Mountain Sports Team athletes hit the park and pipe

Aaron Blunck takes third in Vail

January is a huge competition month for the Crested Butte Mountain Sports Team (CBMST) athletes. The CBMST hosted a halfpipe and slopestyle competition as part of the Southwest Series last weekend, and CBMST athletes Aaron Blunck and Matt Evans headed to Vail to compete in the halfpipe on the second leg of the Gatorade Freeflow Tour.
“The Gatorade Freeflow Tour is the amateur version of the Dew Tour,” says CBMST freeride skiing head coach Woody Lindenmyer. “They’re looking for the up-and-coming Dew Tour athletes.”
Blunck may have caught the eye of the Dew Tour entourage with a third-place finish in the halfpipe in Vail.
With only two days of training in Keystone earlier this year and a handful of workouts on the Crested Butte Mountain halfpipe, Blunck is primed to breakout this season.
“In one day he got all of his tricks back from last year and on the second day of training he added another 180 to a trick,” says CBMST freeride coach Hans vonBriesen. “He took his best trick from last year, which was a nine [900, two and a half rotations] and turned it into a ten [1080, three complete rotations].”
Only the top three results were posted so Evans’ finish is unknown but vonBriesen was psyched with what he saw from both Blunck and Evans.
“They did a good job and held their own,” says vonBriesen. “It’s good starting ground and more fuel for our fire. I’m pleased with what went down.”
Meanwhile, CBMST skiers and riders were on Crested Butte Mountain Resort defending their turf in the second stop of the Southwest Series.
The second stop consisted of a halfpipe competition on Saturday and a slopestyle event on Sunday.
Lindenmyer had three skiers in the competition: Nolan Blunck, Brad Coffey and Jet McGuire.
Lindenmyer had his athletes focus on halfpipe leading up to the weekend and it paid off.
“It went really well,” says Lindenmyer. “Brad had the most amazing progression I’ve seen in halfpipe skiing in a week and Nolan is as consistent as I’ve seen.”
The three skiers held their consistency for solid runs in the slopestyle on Sunday.
Assistant Director for CBMST and “all things knuckle” Christian Robertson had 14 athletes riding in the local event.
After a week of workouts, Robertson felt it all gelled that weekend.
“The kids put down their best runs on the event days,” says Robertson. “Everybody’s riding well and are back to where they were at the end of last year. Now we’re at the point to start moving forward.”
Both skiers and riders from the CBMST will head to Copper Mountain January 23-24 for skiercross and boardercross events.