The top freestyle Park and Snowboard riders from the Purgatory Freestyle Team ventured to Powderhorn for last weekend’s the USASA Slopestyle and Rail Jam competitions with great success.
USASA is the sanctioning body for the Southwest Series which gives athletes an opportunity to earn points towards Nationals at Copper Mountain in April and the Purgatory Freestyle park and snowboard teams won 31 medals over the two-day event.
“This puts a number of athletes in really good shape to qualify for USASA Nationals at Copper Mountain in April,” Purgatory Park team head coach Adam Hirshberg said in a news release. “They have really stepped it up this year.”
The Park team was led by Ian Osby, who swept all four events on his way to earning four gold medals. Max Wilson won gold for his win in slopestyle while Emmett Stottlemyer earned a silver medal.
Rail Jam medalists included Caleb Gates, who took home two gold medals and a silver. Dragon Cruz-Yen brought home silver in the night Rail Jam while Wilson added two bronze finishes and Stottlemyer added one. Cormac Gardiner grabbed two sixth-place finishes in his first ever competition.
The Purgatory Snowboard team was led by Anthony Turco, who earned medals in all four events with two silver and two bronze. Natalie DeBelina, Cody Beaver and Rowan Holiday all won their collective age groups earning gold medals in slopestyle.
Ozzy Mills hit the trifecta with a slopestyle win and silver and bronze finishes in rail jams. Greta Stahl brought home three silver medals. Zander Berriman won the night rail jam and added a bronze in slopestyle. Rory Stahl managed a fourth-place finish in slopestyle.
The team will now wait for the points list to get posted, which should come by March 15.
Meanwhile, Purgatory Resort will host the USSA Rocky Mountain Mogul Skiing State Championships this Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
The mogul skiing championships will bring 140 freestyle skiers aged 7 to 14 years old from all over Colorado. There will be two different categories for the event – the Rocky Qualifier Series (RQS) and the Development (Devo) competitions.
Athletes are judged on turns, aerial maneuvers and speed through a mogul course. The course at Purgatory is on Upper Bull Run below Dante’s restaurant off of Chair 5.
The USSA Rocky RQS/Devo series is the progressive step before athletes move up to bigger USSA Rocky Division, National and International competitions. Highlighted athletes that have moved up from Durango are Trudy Mickel and George McQuinn.
At 15, Mickel has started to dominate regional competitions, either winning or earning podium finishes. Mickel has also performed on the NorAm International circuit by besting U.S., Australian and Canadian national team members on her way to a fourth-place finish two weeks ago in Park City, Utah.
McQuinn punctuated his season by winning last weekend in the final regional competition of the year at Telluride.
Both athletes will attend the USSA Junior Nationals in Sun Valley, Idaho, and U.S. Ski Team Nationals in Steamboat later this month.
Mogul skiing action at Purgatory will start Friday. Competition will begin at 10:45 a.m. and run until 2:30 p.m. each day. The RQS Championships will take place on Saturday with the Devo Championships. The side-by-side Dual Mogul skiing Championships will close the weekend action Sunday.
heraldsports@durangoherald.com
