The United States Ski and Snowboard Association on Friday released a list of 48 athletes — 27 men and 21 women — nominated for inclusion on the 2008-09 alpine team. Notable from a first glance at the nominated athetes is a smaller number of A team members, a squad absent a handful of longtime U.S. veterans who didn’t make the criteria set forth for inclusion and also failed to garner a discretionary pick from the coaching staff.
    Starting from the top, the number of A team nominated athletes is just 10, down from 15 a year ago. The B team list includes 10 men and six women; the C team list includes five men and five women; and the Development Team list includes seven men and five women.
    U.S. Alpine Director Jesse Hunt said a year ago the organization tightened the objective criteria needed to make the team with the goal of raising overall performance on all levels. Hunt said Friday that he was pleased a number of athletes were able to “see the bar raised and step up to it.”
    “It’s a lot of work over a lot of years getting the team to where it currently is, and I think we have a super strong team right now,” Hunt said. 

The United States Ski and Snowboard Association on Friday released a list of 48 athletes — 27 men and 21 women — nominated for inclusion on the 2008-09 alpine team. Notable from a first glance at the nominated athetes is a smaller number of A team members, a squad absent a handful of longtime U.S. veterans who didn’t make the criteria set forth for inclusion and also failed to garner a discretionary pick from the coaching staff.
    Starting from the top, the number of A team nominated athletes is just 10, down from 15 a year ago. The B team list includes 10 men and six women; the C team list includes five men and five women; and the Development Team list includes seven men and five women.
    U.S. Alpine Director Jesse Hunt said a year ago the organization tightened the objective criteria needed to make the team with the goal of raising overall performance on all levels. Hunt said Friday that he was pleased a number of athletes were able to “see the bar raised and step up to it.”
    “It’s a lot of work over a lot of years getting the team to where it currently is, and I think we have a super strong team right now,” Hunt said.  
    “And it’s not just the World Cup we’re looking at, we’re looking at all levels and seeing where we need to push and where we need to provide good programming. And that criteria is part of making sure we have a healthy program at each level. It’s forced us to make some super difficult decisions in the process and we went through that this spring. I think, for the most part, it’s been a really tough process but I think we have a really strong team and we’re looking forward to the year.”
    Hunt said in selecting next year’s team members, athlete performance, race access and funding concerns all had to be taken into account. But first and foremost, Hunt stressed, a lot of athletes made the decision simple because they met the criteria laid out before the start of last season.
    “We’re definitely faced with a tough currency exchange but I think we’re managing it pretty well,” said Hunt, referring to the current weak dollar that’s made supporting athletes in Europe for an entire season much more expensive.
    “At the end of the day, we laid out a criteria and a lot of guys made criteria. We’re working through our challenges with regard to the euro. But the team size isn’t changing a whole lot. When it comes down to making these discretionary calls, some of [the decision process involves] access to World Cup [events]. We need to be sure we have picked a team size that is appropriate to the access we have at these different levels. It isn’t just about funding, it’s about access and performance. That’s why we have to make these hard decisions with regard to team size we’re carrying and what we’re doing.”
    Sarah Schleper and Erik Schlopy, who either missed all (Schleper) or a portion (Schlopy) of last season, have been nominated as discretionary picks for the B team for 08-09. Schleper gave birth to a son in January but attended the first women’s team camp recently at Mammoth and completed off-season testing in Park City.
    “I think her attitude is fantastic. She had a good first camp getting back on snow so we’re excited to see her return,” Hunt said. “I think she definitely comes back with a new perspective, there’s no doubt about that.”
    Schlopy will turn 36 in August but Hunt believes he can still be a force in GS. In the FIS point rankings released May 1, he was ranked 38th in the world in GS.
    “He definitely had an impact last year in the men’s GS and we believe he can continue to have an impact there. I think that’s really what we’re looking for in his nomination,” Hunt said. “He’s still a top level World Cup GS skier and brings great experience to the team and experience we feel is important to that team at the moment and we’re happy to have him back.”
    Hunt said he is particularly excited about a deep men’s development team group with a number of racers ranked high internationally for their age. The women’s D team contains just five members, and Hunt said the charge this season is to raise the collective level of racing among those women and make them more competitive internationally.
    Athletes nominated have 10 days to either accept or decline their nominations. The U.S. team will be named officially later this summer.