The Inside Edge - SARS hosts EEYSL races

n Vonn Dominates Downhill — Lindsey Vonn won the Downhill at Cortina, on a course where she’s won before, by a huge margin of .92 seconds. Jackie Wiles took the Bronze making for a great USA day. Later in the week, Vonn was sixth in Super G and Wiles in 16th. Watch for them at the Olympic Games.

On the Mens’ side, David Chodounsky placed 15th in Slalom at Kitzbuehel, earning a return trip to his third Olympics. Steve Nyman, still recovering from a severe knee injury last season, lead five US men into the top 30 at the fabled Hahnenkamm Downhill, placing 15th. It’ll be tough choosing our Olympic Downhill squad. The US Olympic Team selections will be announced this week. This is a tense week for many of our athletes.

n Junior Race Series — With three days in the books, the standings are starting to clarify. The Rut Monsters hold a narrow lead over the Powder Pirates in the team standings, but the others are in striking range. In the Most improved category, the leaders are: Girls – Fiona MacDonald, Marlee McCrum, Winslow Cox and Anna Woodward. Boys – Landon Buoy, Austin Billstin and Henry Barnes. The fastest boys last week were: Cadin Billstin, Crosby Schmidt and Fletcher Barrett. On the girls’ side, Angelina Knepper edged out her sister Sydnie for fastest, followed by Fiona MacDonald.

n Lake Louise FIS — A number of SARS athletes traveled to Lake Louise to compete against a fast and deep Canadian field. The only local competitor was Farli Boden, who posted results of 28th and 36th in Giant Slalom and 24th and 26th in Slalom.

n EEYSL Race No.1 — The Schweitzer Alpine Racing School hosted two days racing for the youngest league last weekend. For many competitors it was their first USSAl race. We only report top 15 finishers. The top local racer was Dakota Landwehr who took 6th in Giant Slalom then amped it up for a Silver medal in Slalom for U10 Boys. Berkeley Cox was the top local girl, with 13th in Giant Slalom and 12th in Slalom for U12 Girls. Halle Wyman was 15th in Slalom for U10 girls. Other local competitors were Cadin Billstin, Klein Fragoso, Jeru Gidley, Grace Meekings, Riley Murphy, Crosby Schmidt and Faith Stephany.

n Starlight Series Kicks Off — The first night of adult Starlight competition begins next Friday. The theme this year is “007” so get your James Bond on. Teams must have at least one female member, and will be handicapped for age, gender, and mode of travel (Alpine, Telemark, Snowboard or Butt). Contact the Activity Center for details and get that team together.

n Western Region Speed Series — The top FIS athletes in the region will compete on Zip Down Jan. 30 through Feb. 4. They will race Downhill, Super G and Giant Slalom. This is exciting stuff and you can get the best seat in the house by helping out. Putting on a speed series requires lots of folks. SARS is looking for volunteers in many capacities, for the entire series or for a day. Call SARS at 946-7859 to volunteer.

n Potpourri — Watch here next week for Olympic Team announcements, FIS Speed results and results from the Evergreen Cup races. Any comments, recommendations or contributions to this column may be sent to Shep Snow by e-mail at shep@thesnowschool.com. Negative feedback should be sent to someone else.

The Inside Edge runs every Thursday during ski season in the Daily Bee.