JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) - Hilary Lindh has still got it.
If “it” is a love of carving wide swaths in the snow and a passion for playing on the downhills and bowls of winter mountains from Utah to Norway.
If “it” is remembering the days she wore oversized snow pants and ski goggles as large as her helmet, tiny hands gripped on ski poles and her smile reflecting the vast white snowy runs that carried her from a wide-eyed child at Eaglecrest Ski Area to a role model with Olympic and World Cup medals.
“Even more so now,” Lindh said. “Mostly because I don’t get to do it as much as I would like; other things get in the way. Skiing was always a way of life for me, I think, more than just a sport. I am getting depressed that there is no snow yet.”
Eaglecrest officials announced on Monday the annual Hilary Lindh Scholarship Competition is open for the 2014/2015 ski season. Hosted by the Eaglecrest Board of Directors, the Hilary Lindh Scholarship was established in 1992 in recognition of Lindh’s Silver Medal in the 1992 Winter Olympics.
Four Eaglecrest season passes will be awarded; two for the Kindergarten through fifth-grade division, and two for the sixth through 12th-grade level.
According to Eaglecrest Ski Area Community Outreach Supervisor Julie Jackson, “We are looking for students whose competitive spirit reflects Hilary Lindh’s commitment to ski racing.”
Added Lindh; “Someone who is enthusiastic about trying new things and being outside especially.”
Lindh’s enthusiasm for the sport began under her parents’ tutelage and on family outings.
Mother Barb Lindh, a 1963 JDHS grad, grew up during the wooden skis era of the “third cabin days,” an alpine area marked by three cabins along Dan Moller Trail. Lindh’s father, Craig Lindh, worked for the U.S. Forest Service and is largely responsible for mapping out what became Eaglecrest. Lindh, at age seven, became his guinea pig for lift-evacuation practice, this was five years after she had put on skis and the young Lindh had already tasted the slopes at Anchorage’s Alyeska Resort.
“My parents’ love of the sport is for the sake of the sport and not anything to do with racing,” Lindh said in an earlier Empire interview. “That is the atmosphere I grew up in. My parents and all their friends, forever, are still out there skiing. It is neat to see.”
As a 13-year-old at Floyd Dryden Middle School, Lindh’s local ski competitions against boys grew to include competing with college racers and adults in Anchorage.
To continue her dream, she enrolled as a freshman in the Rowmark Ski Academy, part of Salt Lake City’s 110-year-old college preparatory school, Rowland Hall-St. Marks.
In 1985, Lindh began traveling with the U.S. Alpine Ski Team’s Development Team at the age of 15.
At 16, she was racing on the U.S. national team in Europe, beginning what would become 12 years of competition on the World Cup ski circuit. In 1986, she won the first of five U.S. championships at Copper Mountain, Colorado, in the downhill race. A week later, she stunned the ski world by becoming the first American to win the downhill title at the World Junior Championships. She would win another four U.S. Ski Championships: the 1989 downhill, 1992 combined and 1997 downhill and Super G.
In her first Olympics at the 1988 games in Calgary, Canada, Lindh didn’t place in downhill, was 23rd in combined and 26th in Super G.
In 1992, Lindh won a silver medal at the Olympics in Albertville, France.
In the 1994 Olympics at Lillehammer, Norway, Lindh again battled injury and finished seventh in downhill and 13th in Super G. That year she also won her first World Cup victory, the 100th win by an American racer.
At the 1996 World Championships in Sierra Nevada, Spain, Lindh won a bronze medal in downhill and fifth in Super G, and at the 1997 World Championships in Sestriere, Italy, Lindh was the only American to medal, winning gold with the World Cup Downhill Championship.
She retired on March 13, 1997. Her 11-year total on the World Cup circuit is three wins, five podium placements, and 27 top ten finishes.
Lindh was inducted into the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame in April 2006 and the Alaska Sports Hall of Fame in February 2009.
She is also on the ASHOF ballot for selection again this year in the “Moment” category for winning the World Championship in 1997. She had delayed her retirement for a year for that gold medal.
Lindh has a second “Moment” category nomination; winning the silver medal in the women’s downhill at the 1992 Albertville Olympics in France. She was a TV commentator at the 1998 Olympics in Nagano, Japan, and a celebrity Olympian participant explaining competitions during the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics.
Despite the accolades Lindh remains humble, and has not lost the love of strapping on skis, something she sees in her 8-year-old daughter Raiya.
“I remember being the same age and being upset about missing Saturday morning cartoons because of skiing,” Lindh said. “We don’t have the exact same issue as that, but I think sometimes kids are not that enthused about getting out in the wet weather and the cold. But once Raiya is up there she is always psyched to be doing it. She is even more impatient than I am for the snow to come. It is really fun to ski as a family. Not just at Eaglecrest, but wherever we go.”
The Hilary Lindh Scholarship winners will be chosen based on scholastic achievement, competitive spirit and financial need. All applicants who meet all judging criteria will receive an Eaglecrest lift ticket and equipment rental. The application deadline is noon on Thursday, Dec. 4.
Applications are available online at skijuneau.com and at any Juneau School District public school. Applications should be submitted to Eaglecrest via fax, email, or mail, or may be submitted in person at the Eaglecrest ticket window or any JSD school by noon, Dec. 4. The 2014 recipients will be announced via SkiJuneau.com on Friday, Dec. 12.
“We have guidelines when we look at the applications, and I can’t speak for the other people,” Lindh said. “But for me it is always nice to find someone who is up for anything and is eager to get out and try new things.”
The scholarship program has morphed over the years.
Originally it was for kids who were more active in, and wanted to pursue, a race program. A lack of applicants over the years led to an expansion that reaches more youth who would otherwise not have the opportunity. The other unique portion of the program is that youth learn how to apply for scholarships.
“It is a wonderful program and it is great that it has continued on,” Barb Lindh said. “It is a wonderful honor and a wonderful opportunity for kids to get this recognition and to get the scholarship so they can pursue their hopes for skiing or boarding or learning to do either.”
It is not uncommon to see Hilary Lindh and husband Jodie McCutcheon, the manager of the Juneau Alaska Club, finding together time on the slopes, with Barb and Craig Lindh also taking their turns on the lifts and hills.
Nor is it uncommon to see Raiya Lindh McCutcheon grinning from snow-covered ear to snow-covered ear as she tries, and sometimes succeeds, in passing them by.
“She can’t quite catch Hilary right now,” Barb Lindh said. “But she is definitely tearing past grandma and grandpa.”
Hilary Lindh still has “it.”
She ripped the Eaglecrest Ski Area last March to post the fastest women’s time in the Valley Medical Town Downhill, hitting 58 miles per hour along the course that was named after her breath taking ski style and crossed the finish in 50.32 seconds.
That was less time than it took for most fans to cool off their coffees as they watched the event unfold.
She also put on cross-country skies and chased after her daughter in a race or two with Juneau’s Nordic community.
But it is the love of the outdoors and the lure of Alpine skiing that especially thrills Lindh.
“It is a hard thing to describe,” Lindh said. “It is a liberating feeling. One thing that always helps is if you have a certain level of skill then it is not a lot of work and it is not that hard. It is something that you feel empowered that you can charge down something that is steep and challenging and it is such a good feeling to be doing that and feeling like you are in control of it, but at the same time you are just going with the flow. The speed is obviously something that is exciting.”
Perhaps the biggest “it” that remains is found in the applications for the scholarship in her name.
This is where Juneau’s next little girl and little boy may find a wide and white smile larger than any mountain or any competition … just as Hilary Kirsten Lindh (born May 10, 1969) did when she put on cross-country skis at age 2 and skied alpine at age 5.
“Getting the wind in your face,” Lindh said. “Your clothing flapping … or skiing deep powder and you have powder billowing up over your head, it is just awesome.”
For more information on the Hilary Lindh Scholarship Competition visit skijuneau.com.
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Information from: Juneau (Alaska) Empire, https://www.juneauempire.com
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