Always Adapting in February

Minimal snow, but lots celebrate at Park City Ski and Snowboard's cross country team. With a lot of pivoting for the uncontrollable, we have been able to run our programs, events and trips successfully. I've also made more carafes of hot cocoa than I can count in the past month to make sure kids have a smile on their face at the end of the day.

Four of the six IMD races have been rescheduled or cancelled so far. It takes some thinking to remember where the upcoming practice or race is taking place. Sure we have done some additional dryland, but almost all of our scheduled practices have miraculously been on snow, even if it’s just a patch of manmade snow.

February 7th and 8th we went to Jackson for the 2nd IMD Qualifier. Highlights included Rhys Weidenhamer winning the skate mass start race and placing 2nd in the classic U18 races and Mira Smeyak won both races. Donovan Toly showed us as a Nordic Combined skier he can compete well in both skate and classic races, placing 2nd in both U14 races.

PCSS recently completed the third of the IMD Junior National Qualifiers in West Yellowstone on February 21st and 22nd. The team was excited to be in wintery West Yellowstone again. Highlights included Ian Carmack winning the U18/U20 skate sprint, Mira Smeyak winning both U14 races again, continuing her undefeated streak, and Miles Taylor winning the U14 Classic race. Emmett Covington had the best races of his season so far placing 2nd in the U16 skate sprint and 3rd in the classic race.

PCSS qualified 10 athletes to Junior Nationals in Cable, Wisconsin in March. Those athletes are Ian Carmack, Brooke Greenberg, Rhys Weidenhamer, Tegan Hoffman, Hannah Strahan, Phoebe Zaniello, Liam Demong, Emmett Covington, Sadie McCrank and Luke Miller. Kyle Clarke was the first alternate for U18/20 men. Liam, Sadie and Luke will all attend Junior Nationals for Ski Jumping and Nordic Combined instead of Cross Country.

Locally we had a good turn out for the Wasatch Citizens Series race on February 20th at Soldier Hollow and were pleased to see they had a few more trails open. Mason Kautz won the U16 5k, Eli Kurek won the U14 boys 5k and Scout Black was 2nd in the U14 boys 5k.

Another event we managed to pull off was the 9th Annual Cocoa Loppet, a free race for our Kickers and Gliders. They see how many laps of a 400 meter course they can do in 20 minutes and then get Hot Cocoa after. We did this on the outruns of the Utah Olympic Park jumps thanks to snowmaking and UOP groomers.

Everyone on our team was excited to watch the Olympics and our Kickers and Gliders spent some time at a practice writing Good Luck cards to US Olympians that were hand delivered to Italy. We hope these cards gave them an extra boost to do their best and remember why they loved the sport in the first place.

Other highlights included a joint Kickers and Gliders and Devo practice where Devo skiers mentored Kickers and Gliders and a rare opportunity to ski on the White Pine 5k. We also wrapped up our Mini Gliders and Kindergliders programs with an obstacle course challenge and hot cocoa and Olympic pins after, also at Utah Olympic Park. It has been my sixth year coaching Mini Gliders on Sunday mornings and every practice has ended with hot cocoa.

We look forward to March and our Championships races along with our practices, wherever they may be and will be sure to serve up more hot cocoa.