The high school skiing championships won’t go virtual in 2021. Qualifying will be more difficult, though.
After receiving feedback from coaches and schools around the state, the Colorado High School Activities Association solidified dates and venues for the 2021 state skiing championships.
The alpine championships, with boys and girls to compete in slalom and giant slalom, will be held March 11-12 at Loveland Ski Area.
“We are very excited to host our state ski championships in March, and we extremely thankful for the coaches, the administrators for their hard work and to the race facilities for allowing our high school students to participate this year,” CHSAA assistant commissioner Bethany Brookens said in a statement on CHSAANow.com.
State skiing schedules were released earlier in the week after agreements were made with host mountains. It was more complicated to build a schedule for the 2021 season because of the COVID-19 pandemic and strict public health orders.
With that in mind, the state championships will be limited to 75 participants per gender in each race. Last season, 103 boys and girls competed in giant slalom, while 101 boys raced slalom along with 91 girls. Durango freshman Toby Scarpella won the giant slalom and placed third in slalom.
CHSAA had considered doing a virtual state championship with athletes competing at different mountains. Because of all the variables with course conditions on different slopes, the idea did not gain traction.
“It’s a really good way of thinking outside the box,” Durango High School alpine coach Leah LeSage said. “It would be a challenge for us, specifically, because we don’t have the infrastructure other teams and ski areas do. We don’t own our own timing equipment. For us to run a state meet on our own would be challenging.”
Durango is on the schedule for three races before the state championships. The Demons will start Feb. 3 at Ski Cooper in Leadville, where there will be a 100-athlete limit. The next event is slated for Feb. 18, again at Ski Cooper. Then, DHS will travel Feb. 26 to Aspen. There is a chance Durango could add one more event to its schedule if an opportunity arises.
DHS will not have a Nordic team in 2021. This year’s Nordic championships will be held March 6 at the Gold Run Nordic Center in Breckenridge. Those events also will be limited to 75 athletes per race.
jlivingston@durangoherald.com
