Eli has been busy early this season getting training back in early November in Saas-Fee, Switzerland. He is a young ski-cross racer who’s competing at very high levels this whole season. Here is what he has been up to so far:

This winter took me all over the place, starting out my competition season. I was racing at Canyon in Alberta, Canada, for Canadian nations, and it went pretty well. With it being Canadian nationals and having a world cup near there right after the field was a tough one with the top twenty guys being world cup racers. This race was a pretty good confidence boost when I qualified 27th and beat most of the guys that beat me last year.

After that, I went to the Youth Olympic Games and had one of the best experiences of my life. Showing up and meeting other US athletes and learning about these sports was awesome to begin the games. Then at the actual vortex and seeing so many different countries represented and hearing other tales and stories just added to the excitement. It was slightly dulled by the two-hour commute to the mountain every day there and the same back, but it was still a beautiful ride on the Swiss railway. I completed and was definitely a bit disappointed by my performance with 19th. Still, I was only given just a few days to try and adjust to the time zone. I was definitely a bit tired the whole time out there, from activity to activity. Coming back to Canada, I had my best Noram result of the season on the second Calabogie day with a 9th place finish. That was a good day of racing for me. Being beat out of a spot in the finale by a hand length, but that happens in racing.

Those two days of racing were good for me as I was the best rested I have been this whole season, and I had some of the best results. Then in New York right after I ended up sick and the race ended up being canceled anyway, but I ended up just being tired going back up to Calabogie for the second time where I still did well. Not as well as I wanted to with a 14th and 15th. It’s still not bad, it’s just not as well as I had wanted to do. I was ready to do better going into our USA race in Colorado, where I ended up closer than I wanted to on race day one finishing 10th. Then doing a bit worse on the second day finishing 15th due to only having qualifications that day and no heats. Then after a rest day, I had my best result of the season having a fantastic race day and ending up with a 1st place at the Rev Tour! I am now back to CVA and training hard getting ready for Nationals and Noram finals.