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Jasper’s Sam Ruttiman will be Australia’s lone representative in the slopestyle event at the Freestyle Junior World Ski Championships in Italy next month.
The 15-year-old student at Jasper Junior/Senior High School was born in Australia and now holds dual citizenship with Canada. He had been training with the Australian junior team in Colorado for much of January and on Feb. 3 he got a call informing him he had made the cut.
“I was pretty stoked,” Sam said.
A former member of the Jasper Freeride club, Sam later moved to the British Columbia Pipe and Park Team to focus on the slopestyle and big air disciplines and to do more half-pipe training.
“Alberta doesn’t have a pipe and park team so we went with the B.C. program,” said Mark Ruttiman, Sam’s father.
Competing for Australia will add one more stop to an already busy schedule for both Sam and Mark, who accompanies his son on most of his trips.
Between his scheduled training and upcoming competitions in B.C., Ontario and Quebec, Sam will have just one weekend off before he flies to Italy on March 18.
“Then the day after I get back (to Canada) I have another competition I don’t even have time to do training for,” Sam said.
Despite the whirlwind schedule, Mark said his son manages to keep up with school work. For social studies he makes use of Alberta Distance Learning, and for math and science he gets support from his teachers in Jasper, with whom he stays in touch via email.
“Also we have had unreal support from Victor and his team at Totem Ski Shop here in Jasper, keeping Sam’s skis tuned and ready to go,” Mark said.
Sam had a training session in Whistler over the weekend and he hopes to introduce some new moves to his slopestyle repertoire in the weeks leading up to the world juniors.
“I’m working on switch hits and maybe even some double flips and just new tricks to put in my run and take it to a new level,” he said.
The Freestyle Junior World Ski Championships take place March 19 to 25 in Valmalenco, Italy. The slopestyle event is scheduled for March 22. |
