Women's Alpine: Chilean Andes to European Glaciers

PARK CITY, UT (Oct. 15) - It's been a busy late summer for the women's U.S. Alpine Ski Team. Following a speed camp in Portillo, Chile the focus moved a few Andean valleys over for a technical camp in Valle Nevado. The name of the game: repetition.

"We eat, ski, sleep, eat, ski, hydrate, sleep, then do it again the next day," said Resi Stiegler (Jackson Hole, WY). "We had an awesome camp. The main focus was to get lots of runs under our belt, test out our endurance and just ski. No matter how hard you work all summer strengthening, there is nothing like skiing."

Joining Stiegler for the Valle Nevado camp was Julia Mancuso (Olympic Valley, CA), who was also in Portillo for the speed camp, Sarah Schleper (Vail, CO), Megan McJames (Park City, UT), Hailey Duke (Boise, ID), Kaylin Richardson (Edina, MN), Jessica Kelley (Starksboro, VT), Sterling Grant (Amery, WI) and Laurenne Ross (Klamath Falls, OR).

"Every year it seems like we say the Chile camps are the best they've ever been, but this one was exceptionally good," said women's Technical Head Coach Trevor Wagner. "Valle Nevado is such a perfect venue for us because we're able to get in so much skiing, there are seven different slopes for us to train giant slalom and at least five for us to train slalom. All of them challenge the girls in different ways, which is good for keeping them thinking."

Both technical and speed Teams now move to Europe for glacier training with the speed women setting up shop in Pitztal, Austria while the tech group heads to Saas Fee, Switzerland. Members of both groups, including two-time World Champion Lindsey Vonn (Vail, CO) and Mancuso will converge on the Rettenbach Glacier in Soelden, Austria mid month for last minute training prior to the World Cup opener on Oct. 24.

"I'm really excited to get things going in Austria," said Vonn, while attending the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association's New England Ball in Boston, MA. "The time we have on snow this summer is so critical and everything is feeling really good right now, but you never know where you really are until we start racing."

Following the Portillo speed camp, Vonn hit the jet-set tour the last few weeks of Sept. attending the Emmy Awards in Los Angeles followed by filming television commercial for sponsors Under Armour and Proctor and Gamble. She also slotted in an appearance at the NBC's TODAY show, signed autographs for fans and then headed to Boston for the Ball. Then it was off to Chicago to throw out the first pitch at Wrigley Field and up to Minnesota for an autograph session in Minneapolis with her home mountain of Vail, CO.

Despite the schedule, she was able to keep her daily workouts running and says she's all set to get things rolling in Europe.

"Everyone is in great shape going into our final on-snow training before Soelden and Levi [Finland]," added Wagner. "We still have some more time to put in and the conditions are looking pretty good for training right now at Saas Fee, hopefully the speed Team has similar conditions at Pitztal."

Following Soelden and Levi, the U.S. Ski Team will return to the U.S. for training in Colorado prior to the annual Aspen Winternational set for Thanksgiving weekend in Aspen, CO. It is the only women's World Cup stop in the U.S. prior to the 2010 Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver.