from the 2006 Junior Olympics Ski Jumping and Nordic Combined Our compliments to the organizers: Tom Dodds of Ford Sayre, chairman of the Organizing committee, and Jon Farnham, LOC president, chief of the jumping hill, and almost everything else. Tom and Jon assembled a great crew and things went pretty well even with difficult weather.
Larry Stone and Dan Warner didn't have jobs in the event, but they weren't going to miss the show so they drove down from Lake Placid for a couple of days.
Jumper parents form the great mass of the volunteers who make it all happen, and there were many parents in Lebanon to watch their daughters and sons compete. Here are three from the east; you should recognize the family names.
But the east didn't have a monopoly on parental support. Some families made the long trip from other divisions. For example, the National Sports Foundation team from Park City (Intermountain Division) enjoyed more than one hundred percent support. Ten athletes came to Lebanon but, counting coaches, parents and one little sister, the IMD delegation swelled to twenty one.
Of course there were ex-jumpers. We saw Dave Weider, an old Ford Sayre jumper, and Rick Hale from Rumford Maine. Also team-mates on the U.S. Ski Team during the 1970's, Dana Zelenakis who runs a small junior jumping program in his home town of Brattleboro VT, and Bill Cantlin who helps out with the Plymouth NH High School jumping team. Ex-jumper Peter Claus is now a judge, as is Jim Carter whose two boys Josh and Jeremy were good jumpers but haven't jumped in a while. Ex-jumper Bobby Brown from Rumford seems to be getting to more and more events as the years go by.
Chris Jones jumped at Proctor Academy and followed the Eastern circuit, but then spent a couple of years in Coleraine MN where he got to know coach Martin Bayer. Chris is back in the east and in college. Bob Rollins died just days before the JO's. Bob and Roland Tremblay were great pals and regulars on the Newport jumps, making snow, preparing the jumps, then coaching and judging. Roland coached several high school teams, and he was seen manning a rake in the dip during the JO target jump. Don West still jumps a little and keeps the Eastern Jumping web site. He and Tremblay stopped chatting to pose at Bob Rollins wake in Newport.
In the East, Marianne Fairall does it all. Mom of Junior-Worlds competitor Nick Fairall, she organizes, she raises money, and she make the others around her better people.
Jon Denney brought the whole family from Coleraine, up there in northern Minnesota: competitors Karl and Andre, little sister Arianna, and Mom Susan who works tirelessly for central jumping and contributed some pictures to this page. Jon was a team-mate of announcer Jeff Hastings at the 1984 Olympics in Sarajevo.
On the first day, the announcer was Jeff Hastings, fourth at the Sarajevo Olympics, who did expert commentary during NBC coverage of the 2006 Olympic ski jumping, but for the two final days, Jeff's younger brother Chris, a Calgary Olympian, did the honors. In the photo below-left, Chris occupies the high window, above the judges: Peter Claus (Kingston NY), Arne Erisoty (Ogden UT), Jim Carter (Andover NH), Bob Averill (Steamboat Spr. CO) and Korey Arneson (Wisconsin Rapids WI). Below-right, workers Andrew Baker and Roland Tremblay prepare the hill for the night target jump.
Susan Denney contributed a bunch of her nice pictures, but we still welcome more good ones. We especially need team photos for East and RMD, nicer pictures of Jon Farnham and Tom Dodds, and shots of other workers. Please
send them along by e-mail. Thanks - DCW.
The final event of the Junior Olympics was the Nordic Combined Team Sprint, moved from Oak Hill, Hanover NH to Proctor Academy's Blackwater Ski Area, Andover NH where the snow was adequate. Here are three Central Division racers at Blackwater. The big red and white sign says it all!
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