Strong Season Finish For BART Skiers

WALLACE, ID - After over 14 weeks of training and racing, it is likely that the athletes and parents of the Bluewood Alpine Race Team's youth league team are a little relieved that the season is over. Not so for the coaches, who wish that it was just getting started. "We have put a lot of emphasis on skills development this season and our racers are really starting to respond." stated head coach Hal White. "It's hard facing the summer with everyone performing so well."

White and his coaching staff are doing all they can to capitalize on the momentum. Along with plans to hold a summer race camp at Mt Hood, enhanced fall dryland training and a fall ski camp, he is making himself available to coach any athletes that want to attend Anthony Lakes " Broadway Bash" next weekend. This nonleague race will allow skiers another weekend of racing to cap the season, which offi- cially ended with The Emerald Empire Youth Ski League Finals at Lookout Pass Ski Area March 19-20.

All White's optimism comes after two weeks of the most intense racing of the season, where the team's athletes had some of their best successes to date. At the EEYSL Finals, Saturday's Giant Slalom was the final points race of the season. Bluewood skiers managed to rack up four top ten finishes in the event.

Sunday featured the second Kombi event of the season but didn't count toward team or individual awards, which were presented at a banquet Saturday night. There may not have been league points on the line, but that may have made Sunday's racing even tougher as the racers had nothing to lose and let it all hang out. Strong skiing in the slalom sections of the kombi propelled Cody Worden of Walla Walla to his first top 10 finish in EEYSL racing.

The season-long efforts of the BART athletes led to a fourth place finish in the EEYSL team standings. This ranking matched the finish of the team a year ago, but was achieved with a much smaller team. In fact, only seven athletes were able to attend all the league races this season compared to seventeen last year. Individually, all the BART skiers had strong finishes and Eva Siess, of Dayton, claimed the only League podium by skiing consistently enough to finish third in her age group.

Two Bluewood Juniors racers, Reid Reininger and Colleen Gibbons, will be competing in the J3 Finals this weekend at S Schweitzer Mountain Resort in Sandpoint, Idaho.