Freestyle athletes catch air on Highline

Courtesy KMS

Matt Bustillo perfected his backflip iron cross on this jump this week during training.

The Killington Mountain School freestyle team was very glad to have their jump site open over Jan. 9-10. Located on Highline, the jump provides athletes an opportunity to practice aerial maneuvers outside the full mogul course and allows them to focus on small aspects of their run. They can then take these moves and put them together into complete, polished run.

PG athlete Myles Frendel commented, “Although we haven’t had ideal weather conditions this season, it’s fantastic that Killington was able to get the jumping venue open for us this past week. It’s been great to train on it.”

PG athlete Abe Studler added, “We began practicing our aerial maneuvers which we will be performing in our upcoming comps this weekend. It was great to get the practice in ahead of time.”

Earlier this month, Killington Mountain School’s freestyle team took part in a freelance competition in Winter Park, Colo., where they competed in U.S. Selections, which is a World Cup/NorAm qualifier event. Athletes from all over the United States, Australia, Bermuda, China, Germany, in addition to U.S. Ski Team members, participated in the competition.

PG athlete Myles Frendel shared that the trip “was an awesome opportunity to compete against people from all over the world and to show everyone the results of all our training and hard work.” PG athlete Abe Studler commented, “At U.S. Selections, many KMS athletes qualified for NorAm events across the United States and Canada, which are international competitions. It is really cool to be able to represent Killington, KMS, and the East coast in such large, prestigious events.”