Big Alaska Snowboard & Freeski Club
February 2007
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Big Alaska Training
Program
A big thank you to our amazing crew of coaches: Jeremy Puckett, Paul Kelly, Brad Christensen, Kiana Putman, Jake Jaffa, Dan White, Mike Mohl, Rick Malone, Loghan Audett and Billy Homestead as well as course setters and assistant coaches Celeste Prescott and Travis Golay. You can recognize them by their new roasted brown Burton jackets, sponsored by Northern Boarder.
Big Alaska Snow
Series
We’ve completed the Slopestyle, Giant Slalom and Slalom events for the season—if you were the top points getter in your age group in one of these disciplines, you are the Series winner and qualify for Nationals. These unofficial lists are posted on our website – check the “competition” page.
You will not be officially notified by USASA of your invitation until March 12 but should make your travel plans as soon as you can. If you are a Temporary member, you must upgrade to Full USASA membership to be invited to Nationals. If you can’t go to Nationals, please let Series Director Alison Sterley know immediately so the Series second-place finisher can take your place.
There are no wildcards this year, but additional people may be invited to Nationals based on the Nationals Ranking System—check it out on the USASA website: www.usasa.org. Those invitations come directly from USASA, not Big Alaska, and notification will be no earlier than March 12 says USASA Executive Director Jason.
Halfpipe for riders and skiers will be held this Sunday, February 11, and again February 25 at Alyeska. Registration 9:30-11:00 in the bottom of the Sitz, $20. Please come early to register and please bring your registration fees, we need time to generate the start lists and when you turn up late for registration you are delaying the start for all the other competitors.
Boardercross/Skiercross will be Sunday and Monday, Feb 17 & 18, $20 each day. In addition we are working out a deal with Alyeska to have a closed course for practice on Saturday, Feb 16—weather and labor dependent. This training day will be free for Big AK training team members and $10 to all other USASA members. We can’t do this without lots of volunteers to monitor the course—please contact Alison Alison@bigalaskasnow.net or Volunteer Coordinator Angela Moody Angela.Moody@asrcenergy.com to add your name to the list of BX volunteers. Thanks!
Thank you to our judges this year, it’s a difficult task and we appreciate the respect you show them: Head Judge Kari Lamothe, Chad Aurentz, Ken Brown, Fran Byerly and Loghan Audett teamed up for Slopestyle judging.
Fundraiser
Dawn Gray has put together a wonderful fundraiser to help Big AK take our coaches to Nationals with Body Shop at Home. There are 3 easy ways you can earn prizes and help Big AK at the same time: Take orders, host a home party or order directly from Lisa or her website. Please see the attached files for more information or check out the bigalaskasnow.net website for details. Dawn will have packets available at Sunday’s Halfpipe registration or you can contact Body Shop representative Lisa Fletcher, 344-3578 or at TODDNLISA@gci.net.
Volunteers
There is a huge amount of work that goes into running the training program and Series, a lot of it behind the scenes. Many, many people are working very hard to make things run smoothly. Some of the things that we are accomplishing: website and hotline updates, publicity, practice course setting, training program administration and coaching, membership and fee collection, event registration, score input, results, coordinating events and practice space with Hilltop and Alyeska, assessing training program athletes, sponsorships, medals ceremonies, monitoring meeting times and areas, tracking equipment, bibs, radios.
Thanks to all of our volunteers and to all who have volunteered—many hands make light work. If you would like to help, I’ve created a list and Angela Moody is coordinating filling in slots. Contact her at: Angela.Moody@asrcenergy.com
Information
A lot of time and effort has gone into the documents and information that you can find on our website—the answers to most of your questions are posted. Please get into the habit of checking the website and hotline frequently for things like registration times and event fees and schedule changes. With over 150 registered members and 40 training program members, it is important that everybody understand it is an individual’s responsibility to go to the website or call the hotline for information, just as it is the competitor’s responsibility to know the rules in any event.
Fun
There’s nothing more fun than snowboarding. Seriously.