The sun rose over Park City Ski and Snowboard supporters, fans and members on Thursday morning as they celebrated the club’s success at Park City Mountain’s final First Tracks of the season. Park City Mountain brought some of Park City’s very best skiers and snowboarders out for an hour and a half of pristine turns on fresh corduroy off of the Silverlode lift. Sydney Reed has lived in Park City since 1975 and supported the Park City ski team just as long. “When I got here, we all supported the ski team because one of the kids, Roxanne Toly, was going to go to the Olympics! And she lived here, and that was awesome,” said Reed. “Since then, I’ve had three kids who were all involved and now I have grandkids, one in slopestyle and another in ski racing. It teaches a lot of lessons. It’s a great way of learning to be self-sufficient.”The club combined local winter sports programs transitioning five local clubs into the Park City Ski and Snowboard Team in 2017, growing the number of local athletes from 650 to nearly 1,300 in the time since.“Becoming multisport was for training access. We knew if we got a bigger club, we could build more for training and allow the club to really represent the whole community when the sports all come together,” said Brent Nixon, a Park City Ski and Snowboard board member who has been involved with the team for 12 years. “And now that we have this, we also have a great entry level for kids to try everything and learn a lot. It’s a phenomenal tool. Most of the people who are involved all came out of the sport world, you just learn a lot, it helps define you, teaches some lessons and also just gets kids off the couch,” said Nixon. This impact was felt acutely by Senja Maholland, who joined the masters cross country program in June. “When I stopped working, I wanted to give myself the gift of living better. I had a friend of a friend of a friend who heard about the masters program, and I am suddenly working out living healthier and it is the best thing I’ve ever done for myself,” said Maholland. Beyond being a resource for kids’ development in sport and social well-being, for Maholland, Park City Ski and Snowboard offered a new chance at building a life in Park City. Maholland was joined by three of her close teammates on Thursday morning, some who had been at the resort even earlier for a lap on uphill skis. The point of connection in the sports world brought the women a chance at building friendships in the outdoors and in a healthy ecosystem where they support and push each other to try new things and work harder every day, said Maholland.“I’ve met so many people, even after living in Park City for almost 20 years, I am meeting new people and suddenly I feel like I really live here and that is my whole reason for doing it and giving myself the gift of living healthy,” she said. Park City’s best athletes, coaches and fans carved years of training and technique into their fresh corduroy turns on Thursday morning. Credit: Klara Meyer/Park RecordFor Jim and Sue Clifford, this club has been an element of connection in their family for years. Jim coached the alpine team for 14 years before his sons both joined the team.“The boys gained a lot from the team. They’re very disciplined. Our oldest continued with it through college, and his friends now are all ski racers that he met from all over the world who are great kids that are now lifelong friends,” said Sue. The parents, friends and athletes of the Park City Ski and Snowboard team had free rein over the nine freshly groomed trails Thursday morning, displaying generations of training and talent in skiing, carving turns on some of the resort’s most loved and rarely empty runs.Beyond the capacity for continuing Park City’s Olympic legacy, Park City Ski and Snowboard is also there to just get people outside and to grow and learn in whatever environment they strive to. “What is special about this club is that they are really working to provide experiences and opportunities for all types, all sizes, all ways. If you’re chasing an Olympic dream and following the path of athletes before them, there is a pathway for that. There’s also kids that truly just loved the sport and found their posse by being with their team,” said Chairman of the Board Calum Clark. “Our true challenge is actually to be more broad, more accessible, easier, more natural for people to get involved and involved, particularly with those sectors of the community that don’t feel like skiing and snowboarding is part of their culture,” said Clark. “That is what we have the opportunity to do with this club now and over the next 10-15 years.”The post Park City Ski and Snowboard continues community legacy at First Tracks appeared first on Park Record. ...read more read less