The Fernie Freestyle Team is a small group of competitors that travel the Alberta provincial circuit. They recently competed in the BC Winter Games, held in Penticton from Feb. 25 to 28. The team was in Castle Mountain over the past weekend, where they competed in three events: big air, moguls and dual moguls. The four Fernie skiers that went to the event competed well, according to their coach, Luc Juergensen.
“We had four riders: Erin and Jeff Campbell, Sam Goodison and Graham Bradish,” said Juergensen. “Erin got second in big air, Graham got fifth and Sam got sixth. In moguls Graham got first, Erin got fourth, Sam got fifth, and Jeff got 10th. In duals Sam got third, Graham got second, and Erin got first. It was a good weekend for the Fernie Freestyle Club.”
The field for each event are healthy in size.
“I think for moguls there was about 50 riders between the categories and I think there were 35 for big air,” Juergensen said.
After last weekend, Bradish has gained enough Ranker Per Athlete (RPA) points to qualify for nationals.
“If you do well in the provincial competitions overall you get RPA points and then they invite the top 15 riders with the most RPA points to nationals. That means that Graham is top 15 in Alberta.”
The last weekend of February had Graham Bradish and Sam Goodison along with many other athletes from different sports travel to the BC Winter Games in Penticton. While it was good competition, the boys did not get points toward the provincial circuit they compete in.
“We are an Alberta club, that is where we compete out of,” said Goodison.
“B.C. games doesn’t add points toward making it to junior nationals. Mostly Alberta provincial competitions are what get you to junior nationals,” said Bradish.
Despite not gaining points, the boys skied hard and had respectable results. They compete in separate categories due to their age; Bradish is 18 while Goodison is 15.
“[There were] 25 to 30 competitors, I got fifth in big air and slope style and seventh in moguls. I was hoping to do a bit better, but both my runs in slope style and moguls didn’t quite come together as much as I hoped,” said Bradish.