Colette Poirier, JP Race Parents Association President

Thanks again to all the parents who have volunteered, some again and again, to help out with the various races that we have run this year. We really could not have hosted the races without the help of everybody. Special thanks to Chad Lindberg, and Tedd Rinaldi who braved cold temperatures and a relentless and bitterly cold Jiminy Peak wind at the start of Whirlaway for the race this weekend, and to the gatekeepers who volunteered to stand on the side of the steep icy trail throughout the day. That’s real dedication. And a big thank you to Jeff and Liz Urdang, Rick and Barbara Lerner, and Colette Poirier for their relentless efforts in organizing the volunteer squad, Thank you all.

Looking forward to another exciting weekend. It will be nice to have everybody back at Jiminy on Saturday and Sunday, as we have been scattered all over the place the past few weeks.

The weekend kicks off early, on Friday, for many of us, as Jiminy will be hosting the Williams NCAA Carnival. Some of the top skiers in the country, from national powerhouses like UVM, Dartmouth, UNH, Middlebury and Williams College will be there. Some of the racers have national team and World Cup experience. It will be an amazing two days. Please sure to swing by to check it out. Thanks to the parents and athletes who volunteered to gate keep at this event.

With the carnival going on this weekend, and since its a holiday weekend, it will be a busy day and hill space will be at a premium. Tentative plans for training are as follows:

Interclub: SL training on Panorama both days. Meet at the Canteen area at 9:30 sharp both days.

J1-2′s; Train SL on Ace in the morning on Saturday, starting at 9:30, and in the afternoon, most likely free ski and watch the Williams Carnival racers with the coaches. This will be a really good opportunity to watch some really talented skiers and learn first hand what makes them so good. Sunday will be a GS training day, most likely on Exhibitiion.

J3-4-5′s: Free ski, drills and watch the carnival athletes in the morning on Saturday, followed by SL on Ace in the afternoon. The plan for Sunday is to get in some GS gate training, most likely on the upper portion of Ace, as the lower fencing has been moved to Whirlaway for the race.

Saturday night is the annual Awards Banquet, which has been moved to the Stephentown Firehall this year. Word has it that the banquet committee, headed up by Kathy Slyer has lined up a great night of food, music and festivities.

See you all soon.

Bruce

Thank you to all of the parent volunteers, Race Crew, and coaches, and Sherrie and Gary Bradway for all of your help this weekend in running a tremendous race. We could not have put on such a successful race without the help of everyone who worked so hard and gave of their time so generously.

Conditions were ideal for a race, and the race went off (mostly) without a hitch. We received many, many compliments from parents, athletes and coaches for running such a smooth race.

Congratulations to the following J3 athletes for qualifying for the next level of events:

Marriott Eastern Regional J3 Championships (formerly known as the JO’)s at Sugarloaf: Andrew Braverman, Bryce Schuler

J3 Eastern Regional’s at Killington: Kristin Von Ohlsen, Trent Pfeiffer

Piche Invitational at Gunstock: Genevieve Poirier

Congratulations to all of our qualifiers and to everybody for working so hard and making it such a pleasure to coach at Jiminy again this year.

Finally, please note that we still need gatekeepers for the Williams Carnival this Friday and Saturday. Williams will be donating $500 to our Parents Association in exchange for us supplying gate keepers to this event. It is a great opportunity to watch some of the most elite ski racers in the world compete on our home hill, while generating some revenue that will directly benefit our kids.

Please contact Colette if you are interesting in volunteering.

Thank you

Bruce

We have received only 4 donations so far, and would really like our 2nd year to be as great as the 1st year was. We need your help.

Some donation suggestions:

• A gift certificate to your favorite restaurant
• Ski equipment and clothes: hats, gloves, balaclavas
• Tickets to a sporting event or a show in New York City
• Jewelry, Art and Pottery
• Gift Baskets : wine, chocolates, cheese, or something of your own specialty
• Sports equipment
• Do you have a talent? (ski coaching, web site design, knitting, cooking dinner for eight)

If you have a relationship with anybody at Artech, Potter Brothers, Ski Haus or Steiner Sports (ok, we know who you are) – please contact them to ask for a donation.

The banquet is only 2 weeks away. Please email Analisa Allen and Sandra Vonniessen-Applebee at jiminypeakraceteam@gmail.com with your name and donation information so we can have them posted on the website and recognize the people and the businesses that have generously made donations. Feel free to contact us with any questions. Thanks in advance for supporting your race team association.

1st  is this Sunday- please contact Jeff Urdang (jeff at jeffurdang.com)

2nd Williams Carnival- we ONLY need gate keepers for 17th and 18th- Interclub, here is your chance to dig in, we receive $500 from Williams for this event and get to watch amazing skiing at the same time- if you live locally, the 17th is SLALOM and a Friday- please help!  contact Colette (lettepo@hotmail.com)

Lastly, please RSVP to Kathy re Banquet (mksskyhighadventures@verizon.net), we are building an incredible auction, pizza is coming from Williamstown and donated by the Greenwalds- thank you! Everyone know the Cunningham’s and what comes from Chatham?   Live music, trophies, give aways and more!- will be best ever!!!!

What a great weekend of ski racing and football.
Attached, and hot off the press, is the list of qualifiers to the Post Season.

Please note that the athletes listed below have earned spots in the post season championships. Complete lists of the qualifications are linked here: boys girls. Congratulations to everybody who qualified, but also to everybody else who worked so hard all year. You really are an amazing group of young people and we coaches are so fortunate to be apart of your lives. Thank you for all you do for us.

Piche Invitational (my favorite event in the world):

Kitt Urdang

Please note , that in the event that any racers are unable or do not want to go to Championships, their spots will be filled with the next racers on the list, so some of our racers who have not yet qualified, may still be chosen to attend championships, as well as openings for the J3 and J4′s to the Piche Invitational Championships which have not yet been announced .

PLEASE BE SURE THAT EVERYBODY WHO HAS BEEN SELECTED TO TRI-STATE CHAMPIONSHIPS EMAIL THEIR INTENTION TO GO TO CHRIS GAGNE AT THE FOLLWING EMAIL ADDRESS:

maplel@aol.com

ALSO, PLEASE BE SURE TO GO THE HOMEPAGE OF THE TRI-STATE ALPINE SKI RACING WEBSITE TODAY TO REGISTER FOR THE RACES AND CHAMPIONSHIP BANQUETS.
Thank you.

Bruce Diamond
Jiminy Peak Race Team Supervisor and Head Coach

Rick said the 2nd run came out particularly well due to the beautiful sunshine!

http://jpsrt.clickshare.com/

Jiminy J345 Race Photos are also online at same site from 1/29

This is an amazing gift- please enjoy!

NEW LOCATION!!!!!!
Stephentown Fire House, 35 Grange Hall Rd, Stephentown, NY
All Racers and their Families are invited!

Bring your checkbooks or cash, because
The FABULOUS Parents’ Association Auction is back!
A partial list of auction items will be available soon.
To donate, please contact
jiminypeakraceteam@gmail.com

Pizza and soda will be provided by the Parents’ Association.
Interclub and J5 families: please bring an appetizer
J1-J4 families: please bring a dessert

Please RSVP to Kathy Slyer at mksskyhighadventures@verizon.net by Wed., February 15.
Don’t forget to complete the Scholar Athlete Forms found on our website(quick links to right) if your child is in 6th grade or above!
Jiminy Peak banquet

Here we go looking forward to Week Eight already. We had a fantastic week of training and racing at Berkshire East and Bousquet, where our kids continued to race hard and have a lot of fun, while garnering numerous podium spots. It been so much fun to watch the improvement and enthusiasm across the board. It seems that every week there are a several racers whose hard work pays off as they finally have a breakthrough and take their skiing to new levels. We coachers constantly marvel at how wonderful it is to see that happen time and time again. The key is to keep trying and never, ever give up. Sooner or later the hard work will pay off with big rewards.

The fun continues this weekend, as we host the Tri-State Western Mass 3-4-5 Qualifier on Sunday. This is the first of three Tri-State races that we will be hosting, as we will also host the Tristate 1-2′s race on Superbowl Sunday February 5 and the J3 Tri-State Championships on Sunday, February12. Please keep in mind that it takes a lot of people to successfully pull off a race, we can only run these events through the efforts of all of the parents serving as volunteers. Like most programs, ours has a mandatory volunteer policy, that requires each parent to volunteer to work at least one race per year. Please be sure that each one of you fulfills this obligation.

Training plans for Week Eight are as follows:

Interclub: Saturday, GS on Ace, providing that there is enough snow and fencing, otherwise SL on Ace
Sunday, Brushes in the morning on Grand Slam, free skiing in afternoon

TS J3-4-5 Saturday, we will try to load early at 8:00 to ski directed free runs on Whirlaway in the am and GS training on Exhibition to test out the timing and prepare on the hill for the Western Mass qualifier the next day
Sunday, Western Mass qualifier race
TS J1-2 Wachusetts GS on Saturday
SL training on Ace on Sunday

That’s it for now. See you all soon.
Bruce