Wednesday, April 7, 2004

Ketchum duo are
lords of the boards

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By JEFF CORDES
Express Sports Editor

Sophia Schwartz and Karl Fostvedt, two of the Sun Valley Freestyle Team’s best skiers, proved they’re two of the country’s best up-and-coming skiers last weekend at Keystone, Colo.

The two 13-year-olds totally burned it in the Sports Illustrated for Kids nextSnow Search designed to showcase the future of skiing and snowboarding on network television.

Not only did Schwartz and Fostvedt attack the pack and earn some television and magazine exposure, they did great on the result sheet in the national competition for kids ages 9-13.

In the final accounting, Fostvedt earned the highest point total of any of the skier boys. Schwartz was among the top two girls and earned the Skier’s Choice girls’ award for best attitude and ability, voted upon by the 140 contestants.

They both made the nextSnow Search national team comprising 25 skiers. That means they’ll be featured in an upcoming edition of Sports Illustrated for Kids magazine. They’ll also be on television.

NBC Sports will televise the finals of the nextSnow Search in a half-hour program Sunday, April 11, at 11 a.m. MTD on channel 7.

"We’ll be watching," said Schwartz, bronze medalist in halfpipe and Big Air at the Junior Olympic Freestyle Championships March 20 at Silver Mountain in northern Idaho.

Both Schwartz, a Community School seventh grader, and Fostvedt, a Wood River Middle School eighth-grader, whipped through Friday’s qualifications that narrowed down the field of hundreds of skiers and riders to the final 50.

Fostvedt said, "I won moguls, did well in slopestyle and fell in halfpipe, but my points were good enough so I could make the final 50." Schwartz also reached the next level.

Saturday, Fostvedt and Schwartz were among the leaders in the Big Mountain riding all-terrain contest that tested all their skills. Both were in the top 20 in Saturday night’s Big Air, Fire and Snow show.

Fostvedt really took charge Sunday, doing well in the slopestyle jam session, his favorite event featuring rails and 50-foot jumps. Then, in the afternoon dual skiing challenge, he barely lost his first heat and barely won his second—but his times put Karl into first place.

"Karl was outstanding," said Virginia Egger, Sophia’s mother who watched the contest. "It was clear that he could do it all, and that was the theme of the contest—let’s see who can really do it all."

Despite suffering a concussion that kept him from competing in the recent Junior Olympics, Fostvedt said, "I came in really confident."

Sponsored by Nintendo and Burton Snowboards, the nextSnow Search was a series of freeride contests at U.S. and Canadian resorts that ended last weekend for hundreds of kids in the Keystone finals.

The Idaho Mountain Express is distributed free to residents and guests throughout the Sun Valley, Idaho resort area community. Subscribers to the Idaho Mountain Express will read these stories and others in this week's issue.