Hello Angel Fire! My name is Ellie White, I spent this past winter in the beautiful mountains of northern New Mexico. Being employed at Angel Fire Resort allowed me to have so many opportunities. One of them was competing in the USASA regional boardercross series here at the resort. I entered more on a whim than anything because I love competitions of any type and wanted to give it a shot.
I have snowboarded for approximately 8 years and loved every minute of it. But to be honest, I was surprised to place first in my division – qualifying me for the Nationals. Although I qualified for such an amazing opportunity, I still needed a lot of money to be able to compete.
Not sure if I would actually be able to make it happen, I was so honored and thankful for everyone in my department, Guest Services, as they all immediately started pitching in and donating money to make it a realization for me. Not only did they donate their money, but also their time and effort into searching for sponsors for me. Then I learned Angel Fire Resort agreed to sponsor me!
I sincerely appreciate everyone believing in me. Thanks to their support I got to go to Copper Colorado!
The week of nationals was an amazing adventure. I got to snowboard Copper Colorado for the first time. It was a big resort and it had some awesome runs. There were 1,750 competitors there for the USASA Nationals. The skill levels were incredible to see. The day of my competition was nerve-racking but exciting. We started at 7:40 a.m. inspecting the course and then moved right into a few practice runs. After that, we had timed trials where I did an 85-second run, which placed me in the 7th seed. I had my first heat at 12:30 p.m. which I placed first in!
Then, I moved on to the semi-finals. I came out of the gate strong and was in the lead for a second, but then I wrecked coming off a jump. Unfortunately, I was not able to recover and took third in the semi-finals which meant I would not be moving on to the champion round.
I did, however, get to do one more heat for the consolation finals. The competitors in this heat were good. We all were neck in neck going down the course. About halfway down another girl and I ran into each other and I went down making me come in 4th. This placed me in 8th place overall. It was a good competition and all the girls were very skilled. It was an awesome opportunity to see all these people who also share the same love of snowboarding as well as a competitive spirit.
Again, I want to thank everyone who supported me and helped me get to the USASA Nationals. It was an amazing experience and I had a lot of fun. Next year I will take gold!!
Congrats, Ellie White! We are proud of you!
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