Ski Jumping and Nordic Combined Nationals at UOP and SOHO

Athletes searching for gold medals at the end of this rainbow at the Utah Olympic Park. Photo: Michele Roepke

Summit and Wasatch Counties, Utah. — Annika Belshaw, of Steamboat Springs, Colorado won every event offered to her at last night’s national championships at the Utah Olympic Park (UOP) and Soldier Hollow (SOHO). Chicago’s Olympian Casey Larson and Steamboat’s three-time Olympian Taylor Fletcher won first place respectively in the men’s ski jumping and nordic combined.

In a rare double, double-double, both Belshaw and Larson landed in first place on both the normal hill and large hill ski jumping events. Belshaw went on to top the podium in both ski jumping and nordic combined disciplines for a total of four trips atop the podium. This during a week where any iota of downtime was spent watching the concurrent Olympic Games, wherein women’s nordic combined isn’t even a sport.

The 22nd annual Jindro Meyer Springer Tournee is, for all intents and purposes, a three-week-long affair culminating in this, the biggest gathering in the nation of the USA Nordic participants. Fly Camp starts in early July whereby the nation’s seven highest-ranking teenage boys and their girl counterparts spend two weeks, sans parents, training in Steamboat Springs then repeating in Park City.

Parent’s rejoin for day one of Springer which runs simultaneous to the national championships. Day one is Mentorship Day. National team members mentor the up and comers both out on the ski jumps and inside the Basin Rec. Fieldhouse where physical stats are updated from the previous year.

Park City resident Billy Demong is a gold and silver medal-winning nordic combined Team USA member from the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic Games. Demong said, as the executive director of USA Nordic, “The seamless partnerings among our sponsor Backcounty, Park City Ski and Snowboard, the Utah Olympic Park, Soldier Hollow and USANA are what make this large undertaking such a wonderful event. It was an impressive turnout of families from all over the country. My hat’s off to all the staff, especially Alan Alborn, and the volunteers, who, through their pride and passion, turn what could be an exhausting week into what is a fun way to see just how much growth and commitment this sports community continues to show. We had a great group of athletes who prove that the future of ski jumping and nordic combined in this country is bright.”

The rest of Springer week consists of further training opportunities for the athletes whose ages range from single-digits to into their third decade, on panel discussions, parent mixers, and a fundraiser night event in the form of an open-to-the-public soiree complete with local and international auction items and experiences.

The youngest athlete’s jump results come from skills-based actions like catching a ball tossed at them by their coach in the inrun or performing, on their way down the jump, the ever-popular Heads, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes, Knees, and Toes. For the nordic combined portion of the event, younger participants run an obstacle course/1 km/3 km at the UOP. The U16 and older skiers meet in the neighboring county to roller ski a 5/10 km course which doubles as the cross country ski course in the winter, not unlike the ski jumpers are utilizing a winter simulated course at the jumps venue.

Immediate past president of USA Nordic’s Board of Directors, Rex Bell said, “We’re thrilled to be able to host this exciting tournament once again following a year away due to pandemic protocols. It’s great to have families in town again from all over the country and return to a certain level of normalcy.”

From the jumping hills, including multiple down-ticket competitions, it was on to the roller skiing race as nordic combined combines an athlete’s results of both. A 10 km course awaited the men’s and it was a 5 km for the rest of the nordic combiners at SOHO.

Announcers at both the UOP and SOHO spoke in first-person anecdotes of the death of Jeff Volmerich which had occurred three days prior. Volmerich was the man who spearheaded the programming for the sports of ski jumping and nordic combined in Park City Utah decades earlier. Corby Fisher, another name added to the list of fellow nordic sports community members lost this year was mentioned. All of this taking place at the venue partially named after Chuck Heckert who rounded out the people lost of this world all too soon this year.

Volunteer for the event, Steve Camerotta, father of Olympian nordic combined Park City brothers Bret and Eric, said, “My then elementary-aged sons were simply jumping off snowbanks in the back yard before Volmerich explained to them how that was an official sport and enrolled them in the UOP club.”