After a hectic Nov/Dec racing schedule the Alberta Ski Team has been enjoying some high quality local training and racing in January.  The first couple weeks saw the majority of the ski team training locally at Nakiska, C.O.P., Lake Louise and Norquay.  We are so blessed here in Alberta to have so many high quality training venues and I would like to take the time to acknowledge the support of our local club coaches, program directors and ski area managers.  The Alberta Ski Team has taken the initiative to vary it’s training locations and to try and work with local FIS teams as much as possible and these clubs and ski areas have been great in accommodating that.

The racing season has been a mixture of successes and setbacks, as is normal in any sport endeavor.  As athletes and coaches we all want to perform our best at every opportunity, but in reality our plans don’t always go accordingly.  For the second year in a row Ashleigh Alexander sustained an injury early in the year.  Ashleigh took some time off over the Christmas break to recover, then slowly and methodically trained to get back to a confident level of skiing to be race ready.  This culminated with back to back victories at Lake Louise in the GS races last week.

After another 5 day training block the Alberta Ski Team is looking forward to the next series of races in Western North America.  These races will be a good mid season prep before travelling east for the National Championships, our largest event of the season.  I look forward to seeing our committed athletes achieve their potential in these series.  From Leslie, Jonas and I, as well as all the AST athletes I would like to thank you for your encouragement and support and please feel free to stop and say hello on the hill and even jump in for a lap on our course!

Darin McBeath

Alberta Alpine is dedicated to providing Alberta’s racing families the best environment for our athletes from U4 to FIS.

Over the years, Alberta Alpine’s professional management team and board of directors has produced a series of policies that represent the best practices in the sports industry.
 
Please take the time to refer to these policies and familiarize you and your athlete with the policies designed to ensure a safe and fun environment for your athlete and family.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Alberta Alpine or a member of the Board.

LINK TO AASA POLICIES

Hey everyone!

I hope everyone had a great time with your loved ones during the Christmas holidays and are now recovering from all the turkey dinners and festivities.  As we approach the New Year, our girl’s team will be heading out east to compete at NorAms. Unfortunately, I will not be joining them due to a crash in Panorama that left me with a concussion and a partially separated shoulder. I have been cleared of my concussion and am slowly getting back to 100% with my shoulder.  I want to say thank you to all my coaches (Darin, Leslie & Jonas), Rob McCloskey, Gavin Preziosi and the Gray family for being such a huge support and helping me while I was in Panorama following my injury. I also want to mention my teammate Claire Timmermann, who amongst all the craziness of racing, was a true teammate by taking care of me for the first few days after my crash and pulling out her first NorAm Junior podium on her 18^th birthday! Super proud of her!

I hope you all have a great New Year and I hope to see you guys on the slopes! I also wanted to thank our sponsors, Western GMC, Sporting life, and Bruce Legree with Descente for the continuous support! I would also like to thank my personal sponsors Bliz and Rossignol for keeping me safe, helping me ski fast and making sure I always look good!

– Ashleigh

Upcoming AST Women’s Races:

• Jan 2-3 @ Georgian Peaks (2x GS)
• Jan 4-5 @ Osler Bluff (2x SL)

Hi Everyone

Well, our first race of the season is now in the books this past weekend. The participation was great at the Rabbit Hill Open with 70 girls and close to 100 boys!

I would like to thank Rabbit Hill Resort the Rabbit Hill Race Club and all the volunteers who helped put on the two-day event. It was windy one but the event was a great success.

As with the start of the new race season underway, it also brings to a close the past year. The past season has brought AASA renewed energy with the new strategic plan and a new President (Rob) and Provincial Program Director (Gavin) to the forefront of AASA.

I hope some of you and your members had a chance to meet the guys this past weekend at Rabbit Hill.  Both of them are very supportive of our North Zone and truly believe in our success and growth.

Rob and Gavin both originally started their ski careers at smaller hills such as ours and understand the success and challenges we face. You will be seeing a lot of them at our North Zone events in 2019 and beyond.

The upcoming race season will be an exciting one with the CWG being held in Alberta this year. I hope you have the chance to take in some of the events (and not only skiing) if the opportunity arises.

A reminder that the next North Zone Chairs Meeting is scheduled for January 16^th at 6:00 pm Boardroom 1, Percy Page Centre.

At this time I would like to wish all Clubs and their membership A Very Merry Christmas and Season Greetings and a Happy New Year!

Please have a safe and enjoyable time with friends and family and see you in the New Year.

Thanks

Charles Gushaty

Alberta Alpine North Zone Chair
Alberta Alpine Ski Association

As part of a club’s annual registration process, all Alberta Alpine member athletes must sign off on the AASA Concussion Policy Consent Form (Concussion Acknowledgement Form). The next part of this process is what to do IF you get a concussion. Below are 4 quick steps, as part of the AASA Concussion Policy, that are to be followed by either the coach, parent or program director.

Concussion Policy Process:

If your child or athlete has a concussion (to be done by parent or coach);

STEP 1

Notify Alberta Alpine of athlete’s concussion – send email to memberservices@albertaalpine.ca

Info to include;

• Date of incident
• Full name
• Club
• Age Group
• Name of Coach or Parent
• Email of Coach or Parent

STEP 2

The athlete is put on the Concussion Protocol List – this list is sent to all ROC’s and athletes are NOT allowed to race until they’re removed.

STEP 3

Have athlete/parent take AASA Medical Evaluation Form to the doctor or hospital.

STEP 4

Once a doctor has signed the AASA Medical Evaluation Form, scan & email it to Alberta Alpine (Member Services) to have athlete removed from the Concussion Protocol List.

Hello all!

This is my first season as a coach with the Alberta Ski Team and what a ride it’s been so far. I was an athlete with the team for four years between 2010 and 2014 before I transitioned into coaching. Over the past four years, I coached at the FIS, U16 and U14 levels while getting my undergrad in Physical Literacy at Mount Royal University. I knew once I had completed my degree I wanted to coach in the high-performance stream so when an opportunity with the Alberta Team came up it was the perfect fit. I have been with the team since September and am enjoying working with the awesome staff and athletes here.

Most recently, November saw the boys at Alberta Alpine trying to grow upper lip sweaters in support of the Movember Foundation. It was fairly successful for some; others….well it’s a good thing we’re here to ski. The team has been on the road for the last little while and is currently in Panorama. With the early season Sun Peaks and Norquay races in the bag, it was time to switch gears to NorAms. Everyone has been putting in work in the gym over the summer months and has had some focused time on snow in the fall which resulted in some podium results for both Claire and Tora at Sun Peaks and Norquay respectively. With these recent results, there is definitely an excitement surrounding the start of the NorAm season. Andrew, Angus, Claire and Ashleigh made their way to Lake Louise following the World Cups for a week of speed NorAms while Caeden and Tora spent the week hitting the books in anticipation of our current two-week push in Panorama. Racing this time of year can be a challenge as it is quite a full schedule. In the weeks leading up to Christmas, the athletes will have raced 17 times in 21 days!

The group as a whole has been skiing well and confidence is high coming into these races. Ashleigh, unfortunately, had a crash our first day here in Panorama and is currently at home recovering. She is doing well and should be back with the team soon. We are sending you healing vibes Ash! Seeing a teammate go down is always tough but the team rallied during the first two days of SG which saw some results for the crew as a whole and a NorAm junior podium for Claire. We are looking forward to keeping this momentum rolling into the next five days of tech races. Following the NorAms this week the team will have a day off before the Panorama Christmas FIS Series.  Following the FIS Series, the team will have some time off at home to recharge before we head out east for the next series of tech NorAms.

If you’d like to keep up to date on the team and current happenings check us out on Instagram @albertaskiteam.

Thank you for reading and I hope to see you out on the slopes!

Cheers,  Jonas

Hey everyone!

The team just got back from our first race in Sun Peaks! All of us were eager to get back into racing and finally get this season rolling! Even with challenging conditions, all the AST athletes persevered and still had some great results. We are now back at home preparing for an extremely busy month of racing ahead. First, we had two slalom races in Norquay this past weekend and immediately afterwards we’re headed to Lake Louise for NorAms. Unfortunately, I won’t be racing in the speed events at Lake Louise NorAms, but want to wish everyone good luck! My eyes will be glued to live timing! After Lake Louise, we travel to Panorama for another NorAm series and finish December’s races competing in some more FIS tech races. The team has a full schedule all the way up until the holidays! Anyways, I want to wish everyone good luck in their upcoming season. Can’t wait to see everyone out on the slopes!

Thank you to our generous sponsors; Western GMC Buick, Descente and Sporting Life.

-Tora Hoshizaki

Hey everyone! After our first few weeks on snow at Nakiska, The Alberta Ski Team headed to Kamloops November 19th for our first races of the season in Sun Peaks. We’ve been training with high intensity and volume and pushing each other every day. The first few weeks on snow were about fine-tuning technical and tactical goals everyone was working towards in Saas Fee and getting ready to race!

On Nov 16th we received our team uniform and everyone is super happy with how everything turned out, I’d like to extend a huge thank you to Bruce LeGree and Descente for the gear as well as Sporting life and Western GMC Buick! Wishing everyone good luck with their pre-season training and the rest of their season.

The video I’ve done for my athlete journal comprises of pre-season training at Nakiska and dryland workouts at CSI-Calgary, Winsport.

Thanks,

Caeden Carruthers

Please click on the link below for clarification on the FIS Face & Back Protection for 2018/2019 ski season.

Face and Back Protection

Alpine Canada has been working on a new Long Term Development for Alpine Skiing and before the website is launched, Alberta Alpine & other coaches were able to get a sneak peek during the Fall Coaches Meeting. Below is a quick 1-pager overview of the LTAD as it relates to U12.

LTAD U12 1-pager

NGSL / U10 and under athletes require helmets that fit properly and have been designed for skiing.

U12 athletes require crash helmets with hard ears that have been designed for alpine ski racing but do not need to be FIS approved.

U14 athletes and up require FIS approved helmets.

OH Hey,

It’s finally my turn! I wanted to share with everyone in our community, a collection of daily 1 second videos of the AST, from the last few months. My intention by doing this is to give our world a glimpse of what it is like to be a part of the Alberta Ski Team. We really are a family, we have challenging moments, hilarious moments, a great deal of repetition, but what feels like zero routine. By no means can we capture all of the memories, but this is certainly a starting point. To overlay, our prep phase has consisted of 2 on-snow camps, 3 Dryland blocks, lots of sweat, tears, and determination….. oh…. and a ton of fun!

Check us out on Instagram @albertaskiteam for more adventures of the AST throughout the year. Our race season is quickly approaching as we are back on snow November 5th! It won’t be long before the athletes are pushing out of the start gate. 

Ciao,

Leslie