West Yellowstone, Montana

Becca the Wrecka Rorabaugh showing off our new uniforms.

We have spent the past week training, testing skis, and racing in West Yellowstone, Montana. There was not enough snow for skiing on the trails in town, but the skiing on the logging roads (at around 8,000ft) was really nice…not to mention the sunshine!

Our coaches have done an amazing job and an unbelievable amount of work getting things ready for us. Our head coach Erik Flora skied with each of the athletes to help us test our skate skis, which by the end of the day added up to 53k on a 400m stretch of snow...and he's still recovering from his surgery. Our wax tech, Casey “duck dog” Fagerquist spent 110 hrs in the wax room the week before we left for this trip, he flew to Seattle early in order to drive our cargo van full of skis to us in Montana, and has also been busy non-stop in the ski and wax preparations. These guys sacrifice just about everything (including sleep) so that we can race as fast as possible. Brent Knight "the BK Broiler" had some impressive results this weekend.
Congrats to James Southam on becoming a father last week and for finishing in the top 5 both days.

They West Yellowstone ski community was able to put together some great races for us, despite the lack of snow. APU had a solid showing in a very deep field. Kate Arduser put it well when she said something like, “if you were to pick three skiers from the top thirty on the results list, they would likely be the podium finishers in most other races around the country”. Duser and Becca the Wrecka

The Supertours in Bozeman, Montana and Soldier Hollow, Utah have been canceled due to lack of snow so we have a major change in plans and will be making the 14 hr drive to race in Silver Star, B.C. instead. Skiers definitely must learn to be flexible in this day and age. I have heard great things about Silver Star and I can't wait to check it out and get back into sprint racing! Our #1 Anders Haugen