YSL, at the end of January, kicked off its race season at Winter Park with the Head Rebels YSL Kombi on Lower Hughes. The Kombi is a great event to kick off the competition season as it challenges athletes with sections of both GS and SL turns teaching them turn shape, looking ahead and understanding rhythm changes. Overall our skiing as a group was improved over last years event and the results showed that with our U12 Boys sweeping the podium on both races, girls took five podium spots including wins by Annika Tollund and Olivia McGinn and we had several EMSC YSL athletes land in the Top 10 across the ages. Congrats also to all our 1st time racers!!!
YSL has now switched over to Giant Slalom. In training we have been working to build solid movement patterns in all 3 phases of the turn and using transition brushes to teach athletes timing and tactically the line they should be on to be Fast! At our 2/14 Valentine’s LOC we saw not only Love for GS but also Love for increased pace by all athletes attending. These added sessions on Wednesday nights are paying dividends in Fundamentals, Tactics and Pace.
I would like to highlight 2 coaches Lillian Groenendaal and Isla Jones who embody a Legacy of Fun and Learning that was originally produced by a former coach Kathy Collier. Kathy created a learning environment that was so Fun the kids did not even know they were learning. She used multiple props, costumes and themes to create a training day no athlete wanted to miss. Highlights of this include her Santa suit, lights and reindeer antlers for the athletes, use of aprons, trays, stuffies and cookies to build a solid stance and the infamous Gumby suit she wore during Slush Cup. As athletes, Lillian and Isla got to experience the magic of Kathy while Isla admitted she was disappointed to not be in her group. In the big picture these former athletes turned YSL coaches were so profoundly affected by the “Kathy Effect” that they wanted to recreate the magic for future YSL athletes. Thanks to both of you for keeping the Kathy Collier Magic alive and well!!!
Cheers,
Eric Vogel
EMSC YSL Director
Rocky Division YSL Chairman
eric@lertprograms
720-308-1427
Equipment Update: Now that we have started our season it is important to get into the habit of keeping our skis in consistently good shape to maximize the athletes ability to learn and train new skills. This can be accomplished in a variety of ways:
Next is to go shopping and below are some good places to start:
- Maintenance of the shop tune can be done at home in your garage or basement with some highly discounted tuning equipment from Swix/Toko, a wireless speaker, a few good beverages and a little elbow grease.
Also for Swix Orders follow the below:
Log in/Create account: https://teamswix.com/club/?v=Register
Code: club-eldo-58EbUXkO
Questions?? Reach out to myself or your head coaches.
