
“The training up there is really good,” says Ross. “It’s good to see the kids are able to focus on skiing, focus on being a team and focus on improving. It was our biggest week of training thus far.”
Ross and the Crested Butte team were joined by a couple of junior skiers from Vermont who offered some insight into what other programs are doing with their training and technique.
“They were really good training partners for our guys and gave us a chance to see what’s going on in other parts of the country,” explains Ross.
By the time the week wrapped up with two days of racing, Ross’ skiers were noticeably tired. Nevertheless, the race days did provide a chance for the team to shift into race mode.
“The actual results were less important than getting a few starts under our belt,” says Ross. “We still had a few good results though, despite being tired and we should see better results as we move forward.”
The team will continue with workouts this week locally before returning to the start line this coming weekend when they head to the Grand Mesa for some USSA races.
“It’s good practice and a great way to test ourselves before the first Junior National Qualifier race,” says Ross.
The first Junior National Qualifier (JNQ) races of the season for the team will be right here in Crested Butte December 21-22. The race weekend is dubbed the Solstice Showdown and is not only a JNQ but also a FIS-sanctioned race and will showcase the new trail built on the Bench the past summer.