Scott Macartney's path to the USST has been bumpy, but he's ready to shift into overdrive

Scott Macartney’s path to the USST has been bumpy, but he’s ready to shift into overdriveIf Scott Macartney, 25, was looking for a smooth road to take him to the U.S. Ski Team and an Ivy League college education, he must have missed the exit. The amiable, easygoing native of Redmond, Washington, arrived at his destination all right, but his route included a maze of back roads, littered with detours and potholes. There is still some distance to be traveled before Macartney reaches his goals of world-class ski racing success and college graduation, but at least he has finally moved into the passing lane.

“We did things differently,” says Laurie Macartney, Scott’s mother and a master of understatement. “It was hard, but we learned a lot.” Laurie, a retired biology and chemistry teacher in Redmond, has earned the right to use the pronoun “we.” Scott entered Redmond High School with lofty academic ambitions on a par with those he had set for himself as an athlete. At the same time the honors student was moving into ninth grade, he had already started collecting Junior Olympic ski racing titles, while skiing out of the small club at Crystal Mountain. “I was like a manager or aide,” says Laurie. “The coaches couldn’t travel to all his races, so I did travel arrangements, but it was the schooling that was the hardest to arrange.”

Thanks to Laurie’s efforts, a cooperative school system and Scott’s determination, Scott graduated with his class in the spring of 1996, only one B+ away from a 4.0 grade-point average. But it wasn’t easy. “I had to do some pretty weird stuff,” says Scott. That included working independently to complete some full-year classes in a quarter, taking physics and calculus via correspondence courses and attending Belleview Off-Campus for the winter terms of his junior and senior years. “I guess you’d call it an alternative public school,” says Scott. “It was set up for pregnant teens and drug addicts, but I could work with individual tutors and take the winter off for skiing.”

On graduation day, Macartney proudly held his diploma in one hand, relieved that he could finally pursue his ski racing without academic interruptions. In the other hand was a letter of acceptance from Dartmouth College.

Life’s crossroads weren’t always so confusing. Scott’s parents, Laurie and John, a retired Redmond School District teacher and principal, have been making the two-hour trek to Crystal Mountain for 35 years, where they share a cabin with several families. Scott made his first turns by age 3 and won his first ski race by 5. Just a few years later, Alan Lauba came to Crystal Mountain to coach. Fresh off the U.S. World Cup downhill circuit, Lauba brought with him an infectious enthusiasm and a passion for freeskiing.

“Crystal doesn’t have the best snow for training – it’s often too soft or raining, so we’d go off chasing Alan,” says Macartney. “We’d ski the crud, go down chutes, jump off cliffs – it was all about having fun.” Lauba took special notice of two of his young charges, who consistently stayed with him turn for turn – Scott Macartney and Tatum Skoglund – both destined for the U.S. Ski Team. “It was fun knowing that I was finishing my career, just as I knew these two were starting theirs,” says Lauba. “They fell in love with ski racing and knew this was what they wanted.” Skoglund, a classmate, teammate and Macartney’s best friend, set the pace in those J III and IV years, pummeling all the boys on a regular basis. But Macartney was also making his mark within the Western Region, earning his first Junior Olympic slalom title in 1993.

Macartney and Skoglund were now faced with the first of many difficult decisions – attend a specialized ski racing academy or stay home and find a way to get more access to training? “I looked into an academy,” says Macartney, “but cost was an issue, and in some cases the academics weren’t that stellar.” Plan B entailed piling into the Skoglund’s car three days a week after school to make the 45-minute drive to Snoqualmie Summit ski area, where they would meet up with Lauba for slalom training. It wasn’t the best arrangement, but by turning the station wagon into study hall during the commute and getting in a few runs under the lights, they made it work.

Despite the logistical challenges, this regimen was bearing fruit. “It takes mental toughness in this program,” says Lauba. “We’ll ski and train in conditions people wouldn’t even put their boots on.” The program also puts a premium on fostering independence. “If you want to succeed, you have to be self-motivated,” says Lauba. “Scott never needed someone to kick his butt to get in shape or get to training. In the long run, it pays off.”

The payoff in the short-run for Macartney came with three more Junior Olympic slalom titles, along with a junior national super G championship in 1997. It was that year that Macartney opted to defer enrollment at Dartmouth College to pursue ski racing, and it proved to be his best to date. Yet, by the end of the season, Macartney was convinced his international ski racing dream had reached a dead end. “I qualified for the ski team after that season based on my international rankings,” recalls Macartney. “But then they eliminated that criteria. I was discouraged; I couldn’t afford to take another entire year off. This was my last shot.” Fortunately, Macartney had a promising fallback – Dartmouth College.

Macartney had been intrigued by the college ever since he was a youngster, when he noticed a Dartmouth identification in the corner of a poster featuring 1980s U.S. team member Tiger Shaw. In seventh grade, he wrote to Dartmouth requesting information for a mock application project. In the fall of his senior year, his application for early admissions was the real thing. It was also the only one he submitted.

Despite his infatuation with Dartmouth, Macartney didn’t visit the Dartmouth campus until his freshman orientation in 1997. Fellow USST member and Macartney’s current Dartmouth roommate, Bryon Friedman, loves to tell the tale of Macartney’s arrival on campus. “When Scott rolled into his dorm, he gets his bike set up and decides to explore the town. But he goes out the drive and turns the wrong way; he never found Hanover; probably wound up in Etna or somewhere,” relates Friedman, stifling a laugh. Macartney quickly adjusted and thrived, but ski racing’s sirens song lured him into taking the second trimester off to pursue one more shot at the team.

The second time turned out to be the charm. After a series of outstanding results, Macartney was named to the 1998 World Junior Team, and he didn’t let this opportunity slip away. A third-place finish in the downhill at the world junior championships earned him that long sought-after berth on the U.S. Team. But there were more speed bumps ahead.

Macartney blasted into the 1999 season, capturing the NorAm super G title, and a starting spot for the 2000 World Cup – only to be derailed by patellar tendonitis. “It was tough to decide to get it taken care of,” says Macartney. “I had just got a World Cup start for the season, but I had the surgery and went back to Dartmouth.”

After a successful comeback the following season, Macartney went down once again with a torn calf muscle and broken tibia plateau. That spring, Macartney returned to campus with a new set of crutches and renewed resolve to return to the circuit.

After another NorAm super G title, a start in the 2002 Olympic downhill and multiple top 10 Europa Cup finishes, Macartney is now healthy and poised to take the next step – the World Cup. “Getting to the highest levels is difficult,” says Macartney. “You have to push, take chances and fully test yourself in every way. After an initial ass-kicking, you realize you have to rise to a whole other level of intensity, but that’s the fun and the challenge.”

John McBride, U.S. head men’s downhill coach, is confident Macartney
has the tools for the next step. “Mac busts his ass. He works hard and is a physical specimen,” says McBride. “He has all the skills to be successful; it’s now a matter of execution.” Noting that there are a lot of talented athletes on the ski team who will never quite make it all the way to the World Cup, Lauba still likes Macartney’s chances. “It’s his perseverance that’s going to pay off. He just keeps banging away. He did this every step of the way, and he had to do this to make the team. He’ll keep banging away until he gets what he’s after.”

Macartney has every intention of doing just that. “I’m in no rush to go into the real world. I plan on skiing as long as I can, and as long as I’m competitive and having fun. Now is the time; I have the desire and the strength. I want to be able to look back and say, ‘I’ve given it all I’ve got.’ ”

With Macartney in the hunt for World Cup starts, and only two quarters shy of earning a Dartmouth diploma (his degree will be in economics), he’s finally in the fast lane and bearing down on the finish line.