With winter well in progress, Manogue’s Ski team is entering a new season. The team is projected to do well this year, and has gained quite a few new skiers. They kicked off the season with a weekend trip to Mammoth in order to focus on teambuilding and prepare for the races to come. The team met at Manogue early in the morning and loaded up for the four-hour trip. Once they arrived, they spent most of their time free skiing, in order to get reacquainted with the powder. Finally, on the last day they trained gates.This type of practice prepares the skiers for races, and allows them to become more precise. “It was a lot of fun to get together with the team for the first time. It was nice to go to another mountain and just mess around”, senior Natasha Hallerbach commented. The whole team enjoyed the trip, and made great use of the practice time, being lucky enough to have fresh powder.

The girls and boys teams both compete in slalom and giant slalom, advanced speed races, comprised of  fast turns around gates or poles. Specifically, the gates in giant slalom are more widely spaced and the course covers a longer distance than does slalom. After their Mammoth trip, the team continued working hard back at Manogue and have prepared for races through “dryland training”. Coaches focus on teaching core and leg exercises, to improve the skiers’ strength and endurance. These practices are held three days a week, for a month and a half before the beginning of the racing season. Now that the season has started, the skiers race every Tuesday and Thursday at Mount Rose against the other Reno schools. Each race, the skiers arrive early, put on their speedsuits, and inspect the courses. They first take the courses slowly, discussing strategy and analyzing how they should take their turns. Strategy and speed are everything in putting in a successful run. 

So far the team has been largely successful in their races, with both boys and girls placing 2nd among all of the schools in only their 3rd race of the season. The team is looking forward to more success as the year continues and we are excited to see what State holds for Manogue this year!