Team Summit / Photo provided
The Team Summit had a winter season to remember during the 2021-22 ski and snowboard competition season. Summit County-based sports clubs excel not only at local competitions, but also at the local and national levels.
The Team Summit Alpine Program has been particularly prominent in this past winter season. Most notably, the program, supervised by Aldo Radamus, has made three athletes U16 citizens.
Stella Buch Heister led the skiers at the Team Summit, finishing second overall in the women’s competition and third overall in the men’s competition. Nico Roynick also made it to the Nationals, but didn’t finish on the podium, despite his impressive personal performance.
In addition, the Team Summit and Alpine Program were recognized for having the third highest number of elite athletes in the country.
It was largely thanks to these praises that the Team Summit Alpine Program was nationally recognized for its work throughout the season.
National awards of all kinds are great honors, but when it comes from the heads of all snow sports in the United States, the awards tend to be even more meaningful — US skiing and snowboarding.
Following the annual US Ski Snowboard Club Excellence Conference in Park City, Utah on June 16, the Team Summit’s Alpine Program received the “Alpine Club of the Year” award.
This award is the highest honor that can be achieved in a particular program and shows that the Team Summit was recognized for the first time at the national level.
CB Bechtel, Executive Director of the Team Summit, said: “There are a lot of great ski teams in our country. It’s been a long way to reach our level. I’m glad to see the work we’ve done.”
Bechtel became executive director of the Team Summit five seasons ago, and since then he has seen both the Alpine program and the transformation of the club as a whole.
“When I came to the Team Summit, there was no permanent training space in Summit County,” Bechtel said. “Both Keystone and Copper Mountain have really worked hard to create a place where they can provide a training environment suitable for high-performance training, especially for the Alpine team.”
Team Summit / Photo provided
Bechtel also said that the Alpine program is steadily improving thanks to Radamus’ strong coaching curriculum and the staff built around him. Over the years, skiers have steadily increased their competitive rank in response to Ladams’ coaching and passion.
The success of the show at the U16 Alpine National was a big focus this season, but Radhams and his staff believe that the entire program has something to celebrate.
“One of the things I and other staff are proud of is having a wide range of abilities and levels of interest within the Alpine Program and Team Summit,” said Ladams. “It’s really the children in that range that are equally valued for the efforts they put into it.”
Thanks to all athletes leads to a strong culture within the Team Summit and the ability of athletes to find their level of success. Both are the reasons why US skiing and snowboarding have decided to approve the 2021-22 Team Summit Alpine Program.
“It really starts at the top of the organization, and one of the personal beliefs of the Team Summit is the personal podium,” said Ladams. “And we strengthen it with our coaches and have that 360 degree respect among all the members of our community.”
“Most of our culture is a personal podium that applies not only to skiing and snowboarding, but also to skills and scholarship,” says Bechtel, one of the club’s core philosophies. “Personal podiums allow children to set benchmarks to grow themselves and create the ideas they need to push themselves.”
Whether the athlete’s goal is to create the Olympics or learn new tricks, the Team Summit provides a space for athletes to find their own definition of success with the support of the team.
“There is real friendship around the athlete,” Bechtel said. “Children encourage each other and support each other towards their level of success.”
A concrete example of this happened this winter when an athlete from another club came to the Team Summit and was overwhelmed by the support of his new teammates. Whether the athlete was in front of or behind the puck, his teammates were there for support during his ski run — this was not the standard for his previous club.
As a result of the permeation of these club values, the Team Summit feels like a family. Whether children are medals on the slopes or on mountain bike trails, athletes are proud to wear Team Summit racing bibs and T-shirts.
The Team Summit has been successful not only in ski and snowboard programs, but also in this summer’s mountain bike program.The Team Summit dominates local mountain bike racing and has won several podiums at the Summit Mountain Challenge Race and firecrackers 50 on July 4th.
For Bechtel and Radamus, the Alpine Club of the Year award has just begun with the Alpine program and Team Summit. When it comes to the potential for a team summit, both Bechtel and Radamus firmly believe that the cap is out of reach.
“We are still very young as a team,” said Radhams. “All older athletes are qualified athletes for the first and second years of the International Ski Federation, and some athletes will move into that era of next season’s races. All improvements are still in place. It’s going on for the kids, and it’s very exciting. “
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