Steamboat Springs Winter Sports Club alumna Ellie Reynolds scored a U19 women’s International Freeskier & Snowboarder Association Junior National Big Mountain ski competition title last week, winning her qualifying run and capping it off with a final’s win on the Silver Fox run at Snowbird on Feb. 27 in Utah.

“Ellie overcame challenging, hard-packed conditions and put down a fantastic run on Silverfox, sending both Standard and Pistachio airs. She graduated from Steamboat Springs High School at the end of first semester and is now training at Snowbird for the rest of the winter,” according to a news release from the winter sports club.

Nine SSWSC freeride team members and five snowboard big mountain team members competed at the Snowbird event. All of the Steamboat athletes qualified for the finals.

“Qualifying all U15 boys in the top 20 was an amazing accomplishment, said TJ Chase, Freeride Competition Coach. “Other teams and coaches at the event took notice and were extremely impressed by the quality skiing displayed by our SSWSC athletes.”

After all first-run scores were tabulated, Brannigan Murphy was the top qualifier for the boys, notching the third-place slot.  

After laying down solid finals run, Murphy ended the competition in fourth place, earning a top-five finish, according to a winter sports club press release. Banks Ward, who was ninth going into finals, took advantage of the quality snow conditions and moved up two spots to finish seventh. 

In the snowboard division, Reid Graham, who participated in his first Junior 3 National, finished in second place. 

First-time National competitor U15 girls snowboarder Jayla McGlone also finished on the podium in second place. For the U19 snowboard men, Cooper Malia and Calvin Lieberman finished sixth and ninth place, respectively. In the U19 women’s snowboard division, Riley McNew finished fourth.

The weekend-long event was one of the last three national events of the season. With only a handful of events left, including A Basin 2, Aspen/Snowmass 2, and the Breckenridge 3 National, many SSWSC athletes are still in position to make it to Junior Freeride Championships, which will be held April 6-13 in Kirkwood, California.