USC Ski & Snowboard club team qualifies for national competition

Last Monday and Tuesday, the USC Ski & Snowboard club team competed in the Southwest Regional Championships at Mammoth Mountain and qualified for the National Championships. The national competition, sponsored by the United States Collegiate Ski and Snowboard Association (USCSA), draws student-athletes from more than 175 colleges and universities and will take place from March 6-11.

While USC performed well at the regional qualifiers, regionals presented a more difficult challenge.

“We had competitions at Mt. High and China Peak, but both of those resorts were very small,” said Head Coach and senior Nick Ford. “It’s a different feeling when you’re at Mammoth surrounded by a bunch of people and intimidating terrain, parks and races. All that is a new echelon of high level.”

The Trojans were able to handle the obstacles well, with four athletes advancing to nationals in multiple events. For women’s snowboarding, junior Chloe Barker placed first in slalom, second in giant slalom and third in rail jam. Graduate student Gelo Winings placed first in rail jam, twelfth in giant slalom and fourteenth in slalom for men’s snowboarding. Junior snowboarder Jesse Tennant placed 10th in giant slalom, 17th in slalom and 24th in rail jam. In the men’s skiing rail jam event, Ford placed first, while junior Shane Cole placed third. Cole also finished third in slalom. All athletes who competed in rail jam also qualified for slopestyle at nationals. 

Tennant credits the team’s mindset going into regionals for their recent success. 

“Our motto for regionals this year was ‘nothing’s impossible,’” Tennant said. “We all fed off each other’s energy with that mindset, and we placed extremely well.”

Tennant also highlighted Barker’s performance. Barker went to nationals last year and is making an effort to support the rest of the athletes.

“[Barker] had some amazing energy to give to the team,” Tennant said. “She wasn’t supposed to do rail jam, but because slopestyle [at regionals] was canceled, she was kind of forced into it — which isn’t her discipline. But she went out there and threw some amazing tricks and energy, and fed it to the rest of the team.”

Looking forward, the team will travel to Mammoth again next week for nationals. Last year, though many qualified, only Barker and then-senior Ali Hsueh went to the national championships at Lake Placid. With strong qualifiers and Mammoth as their training ground, the team is feeling optimistic this year.

“It’s a major plus being on our home turf,” Winings said. “Some of the other schools competing with us may have been to Mammoth a couple times, but they don’t necessarily get reps on big jumps, rails and big mountain territory like we’re able to.”

Despite the advantage, Winings also acknowledged that competing at Mammoth doesn’t guarantee success.

“I’d say the biggest challenge is just staying dialed in, showing up for your event and doing what you need to do,” Winings said. “It’s definitely easy to get distracted out there.”

As a senior, this is Ford’s final season as a coach and athlete on the team. He’s looking ahead to his last attempt at a national championship with confidence.

“We have a great chance of not only doing well, but making a name for USC,” Ford said. “Right before I came to USC, I watched old videos of the team from almost 10 years prior. That was the first and only time our team was really doing well at these national competitions. So it’s cool that that life can come back — it was hibernating for a little bit. Now we’re reliving it.”

Ford spoke especially to the people who make up the team.

“We have a good crew, and a lot of people who are younger than me will continue to compete,” Ford said. “Hopefully, if I gave them anything, they’ll continue to kill it.”

With eyes on the prize and a strong record, the Trojans will test their skills for the final time this season on their home mountain next week at Nationals.