Mission Ridge’s Brooke Wales competes at Aspen, Colo., in November. Last season, she made junior worlds.
Editor’s note: These are the first two team profiles. Others will run each week in the Sunday Sports section.
Notable ski racing accomplishments: Qualified for the Western Region Junior Olympics and the Canadian J1 Nationals; raced in Western Region Elite Spring Series.
Favorite run at Mission Ridge: Anything off Windy Ridge.
Words of wisdom for young skiers: Do what makes you happy. And if that happens to be skiing, then rip it.
Notable ski racing accomplishments: 2010 World Junior Championships athlete; ten Top 15 finishes in NorAm races (including an 8th in Super G at NorAm Finals); and 1st and 2nd place finishes in Western Region Elite Spring Series at Mission Ridge.
Favorite run at Mission Ridge: Skookum!
Words of wisdom for young skiers: Listen to your coaches and put in the time and effort on and off the hill.
Favorite activity off the slopes: Playing games outside such as Ultimate Frisbee and reading in the sunshine.
On my iPod: I unfortunately don’t own one right now, but if I did, it would have lots of country music including Keith Urban, The Band Perry, and Lady Antebellum.
Favorite food: Ice cream. (I’ve recently been favoring Moose Tracks)
WENATCHEE — When Ryan Shorter took over the Mission Ridge Ski Team a few years ago, the program could be defined as such: A box of records and no money.
It was a sharp fall for a ski team that once knew national fame.
Now, five years later, the program has an annual budget of about $350,000, well-respected coaches gracing the slopes, and top athletes coming to Wenatchee to ski — two team members made the world junior championships last season.
More importantly, the program is growing, from about 45 members mid-decade to 70 today.
Although the 31-year-old Shorter, a former ski racer himself, is hesitant to claim credit, he has received accolades from those in the ski community for his vision, focus, organizational skills, hard work and commitment to the sport and his team.
“In a short amount of time, Ryan has taken the Mission Ridge Ski Team program to a level of national recognition for athlete development and results,” said Mark Milliette, Mission Ridge Ski & Board Resort general manager. “He has recruited some of the best coaches in the Northwest, including talent from the U.S. Ski Team. MRST now has athletes on the World Junior podium, competing in the FIS World Cup and on the U.S. Ski Team. There are a number of MRST athletes with national and regional podium results.
“Besides the athlete results ... MRST has established itself as one of the new economic engines for Mission Ridge and the Wenatchee Valley by bringing hundreds of athletes, coaches and families,” Milliette said.
We sat down with Shorter, a Petoskey, Mich., native, to ask him some questions about this ski season and the direction of the program. Here is what he had to say:
1. When did the Ridge team start the season? Where?
We did a two-week prep camp getting ready for the season at Vail, Colo., during the last two weeks of November. During the camp, we raced two FIS giant slalom races. Then we went to Jackson Hole, Wyo., in early December. That was just the eight boys there, two slaloms and two giant slalom FIS races. Every one of our guys scored in one event and lowered their world rankings. About the same time, we had skiers at Lake Louise for the Nor-Ams. They ran downhills after the World Cup. Brooke Wales had a couple top 10 downhill finishes. And Clare Wise and Tara Hines had a couple top 30s in downhills.
2. What races will you be holding this season at Mission Ridge?
We start off with the Apple Invite on Jan. 22-23 for 7- to 12-year-olds from around the Northwest. Then Feb. 4-5-6 is our Hampton Cup. That’s for those 13 and up and attracts skiers from Washington, Idaho and Oregon. From April 1-3 is the Northwest Cup finals, which is for those 13 and up. It attracts the best kids in the Northwest. And then the Spring Series starts the 7th of April and goes through the 12th of April. That’ll be people from around the world, but mainly from the United States and Canada. It’ll be big again.
3. You had the Spring Series this past April for the first time in many, many years. Why did you go after the Spring Series again?
It’s nice for the kids to have this on their own turf, particularly ones who are trying to get a college scholarship or are trying to make the national team. For example, Brooke Wales scored her best results of the season at this event last year. It’s also good for the community, too, in terms of the dollars it brings into the local economy. Last year, we estimated it pumped about $350,000 into the local economy. And finally, it’s also a money-maker for us. We have three sources of income — tuition, fundraising events and hosting races.
4. How else does Wenatchee benefit from this race series?
You get an incredible amount of press from people (top ski racers) who know ski areas and ski all around the country. When they come here, they recognize what a great place it is to ski and what a great place it is to live. In talking to (racers last spring), they said they felt people really like skiers here. Most areas don’t give such a warm reception to skiers like we do here.
5. How many members of the ski team this year, top to bottom? And how many of those are from NCW?
We have about 70 in all this season. That includes 12 who are FIS and 25 in the Ski Star program (6 to 12-year-olds). We also started a freestyle team and have four in that. We’re quite a bit larger. When I first started, we were probably at 45ish. Almost all are from North Central Washington.
6. Who have been some of the top skiers so far this season?
Cai Yamamoto, Kyle Coxton, Alec Jones, Clayton Connor, Clare Wise, Tara Hines and Brooke Wales. They’ve all done quite well this year already. My other skiers have done well, but those ones have done the best. I have a lot of depth now. It’s actually quite impressive. It’s year five and more kids are involved, and really committed kids who’ve put a lot of time into it. It certainly makes a difference.
Cai Yamamoto for sure. He’s always been good so that’s not a shock. But his ranking coming out of last year was 54th, and at Jackson he finished fifth in his first run and started way back (54th). So that’s a huge move. I certainly expected him to move up. I didn’t exepct him to get fifth. He’s not a very big kid. But certainly getting older helps. He works really hard and did really well at fall camp.
You could look at a program’s registration numbers but being a big team doesn’t mean you’re a successful team. You like to look at it from
a results-per-capita standpoint. How we do on the national scale divided by how big we are? Last season, we had two skiers (Colby Granstrom and Brooke Wales) in the world junior championships. Only two others teams in the country — Squaw Valley and Vail — did that, and they’re very large teams with each more than 500 kids. So I measure it by our ability to have kids excelling at the national and world levels and not having to have 500 kids to do that.
We focus on staff and having the best staff we can possibly have. When you look at our staff bios, it’s pretty clear where our success comes from. In terms of full-time staff, we have five — Greg Needell, Alex (my wife), Lou Otto, Claudia Yamamoto and myself. We also have weekend coaches, including kids who have graduated and come back to coach for us. For example, Julie Janisch, whose last year was 2009, she goes to the University of Washington and comes back every weekend to coach. People want to live here. So it’s easy to recruit staff.
Well, we started at sea level. It’d been a rough decade for the club and I know they had some down times before I got here. Luckily, they had a board that persevered. Now, it’s like we’re on Everest. Fundraising is easier, more professional and we have something people can get behind. They can see the results and see that their money is working. This year our auction was up 20 percent from last year, and last year was a record year. Corporate support is slmost double this year.
11. If you were to point to one or two things that have been the biggest factors in the success, what would they be?
Staff is key. You can’t do anything without quality people, without surrounding yourself with quality people. Even in the down times, they had those (committed) people. There was a core group of board members and volunteers. But now there is a direction.
Our relationsilp with Mission Ridge is another key. They do an incredible amount of work for us. And their facilites are excellent for us and for our racing needs.
12. How important is it for Mission Ridge and even Wenatchee to have a successful ski team here?
We can take a talented athlete and put them on a national stage because the (ski team) program is so strong. We have an advantage over 99 percent of other areas in the nation. There are certainly good clubs out there but few can do what we do. We focus on the individual athlete and show them the value of work and of work ethic.
Athletics are incredibly important for kids. It gives them something to do. We sometimes forget what being an athlete means to a kid and the things and lessons we can provide them. (Skiing on the team) is a healthy lifestyle. You have to train right, eat right and it’s year round. It’s a full-time managed thing.
What they learn outside ski racing is extremely important. As humans, we enjoy getting better at things. Each of my ski racing friends from college graduated and today have jobs in this down economic time.
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