Starting off our 2024 race season, we headed up to China Peak for our first official competition. It’s a small family resort up in the Sierra Mountains near Fresno, so it was quite the drive, but we still got over forty members to come out and compete for the team. Our league, the USCSA Southwest division, set up four events for each discipline, split over Saturday and Sunday. Our team excelled in Slalom, Giant Slalom, Slopestyle, and Railjam throughout the weekend, even bringing home a couple of podium positions. The weather was unfortunately not ideal, with a high of 50 degrees Fahrenheit on Saturday, and a scorching 55 degrees Fahrenheit on Sunday. These may not sound too warm, but the mountain sun and its reflection on the snow can heat you up fast, so a big part of the team ended up competing in t-shirts or long sleeves, bringing an enjoyable spring vibe to our weekend and making the best of the situation.

On day one we started nice and early, with a 6:00 AM wakeup call to be on the mountain and ready by 7:30. It was a gorgeous day, and the competition kicked off with women’s and men's Skiing Giant Slalom in the morning. Our racers did very well, with many taking top 10 positions and Jordan Flood taking second for the women’s division. After that, we moved on to women’s and men’s snowboard Giant Slalom in the afternoon. We had several top ten’s here as well, with Sierra Scarlet taking third in the women’s division. In the evening, we moved on to the rail jam competition for each division. All of our athletes were putting themselves out there and trying new tricks, making it one of the most fun events of the weekend. We closed out the night with an awards ceremony celebrating all of the competitors before heading back to the cabin.

On Sunday, we started off the day with slopestyle for men’s and women’s skiers, and slalom for men’s and women’s snowboards at the same time, alternating with skiers doing slalom and snowboarders running slopestyle later in the day. Slalom went well with athletes improving on their times and pushing themselves to get on that podium. For men’s ski we had Varun Suklilar take the bronze and for the women, Jordan Flood with the silver. For our female snowboarders, Sierra Scarlett took the Gold in border slalom. Slopestyle was a blast with many of our athletes attempting and landing new tricks on the course. For men’s freeski we had a podium finish from Ben Scheerger in 2nd and an unexpected 5th from Seiji Minowada. For men’s snowboard, we had Logan Lavine take 2nd and for the women we had Sierra Scarlett take 4th. That about wraps up our first race, it was an absolute blast, and we can’t wait to get after it in Mountain High next weekend!