WHAT A SEASON!
A MESSAGE FROM EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, CHRISTIE HIND
Last week Summit County enacted a “Stay in Place” order that will impact everyone in our beautiful mountain town. This is essential for everyone’s safety but tough news nonetheless for the whole community, and especially for our student athletes for whom this is an especially trying time. With championship season cancelled, training suspended, banquets postponed, and school/social events cancelled for the next month at least, many of our athletes are feeling a sense of loss, grief, and discombobulation.
I want you to know that PCSS absolutely understands this dynamic and cares deeply about the well-being of athletes and family members. We are doing everything possible to help keep you engaged, connected, and supported during this time. Now more than ever, PCSS is putting its character and social development-focused core values to work, Each of us play an important role in this community and keeping one another safe during this time. The PCSS family is very special and we will get through this together!
We now know that the best way to slow the spread is social distancing, and it's something the PCSS community can take the lead on. If you haven't already, please have your athletes observe best practices for all indoor & outdoor activities -- avoid groups, including visits to other homes, and keep an 8-10 foot radius between yourself and others at all times.
PCSS is also focused on providing timely updates without bombarding your inbox. I recognize you are likely receiving COVID-19 emails from every company and organization you’ve ever interacted with, so we will be sparing in our outreach and use email alerts when material changes have been posted to our website. As of now, I can share that all team training and activities have been suspended to comply with all Summit County orders. Some teams have provided dryland workouts and other activities that can be completed at home. We will continue to provide updates as we have them.
In this edition of the newsletter, we are going to turn our attention to happier moments and celebrate the many incredible athletic accomplishments of the 2019-20 season!
On behalf of PCSS and all our staff, we appreciate your support and understanding during this time of uncertainty. We hope you still find the time to enjoy the mountains and outdoor activities that we all love so much (while practicing safe social distancing, of course) and we look forward to resuming training and activities soon.
Here is a short video that I think all of our athletes might find both hopeful and interesting during these trying times.
– Christie Hind
CLUB NEWS
End-of-Season Banquets and Coach Appreciation
Due to the community-wide stay-at-home order, all end of season banquets are postponed.
In addition to celebrating our athletes, banquets are often the time that families acknowledge and thank our hard working coaching staff.
Our staff would still love to hear from you! For those families wishing to send cards or tips expressing coach appreciation, please contact your program director. They will provide you with an address to send cards or Venmo account information. We appreciate your support.
TEAM UPDATES
AERIALS
Aerials was fortunate to be able to wrap up the season with the completion of all events. Bristol Mountain hosted a successful NorAm Finals, Junior Nationals and National Championships despite the challenges of warm weather and COVID-19 impacts. Congratulations to all of our PCSS athletes on their amazing performances!
2020 Junior National Champions - Dani Loeb & Finn McEneany
NorAm Finals Results - Women (Dani Loeb 2nd, Tasia Tanner 3rd), Men
Women’s Overall Rankings
Men’s Overall Rankings
National Championship Results - Women, Men
Madison Kaiserman closed out the weekend with two first place finishes.
ALPINE
U16 Regionals
YSL Championships
National JR Championships
Wes Campbell stands on the podium at Junior Nationals.
Cross Country
PCSS’ cross country programs wrapped up in early March with competitions going out on a high note. In just two days at Junior Nationals (March 8–14), PCSS had more top 10 finishes than in the past two years at the event. Wes Campbell was crowned national champion in the classic race. Lane Myshrall had two top-10 finishes in the U20 category and Elena Grissom was top 10 in U16.
Athletes also competed in the Youth Ski Championships Feb. 28 – March 1 in McCall, Idaho. Highlights included Ian Carmack finishing top five in all three events after missing some of the season due to a broken wrist. Tegan Hoffman was top three in all three events and Henley Wismer won the obstacle course.
The athletes had a lot of fun this season and we look forward to resuming training.
The Big Mountain team trains on the Park City ridgeline.
FREeski - Big Mountain & Park N' PIpe
The Big Mountain team ended the season with some great results. Congratulations to Ali Macuga who ended the season ranked fourth in the 15-18-year-old division with four podium finishes. Had we been able to hold the North American Junior Championships, she would have been well-positioned to podium at the event. We were also proud to host our first IFSA competition this year.
PCSS Regional Team athletes compete at the USASA BMW Series at Woodward Park City.
The story is much the same for the PCSS Park and Pipe athletes. Teams ended the season with three athletes ranked in the top 15 on the NorAm circuit and 16 athletes with top 5 national rankings. We had a record 48 athletes who would have qualified for the National Championships.
We are sorry to have to conclude our season early, but we are grateful that we were able to have had such a great season with good snow and great venues to train on. We are now working on what we can all do better for next season!
Freestyle Development
Thank you everyone for another great season! We know the season didn't end the way everyone would have liked, but the coaches and staff still had an amazing getting to know and working with the athletes all season long. Thank you for being a part of our program and we hope to see you all this summer at the water ramps!
Speaking of that...summer water ramp and air camp registration will be live soon! We are expecting to have camp registration open on Monday, March 30th. If you have any questions about summer camp or how to register please reach out to Ryan Devine at rdevine@parkcityss.org.
Alli Macuga stands on top of the podium at junior nationals.
MOGUls
PCSS has another junior national champion! Congratulations to Alli Macuga who won the women’s moguls competition in Winter Park, Colorado on March 14. Alli is now a two-time junior national champion after winning duals at Snowbird last season.
Macuga also landed on the podium at NorAm finals in Killington, Vermont with a second place finish in duals. Jack Kariotis led the men with a third place finish in singles.
NorAm Finals Results
Although the 2020 U.S. National Championships were canceled, we would like to recognize and congratulate the following PCSS athletes who qualified:
Women: Alli Macuga, Zoe Dwinell, Kassidy Lynch
Men: Jackson Crockett, Cole Ward, Cameron Solomon, Julien Markewitz, Trevor Reilly, Jack Kariotis
Ski Jumping and Nordic combined
PCSS Ski Jumping and Nordic Combined members are engaged in a weekly contest which will run through the last week April. Due to the recent events and stay at home orders, we are coming up with engaging ways to continue to think about healthy activity and outdoor sport. PCSS members will be sending in video of their at home contests. This week's contest was to build your best backyard ski jump.
In addition to the weekly contest which started the week of March 23, the coaches are reviewing athletes from the winter season. The end of March and April is historically the off season for Ski Jumping and Nordic Combined members. We are looking forward to a happy and healthy summer season.
SNOWBOARd
PCSS is proud to announce that our snowboardcross riders took home half of the men’s and women’s combined overall NorAm titles this season. Mikey LaCroix was the men’s overall winner, with teammate McKinzie Edwards finishing third overall. Livia Molodyh finished second in the women’s overall.
The park and pipe team also has much to celebrate, with many athletes stepping it up and making finals throughout the season at all event levels. Although invitations for USASA Nationals were never released, we projected nearly 20 riders were going to qualify!