Nordic season kicks off with Yellowstone Ski Festival
Published: November 2, 2009
For more than three decades, cross-country skiers from across North America and around the world have gathered at the Yellowstone Ski Festival to begin their Nordic ski season on the Rendezvous Ski Trails. Traditionally, the festival takes place during Thanksgiving week and this year will be no different, with events slated for Nov. 24-28.
Highlights include a series of Nordic skiing clinics, SuperTour races, Biathlon races, the Try It and Buy It Gear Demo (the largest public gear demo of its type) and an Indoor Ski Show. A variety of presentations, clinics and classes are taught by former Olympic athletes and lifelong Nordic skiers.
Each year, up to 3,500 skiers, ranging from novices to professionals, from around the United States and Canada attend.
Rendezvous Ski Trails
Skiing in the West Yellowstone area dates back more than a century to a time when U.S. Cavalry soldiers patrolled Yellowstone National Park on skis they dubbed "agony boards." Skis were also used by early explorers and trappers as they traveled through this immense mountain valley.
In 1908, the Union Pacific Railroad reached West Yellowstone and put the town on the map as the West Entrance to Yellowstone National Park. Summertime tourism boomed but when deep snows closed the mountain passes and shut down rail travel, West Yellowstone was a world unto itself. With four-to-six feet of snow on the ground from November to April, skis were used for both travel and sport.
In the 1970's, Neal Swanson and his sons, Kent and Carl, saw the potential for expanding the cross-country skiing opportunities in West Yellowstone. With the help of Claude Coffin and his U.S. Forest Service crews, Kent put in many long hours fashioning the Rendezvous Ski Trails on the old logging roads south of town.
Meanwhile, Carl Swanson was skiing competitively and won the Junior Nationals in 1978. That same year, the Swansons were able to coax the U.S. Nordic Ski Team to West Yellowstone for their November training camp. During each November since then, hundreds of the nation’s best skiers flock to this tiny mountain community for up to a month of physical and mental conditioning.
For more details, or to register for clinics or races, visit www.yellowstoneskifestival.com or call 406-599-4465.
