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Don*t Be Stupid, Go To School
I recently went skiing with some Far West juniors and was surprised at some
of the questions they asked me during our ski. Nick Sterling, a promising
high school junior from Truckee, asked me my view regarding skiing after
high school and if he should go to University or focus solely on ski racing.
As it turns out there are many young skiers who are struggling with this
issue and don*t know where to turn. Even worse is the fact that there are
coaches persuading young athletes that University is the end to a promising
ski career. I strongly disagree with this and say to anyone who is thinking
of postponing their studying; don*t be stupid, go to school.
The most overwhelming argument in favor of going to school is the fact that
good young skiers don*t always become great World Cup skiers. The average
age of the top thirty skiers in the World is twenty-nine years of age. Many
of those skiers did not even compete on the World Cup level until they were
twenty-five years old. They mainly competed for their clubs while working
or going to school. Many of these athletes worked or studied full time.
There will always be exceptions. Thomas Alsgaard and Per Elofsson are the
only two that I can think of. I can however name many skiers who were top
juniors who are struggling on the World Cup. Martin Koukal, of the Czech
Republic and Axel Tiechman, of Germany were both Junior World Champions in
1998 and 1999 respectively. These athletes struggle to place in the top
thirty in World Cup races and often finish outside the top fifty.
If you look at the Norwegian training system you will find that they put
very little emphasis on the Junior World Championships, yet have dominated
the World Cup for ten years with skiers who did poorly or did not even
compete at the Junior World Championships. Bjorn Daehlie did not place in
the top twenty at Junior Worlds. What the Norwegians have figured out is
how to keep their skiers training well from age twenty to twenty-five and
that is why they dominate. Skiers like Espen Bjervig and Odd-Bjorn
Helmesset, did not emerge as top skiers until they were twenty-five or
older.
During my tenure with the US Ski Team I have seen the administration place
far too much emphasis on juniors often at the expense of talented young
seniors. Most of these juniors fell by the wayside and the focus and money
went to the next crop of junior *superstars*. The only way to get support
from the US Ski Team was to fight your way to the top as a senior as quickly
as possible before they could pull the rug out from underneath you. If you
look at the top skiers currently in the United States you will find that
most of them graduated from college. This may be attributed to the fact
that there was no development program to speak of when most of us where
juniors or young seniors. That is another story altogether.
What I suggest to a high school skier is go to college and train hard while
you are there. The college circuit provides the best level of racing in the
country and brings good European skiers to compete against. Go to a school
that has some good foreign skiers and learn from them. That is what I did
and it helped me more than any other resource available. If you don*t
believe me then ask my former teammate at the University of Utah, Havaard
Solbakken. He won the bronze medal in the World Championship Sprint this
year in Lahti. Another teammate at Utah, Ine Wiegernas has placed in the
top twenty several times during the past two World Cup seasons. The winner
of this year*s Vasaloppet competed for the University of Colorado last
season. Katerina Hanusova, three time NCAA champion at University of
Nevada, Reno was eighteenth at the World Cup in Soldier Hollow. She had the
ninth fastest skate leg in the women*s pursuit while being a full-time
student.
Not all schools have good foreign skiers, but there are many Universities
with good coaches and a great training environment. The most important
thing to focus on is choosing a school that will help you reach your goals.
Combining college and training is difficult but if you don*t have the
dedication to combine both then you probably don*t have the work ethic to be
a top skier anyway. The worst that can happen is you get a college degree
and have a lot of fun doing it. The trick is to stay focused on training
and use those four years to develop a base of great training. My goal at
Utah was to ski well enough to not only make the World Championship and
Olympic Teams, but to go straight on to the US Ski Team when I graduated.
The best part is that a bad race doesn't seem so bad if you have that
University diploma in your back pocket.
I challenge the top US juniors to do this and if you are as good as you
think you are then you will have no problem. You will be NCAA Champion, the
US Team will be asking you to join them and your parents will be more
willing to see you leave college a year or two early in pursuit of that
elusive Olympic medal.
Article written by US Ski Team and Fischer/ Salomon Athlete Force Member
Marcus Nash. Brought to you by SkiPost, your source for cross-county
knowledge. If you have any questions or know someone you would like to
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