How Team GB is searching for the ski and snowboard medallists of the future

As the dust settles on a successful season for Team GB on the snow, coaches are already hard at work developing the next generation of British talent. A video team caught up with the GB Park and Pipe squad in Laax, Switzerland, to find out how the Performance Pathway scheme helps young freestyle skiers and snowboarders to fulfil their potential.

Funded by British Ski and Snowboard, along with Snowsport England, Snowsport Scotland and Snowsport Wales, the Pathway gives training for young riders, as well as support in competitions.

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The programme uses full-time coaches, working on the three freestyle disciplines of slopestyle, halfpipe and big air. Skiers and boarders start off with Pathway training sessions at their local facility, whether that’s a dry slope or an indoor snow centre.

After that, they move up to the National Academy, based in Laax for the 2016/17 season. With four terrain parks full of kickers and rails, plus the world’s largest halfpipe, Laax is the perfect place for riders to take their skills to the next level.

The snowboarders and skiers in the video are clearly having the time of their lives, but there’s a lot of hard work involved to get to this point. The selection criteria for youngsters to be accepted on to the Pathway programme include “fitness level” and “willingness to train on and off the snow”.

A standout performance in the terrain park calls for extreme levels of agility, so as well as plenty of skiing and snowboarding practice, training also includes activities such as gymnastics, trampolining and wakeboarding to help the students improve their technique.

“Although we ride as a team on the mountain, working with individual riders means working with lots of different trick goals,” snowboard coach Ben Kinnear explains. “Helping a rider to work through towards learning a trick can be a long process, involving an element of problem-solving and creativity on and off the snow. It’s always different and unique to a rider, so it’s very rewarding as a coach to aid that process.”

Besides mastering tricks in the park, there are other obstacles as well.

“I think one of the most challenging aspects can be returning from an injury,” Kinnear says. Although the Pathway benefits from access to physiotherapy and other support staff across the UK, the recovery process is both physical and mental. “Staying motivated while they’re not training, or while they’re on rehab and therefore not riding with their friends and the team, requires real determination.”

Having been through the Pathway, skier Tyler Harding and snowboarders Matt McCormick and Fin Bremner are now a part of the GB Park and Pipe team. As the video shows, the next generation – Jake Simpson, Ciaran Tucker, Tom Greenway and Mason Ferebee among them – is already riding hard on their heels.

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“My best memories have mostly been when we’re all riding together in the park, trying to push each other,” says Matt McCormick of his time in the programme. “It makes such a big difference to have your mates with you when you’re trying a new trick, and it’s awesome to have them there when you get to celebrate landing something new.

“It can be hard for me to balance my snowboarding and school work. Not many of the other riders on the pro team are still in education, so it can suck sometimes having to come down the hill after a sick day’s riding, knowing you have to open up a textbook. But this year I think I’ve managed to balance it quite well – and I’d definitely like to have a degree one day, so I’m sure it’ll pay off.”

Are next year’s Winter Olympics in his sights?

“This has been the first year I’ve been able to do World Cup contests, so I’ve been happy to make that step up in my riding. I know I’m still not one of the stronger riders on the World Cup circuit so I mostly want to just try to progress up the ladder, regardless of whether that gets me a spot at the Olympics or not.”

Of the other riders in the video, skiers Tyler Harding and Tom Greenway were among the British talent featured in James Woods’s freestyle skiing tour of Britain in October last year – along with Kirsty Muir, who at 12 years old is one of the youngest in the Pathway programme. Even younger is 10-year-old snowboarder Mia Brookes, who has been winning national competitions since the age of six.

The cream of the UK’s skiers and snowboarders will be back in Laax on April 2 for the annual British Snowboard and Freeski Championships. As well as pitting the stars of the pro team against each other, the week-long Brits Festival is a chance for young riders to compete on the big stage, showing how far they’ve come in the past year – and it’s also a good excuse to come together for a party. After all, as snowboarder Katie Ormerod said at last year’s event, “We’re like a family.”

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