Next week (June  6-9), for the first time ever, a group of elite-level ski racers and top waters skiers will meet to take part in a special event called Skier vs. Skier. Though some competition in both sports is on the agenda, the primary goal of the gathering is to have fun and promote the passionate lifestyle of the athletes.  

Representing the alpine skiers will be U.S. Ski Team members Stacey Cook and Julia Ford joined by Tahoe-born, Jamaican ski cross racer Errol Kerr and Hall of Fame Paralympic sit skier Chris Wadell, who made headlines last summer when he climb Mount Kilimanjaro in an arm-powered, four-wheeled vehicle. The snow experts will be accompanied by some of the nation’s leading professional water skiers including: Jamie Beauschesne, Marcus Brown, Jason Seels, Zack Worden and Casey Mommer. Several youth skiers will also take part in the event.

The athletes will convene Sunday evening in Mammoth, Cali. and begin filming interviews and group discussions. On Monday the water skiers will have to find their mountain legs on snow in preparation for Tuesday’s ski racing competition between teams made up of athletes from both sports. The whole entourage, including photographers and editors, will then hop on planes to head to Cheyenne Lake, a manmade lake in southern California especially designed for water skiing.

The event, designed to capture the true lifestyle of the athletes, was brought to life by Stephen Garcia, a Long Beach, Cali. attorney and father of  Mammoth Mountain ski racers who are also competitive water skiers.

“This whole project is being put together to share the message that these people live together, train together, work together and take care of each other when they’re hurt. World Cup Dreams is a great example of that and water skiing is the exact same thing,” says Garcia. “What we are really going to do is package this lifestyle of passion and coolness and show that this is a group you want to hang out with. We are also going to couple it with techniques and show how the physical aspects of one cross over to the other.”

While encouraging his children to reach for their athletic goals in both sports, Garcia noticed a need for a shot in the arm in the public perception of what goes into snow and waterskiing. 

“We started talking about the dynamics of the techniques that cross over and we realized that these are two sports that are dying in a large respect internally because of a lack of sponsorship and an inability to express to the general buying public what it’s about,” says Garcia. “There seems to be this sense that if you have to work hard and train hard to be good at something, then it is no longer cool or rad. The boarders, both snow and wake, have this image that they don’t work at what they are amazing at, and of course, that’s incorrect. They have this ambiance that reflects coolness and therefore marketability.”

The footage and photographs gathered during the event will be provided to various media outlets to cover the event and promote its goals. Though several sponsors stepped forward to get involved in the Skier vs. Skier, Garcia has turned them down in order to maintain the honesty of the piece.
 
“So far we’ve turned down every penny of sponsorship money,” says Garcia.  “We want it to be [the athlete’s] event, we want them to be able to tell their story so they can decide what they want to do to it. What I’m insisting it be is a story about the athletes, their lives and what they care about and how they care about each other, not at all about boats or skis.”

Cook, a three-time national champion and Mammoth local has been in on the project from the ground level and helped bring the event together.

“Stephen’s idea was to bring more awareness to the sports and show the lifestyle a little bit more what incredible athletes both sports produce by bring them together,” says Cook. “The idea is to do some form of cross training and show the adaptability of the athletes and show them as athletes that work really hard and can still be cool and achieve their dreams.”

“The idea is that it’s not about the individuals involved it’s about the sports. Right now there seems to be a lot of attention in the snowboarding and freeskiing world, that these kids never work out they just go have fun all the time and that is cool,” continued Cook. “We want to put our sport out there as cool also, but maintain that we are athletes that strive every hour of every day for excellence and how our lifestyles can still be cool but it’s also cool to work really hard and get what you want.”

For Cook, it makes perfect sense that Skier Vs. Skier take place in Mammoth, where she says the community is really getting behind young athletes.

“This project really ties in with the movement in Mammoth right now and with the Mammoth invitational. It’s really creating an environment here that can produce world-class athletes. There is so much enthusiasm and passion for the sport here,” says Cook. “The eyes of the parents and athletes here are lit up every day and it’s really cool to see and it’s extending beyond the highest level. You see J4s and J5s loving the sport and their parents loving the sport.”

Look for video segments of the Skier vs. Skier event on Skiracing.com throughout the summer and a compete feature in the first issue of the 2011 season in early September. 

SkiRacing.com
5/06/2010