IFSA athletes from around the Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah descended on Crested Butte Mountain Resort for the first of 2 junior events to be held here, this time the Rocky Mountain Regional Series event. With a decent start to the year and the resort skiing great, the Crested Butte Mountain Sports Team and local athletes were ready to take on the regional competition. After all was said an done, 14 CBMST athletes competed with a total of 104 athletes, 10 athletes making the finals and 5 taking podium finishes, highlighted by Carson Hildebrandt and Dane DeFrates going 1-2 in the competitive 12-14 skier boys division and Turner Petersen and Jon Clay Patterson taking 3rd and 6th, respectively, in the 15-18 skier men division.
Photo: Carson Hildebrandt and Dagan Schwartz took 1st in their divisions, Dane DeFrates freeheeled his way into 2nd, and Turner Petersen and Ella Haverkampf finished in 3rd in their divisions. Photos and words from CBMST Head Freeride Coach, Will Dujardin.
The 15-18 Men’s Ski Podium: 1st: Grifen Moller, 2: Cam Dudiak, 3rd: Turner Petersen, 4th: Finn Andersson, 5th: Cam Daley.
The action kicked off on the Hawks Nest venue on the North Face. Navin Federico had the CBMST’s lone U12 start with locals Tor Hudson and Jacob Bernholtz in a division of 8 athletes. Navin found himself in 4th going into finals after Tor and Jacob had control issues. Ella Haverkampf threw down a safe, solid run to slot herself into 4th while local shredder, Avery Bernholtz, took a quick tumble and was cut from the division 6 athletes. Dagan Schwartz, at this point the most-experienced freeride snowboarder in CBMST history, was able to rock a solid run in his small division of 2 athletes to take 1st on the day.
In the 34-athlete 12-14 boys ski division, CBMST was represented by a few freeheelers, Dane DeFrates, Luke Shull, and Dylan Alagna, alongside the alpiners Jesse Gerber, Nate Ball, Jackson Warner, and Carson Hildebrandt. Luke and Dylan both had strong runs but were unfortunately self-eliminated after falls. Jesse Gerber and Nate Ball found themselves just on the wrong side of the cut in 22nd and 19th, respectively, out of 34, after fun runs in their first competition on their home mountain. Jackson Warner was able to execute his airs and arc some turns to finish in 16th and qualify for finals on Headwall. The top 3 runs of the day belonged to Crested Butte locals, Dane DeFrates and Carson Hildebrandt represented the CBMST in first and third sandwiching the local independent shredder, Brooks Hudson, in second, all separated by just 1.5 points for the finals on Headwall.
All 4 CBMST athletes in the 15-18 ski men division qualified for finals in a field of 38. Matthew Harper-Johnston and Conrad Truettner executed well to take 12th and 11th, respectively, while Jon Clay Patterson had a top run slightly marred by a hand drag control issue to finish in 9th. Turner Petersen was on fire, nailing his airs and staying fluid to find himself in 1st place going into the finals.
The 12-14 Ski Boys podium: 1st: Carson Hildebrandt, 2nd: Dane DeFrates, 3rd: Tanner Moller, 4th Liam Mattison (not pictured), 5th: Holden Bradford.
Headwall was a beautiful sight on Sunday with Angle Gully open to 15-18 year old athletes. CBMST athletes were hungry for the podium. Navin Federico and Ella Haverkampf continued their solid skiing to both move up into 3rd place from 4th. Dagan Schwartz had the top runs both days amongst ALL snowboard athletes in both divisions to take 1st in his proper 12-14 boys snowboard category.
The action continued into the bigger 12-14 skier category with Jackson Warner rocking a good line to maintain into 13th place. Dane, Brooks, and Carson were ready for a podium battle with Carson opening up the top 3 action with a super strong run over, around, and through the rocks in the Upper Triangle of Headwall down onto the Handrail next to Powder 8 gully. After a remarkable 3rd place finish at the Snowbird National a few weeks ago, Brooks Hudson was ready to send but unfortunately couldn’t stick his effort off of Box Rock, being one of only a handful of athletes to attempt the move. Dane DeFrates continued to drop the knee and crush his line, but was barely over taken by Carson, the boys finishing separated by .11 of a point after 2 days of amazing skiing. Tanner Moller from Team Summit finished in 3rd with Liam Mattison of Ski Club Vail in 4th, and another Team Summit shredder, Holden Bradford, in 5th.
The older athletes made some impressive moves in and out of Angle Gully. Unfortunately, Conrad Truettner and Matthew Harper-Johnston had control issues that knocked them down into 17th and 15th, respectively. Jon Clay Patterson had a little work to do and laid down the 2nd best run of the day with smooth skiing and a good exit through Angle to move up to 6th. Turner Petersen had the top dogs of the region gunning for him and laid down a rock solid run similar to Jon Clay’s to stay on the podium in 3rd place. He was joined by Telluride’s Cam Daley in 5th, Ski Club Vail’s Finn Andersson in 4th, and a Team Summit combo with Cam Dudiak in 2nd and sick skiing from Grifen Moller in 1st. On the ladies’ side of things Morgan Westfall and Abby Ward of Winter Park took 1st and 2nd, respectively, with Abbi Edgerly of Team Summit in 3rd in a division of 9.
Next up for the CBMST is the Regional-National combination at Taos Ski Valley, New Mexico, next week, over winter break. Full competition results are available on the IFSA Facebook page.
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