Silverthorne Storm gymnasts Eloise Hood, right, and Mia Norden, center, pose for a photo after placing third and first, respectively in the compulsory 4 older division floor competition at the Foothills Flairs gymnastic meet on Saturday, May 20.
Claudine Norden/Courtesy photo

The Silverthorne Storm gymnastics team has reached its 2023 competition season, and local gymnasts have been working hard to qualify to state as things get underway.

For those who may not be familiar, the Silverthorne Storm is a youth gymnastics team that is hosted out of the Silverthorne Recreation Center. Without a middle school or high school gymnastics program in the county, Silverthorne Storm allows student athletes to explore the sport while competing at a high level.

The Silverthorne Storm is made up of local Summit County middle school and elementary school students, and the team competes in the Colorado Association of Recreation Athletics gymnastics meets from May through July. 

“The mission of the Storm is to provide children with the ability to participate in gymnastics at a higher level than classes,” head coach Ben Way said. “Participation in gymnastics helps with so many things — from body awareness, strength, focus, flexibility, self-confidence and more. These are all things that will help them throughout their lives. We want to provide the space for those who want to be more involved with the sport and take it to another level by competing at a recreational level.”

During the competition season, Way — who has coached at the Silverthorne Recreation Center for 25 years — works with the team to perfect its members’ skills they have already learned. But during the fall and winter, the team focuses on learning new skills to foster progression.

Beyond the team placing highly at its first meet of the season, the Storm was able to qualify the majority of the team to the state gymnastics meet, which will take place in July.

“I would say it was a successful first meet,” Way said. “We qualified 22 out of 26 girls for the state meet  with eight of them in all around.” 

The Silverthorne Storm will now prepare to travel to the Broomfield Flyers gymnastics competition, which will take place on Saturday, June 3, at the Paul Derda Recreation Center in Broomfield.

Following the Broomfield competition, the Storm will then host a home meet at the Silverthorne Recreation Center on June 24 and will then close out the season with a meet on July 8 and the state meet from July 22-23. 

I expect more polished routines, more state qualifiers and plenty of trips to the podium,” Way said of the coming weeks.

Members of the Silverthorne Storm gymnastics team pose for a photo before competing in the Compulsory 4 competition. Eloise Hood of The Peak School first from the back for The Silverthorne Storm.
Claudine Norden/Courtesy photo.

Story originally submitted on June 2, 2023 in The Summit Daily. Written by Cody Jones. For the full story click here.

Cain Steinweg and Nina Schamberger, left, begin the second Summit Trail Running Series race on Wednesday, May 31. Schamberger was the first female athlete to cross the finish line in the short course race.
Cody Jones/Summit Daily News

As cars started to stream into the B&B trailhead parking lot off French Gulch Road in Breckenridge, thunder started to boom and rain started to steadily pour down from the sky.

While many people peeled out of the parking lot after a jaunt on their bike, others exited the warmth of the interior of their cars in order to compete in the second of six scheduled Summit Trail Running Series races on Wednesday, May 31.

Part of the town of Breckenridge Recreation Department, the Summit Trail Running Series and the Summit Mountain Challenge strives to get people together in the community to challenge their fitness on local trails via trail running or mountain biking.

After hosting the first race in the series in Dillon on May 17, the French Gulch race consisted of both a short course and a long course on the trail system surrounding the B&B trailhead.

The French Gulch short course race was advertised as a 3.43-mile race with over 459 feet of elevation gain, while the long course race was marked for 5.34 miles with 652 feet of total elevation gain.

The short course race ended up being marked short of the prescribed mileage with the race being closer to 2.5 miles with 350 feet of elevation gain.

At the front of the short course race field were several standout Summit High School and Summit Middle School distance runners who were willing to brave the cold rain and slippery course.

Leading the pack was incoming sophomore Cain Steinweg, who completed the course in 18 minutes, 17 seconds in order to win his second 2023 Summit Trail Running Series race.

Steinweg was followed by his new Summit High School cross-country teammates Jay McDonald and Lukas Remeikis, who tied for second place with a time of 18:40.

The Peak School graduate and University of Utah commit Nina Schamberger was the next athlete to cross the finish line. Schamberger showed off her aerobic engine from Nordic skiing by completing the short course in 19:17, earning fourth place.

Originally featured in The Summit Daily on June 3, 2023. Photo courtesy of Curtis Devore/Copper Mountain Ski Resort.

Graduates of The Peak School throw their caps into the air during the commencement ceremony at Copper Mountain Resort on Friday.

Originally posted in the Summit Daily on January 5th, 2023. Written by Cody Jones. Read the full article here.

Team Summit's Nina Schamberger, center, celebrates her ninth place overall finish at the 2023 U.S. Cross Country Ski Championships in Michigan on Monday, Jan. 2 Schamberger's finish currently ranks her as the top ranked junior level skier in the country.
Team Summit/Courtesy photo

Team Summit athletes were busy competing at Copper Mountain Resort’s New Year’s Eve Rail Jam on Saturday, Dec. 31, while Nina Schamberger competed in Michigan on Monday, Jan. 2. 

At Copper Mountain Resort, Team Summit earned 12 podium finishes. 

In the freeski competition, Lainey Steen, Andrew Thisted, David Asher Cockrell and Evan Wischmeyer all placed first overall in their age divisions. 

Naomi Lyman, Avery Thisted and Alex Swedenborg placed second while Forrest Woodard placed third. 

In the snowboard rail jam competition, Madeline Morton, Elijah Stroker and Caleb Dhawornvej placed first overall in their divisions. Lily Dhawornvej placed second behind Morton in the girls 11- to 14-year-old division.

Meanwhile, Schamberger — a recent University of Utah commit — traveled to Houghton, Michigan, to compete at the 2023 U.S. Cross Country Ski Championships. Schamberger competed in the 10-kilometer, freestyle-interval-start women’s race among collegiate level competition.

Schamberger hung tough to place ninth overall in a time of 29 minutes, 17.3 seconds. The race was won by 2022 Olympian Hailey Swirbul in 27:32.5. 

The finish from Schamberger currently ranks her No. 1 in the country among junior-level skiers. The accomplishment marks the first time a Summit Nordic skier has ever ranked so high. 

At the Holiday Classic giant slalom in Steamboat Springs on Dec. 20, Stella Buchheister placed first overall in the U18 women’s giant slalom while Ella Snyder placed second.

Snyder doubled up her winnings by placing second in the U18 women’s slalom competition. Snyder finished behind teammate Skylar Sheppard, who placed first in the event. Stanley Buzek took home gold in the U18 men’s slalom competition.

Rounding out the Alpine skiing results for Team Summit, Jevin Palmquist skied to a first-place finish in the slalom and the giant slalom competition at Loveland Ski Area on Dec. 20.

From the Summit Daily

Written by Lindsay Toomer

Published on August 18, 2021

Ambur Vincze poses with her mustang, Odin, and the ribbons they won at the 2021 Oklahoma Youth Extreme Mustang Makeover competition.
Photo from Ambur Vincze

Breckenridge resident and Peak School student Ambur Vincze, 15, placed 10th overall in the 2021 Oklahoma Youth Extreme Mustang Makeover competition out of 34 competitors.

The competition — which is run by the Mustang Heritage Foundation — allows horse trainers to show off their skills by working with an untouched, wild mustang for 100 days.

Vincze drove 14 hours to Oklahoma City for the competition with her mustang, Odin, a 2-year-old bay gelding from the Swasey Mountains in Utah.

“I really loved the training aspect, but going to the competition was such a unique environment,” Vincze said. “There were so many kind people there, and it just really made the whole entire experience really rewarding being able to show what I have accomplished with him and worked toward these past 100 days.”

In order to get into the competition, Vincze said a trainer must go through a lengthy application process and be approved by the Mustang Heritage Foundation and the Bureau of Land Management, which keeps wild horses in corrals across the country with its Wild Horse and Burro Program. Once a trainer finds out they’re accepted, they go and get a wild horse from one of the bureau’s corrals.

Vincze said wild mustang populations are high and that the lands they live on can’t sustain them all. She said this competition is one way to train horses before finding them permanent homes.

“These competitions just help place mustangs into their forever homes because there are a lot of them, and we want to keep America’s living legends alive,” Vincze said.

The competition includes three categories: Vincze and Odin came in eighth in handling and conditioning, which demonstrates basic skills; 15th in trail, which demonstrates riding skills; and 10th in the freestyle category, which gives a trainer the opportunity to show off their horse.

Vincze said the most challenging part of the competition was teaching Odin to be less aggressive. She said mustangs have natural tendencies and that Odin was dominant, making him even more difficult. While she has worked with wild horses before, Odin is the first one she personally trained from “wild to mild.”

“He had a couple of aggressive tendencies that I had to work through, but after awhile, he got used to me and learned to be kinder to people,” Vincze said. “And now he’s like an absolute cuddle bear; he’ll just always come up to you.”

Vincze joked that usually when getting a wild horse, it’s best to avoid the ones picking fights, but she liked Odin the most.

“I liked the way he was built and the way he looked, so I picked him as my mustang, and he has turned out to be such a kind-hearted horse,” Vincze said.

Vincze has worked with horses at the Far View Horse Rescue in Fairplay since 2016. She is still working with Odin as she prepares him for his first ride and looks for his next home.

“I love mustangs. They’re so unique,” Vincze said. “They always have the best personalities and turn out to be amazing horses. I wanted to make sure that I could be a part of keeping them populated in America and that they could continue to be a part of other people’s lives just like how they’ve impacted mine.”

Read the full article here: https://www.summitdaily.com/sports/breckenridge-resident-competes-in-national-mustang-makeover-competition/

From the Summit Daily

Written by Antonio Olivero

Published May 29, 2021

With his little cousin beside him, Al Espinosa receives his diploma, via an old racing ski with a basket attached to the end, from The Peak School's Head of School Travis Aldrich at the top of Copper Mountain Resort's Super Bee chairlift Friday, May 29. Fourteen seniors graduated as the class of 2020 from The Peak School in Frisco.
Liz Copan / ecopan@summitdaily.com

COPPER MOUNTAIN — An old SL Dynastar racing ski long relegated to a backyard fence was the secret ingredient to giving The Peak School graduates what some said was the best graduation in America.

“How skinny the ski is gives you an idea how old it is,” The Peak School Head of School Travis Aldrich said.

A couple of weeks ago, Aldrich reached out to the Summit County Public Health Department and Copper Mountain Resort General Manager Dustin Lyman with an idea for a chairlift graduation ceremony for his students amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

He’d take that old Dynastar ski and adhere a woven picnic basket to the end of it. In the basket, he’d place each of the 14 Peak School graduates’ diplomas. From there, the students, riding on chairs along with members of their households, would grab their diplomas as their chairs crested the top terminal of Copper Mountain Resort’s Super Bee lift.

Lyman loved the idea, especially on the Super Bee. Super Bee’s base area behind Copper Station in the resort’s East Village would be spacious enough to space out the 80 people — students, families, relatives and teachers — who came out Friday morning. And the top of the Super Bee, at tree line on Copper’s eastern-most terrain, would be a glorious view for graduates and those there supporting them with the iconic Tenmile Range in the background.

“Whether or not we could pull it off was a whole ‘nother question,” Lyman said. “So we worked with Summit County Public Health to establish the protocols for the ceremony with loading and unloading. Our operations team did a great job of just figuring out the logistics, and we got lucky with the weather (Friday), and it was great for the community.”

As the 14 graduates and their family photo-takers dispersed from a final round of pictures on a patch of Copper Creek Golf Course grass after the ceremony, smiling Peak School teachers belted out how this was “the best grad ceremony in America” and how they’d “like to do this every year.”

Whether the tradition sticks, Aldrich said it was the small student body, along with creative thinking, that facilitated Friday’s festivities.

After the directive from health officials that household groups must stay 6 feet apart from one another, organizers planned to give masked students, sitting beside parents and siblings, the chance to have their pictures taken while grabbing their diplomas from the basket as the chairlift stopped one by one at the top before turning around for the ride downhill.

Smiling from ear to ear beneath their special Peak School face masks — which were sewn by 2020 graduate Cameron Bryant’s grandmother — the grads slowly descended 2,293 vertical feet, staring out at one of the most breathtaking views of Summit County. One grad even had the fickle Tenmile Canyon wind steal his cap on the ride down.

For Bryant and his mother, Marilyn, the effort and creativity on the part of the resort and school administration meant the world and crystallized for them why they moved from Leadville to Silverthorne for Cameron to go to The Peak School. Along with his grandmother and mother, Cameron had a tribe of family members with him Friday riding the lift in separate groups. They held up homemade signs of Cameron holding beakers and dressed in a chemistry gown to celebrate his next step: studying pharmaceutical engineering at Regis University in the fall.

It meant that much more to the Bryants that their grandparents could be there. Until this week, they hadn’t seen them for almost three months through the pandemic.

For another graduate, Summit Tigers football star Al Espinosa, Friday was the exclamation point on the reason why he chose The Peak School two years ago as an international student from Mexico City. When he looked into living with his uncle Luis in Breckenridge, The Peak School rose to the top of the list because it was one of the few schools that sponsored student visas. Ever since, The Peak School has provided him with a community, he said.

“It’s family,” Espinosa said, “just a family.”

As for what’s next for that community, Aldrich is hopeful The Peak School will be able to resume classes at its Frisco campus this fall. That’s thanks to the numbers game: The Peak School already has a 1-6 student-teacher ratio.

Time will tell if, even in a post-COVID-19 world, this Peak School tradition sticks. For now, Aldrich and the school community are just grateful — thanks to that old, skinny racing ski — they threw a creative graduation party at Copper.

You can read the full article here: https://www.summitdaily.com/news/the-peak-school-hosts-chairlift-graduation-ceremony-at-copper-mountain-resort/

The class of 2017 gathers around their newly installed class photo (Santinelli/Peak).

Last June, The Peak School waved goodbye to our first graduating class, sending students across the globe from Olympia, Washington to New York City to Edinburgh Scotland. 

So with open arms, fresh baked pancakes, and a lot of questions, we welcomed back those first pioneers on Thursday, December 21 for the first Peak School Alumni Breakfast and Panel Discussion. 

Our entire Middle and High School gathered in the Community Room to hear stories and seek advice from the class of 2017. 

We look forward to making this a tradition at The Peak School for many years to come!