MOUNTAIN LIFE - Blue Mountains | Fall 2018

76 ML BLUE FALL 2018 Last year I started coaching weekends with The Senders [snowboard coaching and camps at Mount St. Louis Moonstone and Blue Mountain Resort] with no real expectations. Throughout the winter, I was working well with the kids and I’d look forward to riding with them. They were pushing me in a way. Working with them I’d stay out longer, ride longer, even when the conditions weren’t perfect. ML: How did coaching help you with your own riding? KH: It was good for me. The kids have such a pure love for snowboarding. I think that gets lost in translation as you get older, especially if you’re in the competitive scene. That kind of original feeling of “Wow, I just really love doing this” gets turned into, “I have to do this.” ML: Were you workingmainly with female riders? KH: At The Senders, all of our sign-ups happened to be boys. But then I got involved with Snowboard Ontario’s Elleboard Days at Mount St. Louis Moonstone. It was nice to have girls all pushing each other and being supportive of each other and trying new things. If one girl was scared, everyone would encourage her. After that I started doing a few days here and there at Mount St. Louis Moonstone with the girls from The Senders group. They are such nice kids and they all want to progress. You can see them working through their roadblocks and you know when they are ready to try a trick mentally. That’s sometimes the biggest part. Anyone can do it, but working through the mental side, visualizing it and realizing you can do it is almost the hardest part. It’s 90 percent of the trick. ML: What’s your plan for this winter? KH: More Elleboard days, coaching Fridays at Mount St. Louis Moonstone with the girls there and Saturdays and Sundays I’ll be at Blue Mountain with The Senders. This year we have one or two girls signed up, not all boys [ laughs ]. I’m also doing an all-girls trip with The Senders to the Banff area. ML: What advice do you have for girls coming up in the sport? KH: When I was snowboarding, I didn’t have any other girls on my team. It can be intimidating. It takes a lot of courage to just drop into it and say, “I’m going to try this and I don’t care who sees me fall.” But getting over that and realizing everyone falls—everyone makes mistakes—is key. I think women’s snowboarding is definitely going to keep progressing. If you want to keep up with that progression it can’t be a seasonal sport. You need to commit year-round. It’s not just about being on snow. It’s about training in the gym, it’s about being on the trampoline, it’s about using the air bag if that’s available to you. That’s a big part of keeping up. To find out more about The Senders, visit thesenders.co . To find out more about Elleboard Days, visit canadasnowboard.ca/en/programs/ elleboard. “Anyone can do it, but working through the mental side, visualizing it and realizing you can do it is almost the hardest part. It’s 90 percent of the trick.” Kiersten Higginson at Grouse Mountain, BC. ILANNA BARKUSKY