Woodstock Ski Runners

IMMEDIATE RELEASE

WOODSTOCK SKI RUNNERS RECEIVES GRANT FROM KILLINGTON

World Cup committee provides support for Friday Learn-to-Ski Program

South Pomfret, VT (April 9, 2018) Woodstock Ski Runners has been awarded a $25,000 grant by the Killington World Cup Committee (KWCC) to support and enhance our popular Friday Learn-to-Ski Program. 

This generous grant will allow Woodstock Ski Runners to commit to our low $85 Friday Program fee with no increases for five years. Now in its 63rd year, the Friday Program provides low-cost ski instruction to the children of Vermont. This season, 323 children from 16 Vermont schools learned to ski from 80 devoted volunteer instructors.

“The Friday Program is our history,” said Steve Hambsch, President of Woodstock Ski Runners. “We offer fun ski instruction in a safe and welcoming environment. This generous grant from Killington allows us to keep the cost very affordable, and the scholarship will motivate the kids to try racing.”

A new scholarship will also be created for the Friday Program skier most ready to go racing. One Friday participant will be selected each year for the next five years and awarded the KWCC Scholarship to enter our alpine racing program the following season. 

Funds from the KWCC grant will also be applied to our scholarship fund, allowing Ski Runners to continue our mission of ensuring every child that wants to learn to ski has an opportunity to do so. In 2018, Ski Runners provided 37 scholarships, 28 of which included aid for ski equipment.

The entire amount of $25,000 was featured in Ski Runners Annual Appeal fundraising drive as a matching funds incentive, and we are happy to announce that a friend of Woodstock Ski Runners has matched the entire $25,000 grant with a gift of another $25,000. The Woodstock Ski Runners Board of Directors, our members, and our athletes are extremely grateful for the grant from the KWCC and the generous additional gift it inspired.

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About Woodstock Ski Runners

Founded in 1932, Woodstock Ski Runners is one of the oldest ski club in the eastern United States. Today, Woodstock Ski Runners offers both Alpine and Nordic programs for kids ages 6-19. The Alpine and Friday Programs train at the Suicide Six Ski Area while our Nordic Programs train nearby at the beautiful Woodstock Nordic Center.  For more information about Woodstock Ski Runners, please visit www.skirunners.org

About the Killington World Cup Committee

The “Killington World Cup Committee” (KWCC) was created to support the Women's World Cup at Killington and to benefit local and regional youth development programs. The KWCC will work through Killington Resort in various ways including providing support for athlete housing and VIP events. For more information about the KWCC, please visit https://www.killingtonmountainschool.org/kwcc

Gould Academy Adds T-bar to Training Venue

Gould Academy Adds T-bar to Training Venue

Gould Academy continues to provide some of the best alpine training in the East, and with the addition of a new $1.1 million T-bar on their training venue, this top-notch program just got stronger.

The new lift will service the Monday Mourning training and race slope at Sunday River. The venue provides excellent early-season training on the most dependable snow in the East. It also allows for full-length Slalom and Giant Slalom runs with a four-minute turnaround.

Former U.S. Ski team coach Parker Gray recently joined Kurt Simard and Rogan Connell in a leadership position on the Gould coaching staff. A Gould grad who served on the Men’s Alpine staff for three years and coached in the 2018 Olympics, Gray now leads Gould’s post-graduate Gap Year program, a small program for highly competitive skiers who are college-accepted high school graduates (male and female) and focused on earning spots on college programs and/or the US Ski Team (Simard and Connell are both former Division I collegiate coaches).

Athletes can get an early start in the Gould program as well. Based at the Gould campus only six miles from Sunday River, the Winter Term program for 7th and 8th graders provides a strong academic component to alpine training six days a week from November to March.

“This is incredibly exciting,” says On Snow Program Director Kurt Simard. “Gould is unique in that we have all the pieces here for student-athletes to reach their goals.”

Release courtesy of Gould Academy.

KWCC Gives Back 4241 Magazine

Killington World Cup Committee Gives Back to the Ski Community

By Peggy Shinn

This winter, the upper section of Pico’s B Slope is significantly wider, giving kids in Pico’s race program more training space. And the Woodstock Ski Runners aim to keep their Friday ski program affordable; it will remain at $85 for the next five years. The club is also offering a scholarship for one child who would like to join the club’s ski racing program. 

It’s not resort funds or club dues that are paying for these improvements, and similar ones at 14 other ski and outdoor programs in the East. Monies are coming from the Killington World Cup Committee (KWCC).

The KWCC was the idea of Phill Gross. A long-time advocate of youth and adaptive sports — and a long-time Killington skier — Gross saw the crowd at the first Killington World Cup in 2017 and wondered if the popularity of the event, and the great venue, could provide an opportunity to give back to the ski community. The VIP access tickets had sold so quickly that Gross thought extra money could be raised if these tickets were offered as VIP packages. This additional money could provide funding to local ski programs in the East. It’s a model Gross had seen used successfully at PGA Tour golf tournaments.

“My idea was if we could put these VIP packages together and raise a little bit of money, then we could end up having the World Cup leave a positive impact on the ski community throughout the East,” said Gross, a co-founder and managing director of Adage Capital Management in Boston. He is also a U.S. Ski & Snowboard trustee, and he serves on the boards of several youth and adaptive sports organizations.

The KWCC offers three levels of World Cup premium VIP packages, ranging in price from $5,000 to $50,000. Each package includes tickets to the VIP tent at the base of Superstar, the World Cup slalom and giant slalom race trail, and tickets to the Peak Gala, which honored the 1968 Olympic alpine team last year, among other benefits. 

Killington Resort also donates the proceeds from reserved grandstand seats to the KWCC.

With these funds, the KWCC pays the athlete hospitality fees — to give back to the resort. The organization then accepts grants requests from organizations in the East to either improve access to outdoor sports or to improve program infrastructure.

“We go to a lot of places where we just show up and have the race and we depart, and truthfully the only lasting thing for the community is the fact that they got to experience a World Cup race,” said Mike Day, Mikaela Shiffrin’s coach. “The Killington World Cup Committee is going well beyond that now to make sure that the impact is felt by many regional programs. It’s really special to have a group of people that want to give more in legacy to the region rather than just ski race.”

In March 2018, the KWCC awarded 16 grants ranging from $3,000 to $25,000. The grants went as far south as North Carolina (the Appalachian Ski Education Foundation received funding for infrastructure improvements) and as far north as Maine (the Winterkids Education Foundation was given a grant to expand its nordic program in Portland and to start programs in other communities). 

“We gave grants where we felt like we could make an impact,” said Lynn Boynton, KWCC director.

In total, the KWCC gave away $207,000 last year and favored grants with matching components. 

“You add all that up, and it’s a total impact of $350,000 to the ski racing community,” said Gross.

For the 2018 Killington World Cup, the KWCC will honor the 1980 Olympic alpine team, which trained at Killington before heading to Lake Placid. Tickets to the Peak Gala on Friday night are part of the VIP packages and are only available through the KWCC website. Packages are available starting in September at www.kwccgivesback.org. 

“If the Killington World Cup continues in 2019,” said Gross, “we expect the KWCC to continue to make grants and have the same ticket opportunities.”

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