{"id":2442882,"date":"2019-04-11T23:12:00","date_gmt":"2019-04-12T05:12:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/news\/avscs-garrett-russell-coaching-cross-country-skiing-in-alaska-australia\/"},"modified":"2019-04-11T23:12:00","modified_gmt":"2019-04-12T05:12:00","slug":"avscs-garrett-russell-coaching-cross-country-skiing-in-alaska-australia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/avscs-garrett-russell-coaching-cross-country-skiing-in-alaska-australia\/","title":{"rendered":"AVSC\u2019s Garrett Russell coaching cross-country skiing in Alaska, Australia"},"content":{"rendered":"
AVSC’s Garrett Russell<\/strong>
Courtesy photo<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Garrett Russell is always looking for unique travel opportunities, and his knowledge of Nordic skiing has opened many doors for him to do so. Russell, who is the Bill Koch Youth Ski League director for the Aspen Valley Ski and Snowboard Club, has spent the past week teaching in northern Alaska through a program called Skiku.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou go with a group of people who may coach Nordic skiing or have a passion for it and want to pass on their skills,\u201d Russell said prior to leaving for Alaska last week. \u201cWe will be working during their P.E. class. We will be taking them out and outfitting them with a bunch of skis.\u201d<\/p>\n

Russell traveled to the village of Point Lay, which is located within the Artic Circle, this week where he was working with the local schools to teach cross-country skiing. While the Anchorage area is one of the world\u2019s premier hubs for competitive Nordic skiing, the sport isn\u2019t as present in the rest of the state.<\/p>\n

According to its website, Skiku\u2019s \u201cgoal is to get Alaska skiing.\u201d Russell volunteered with the nonprofit for the first time last spring, where he went to Utqiagvik, Alaska, otherwise known as Barrow, the northernmost city in the United States.<\/p>\n

\u201cI actually grew up in Alaska from the age of 9 to 15. Last year was the first year I was able to go back in 18 years, since I moved,\u201d said Russell, now 33. \u201cBecause my passion is Nordic skiing, I also wanted to find another volunteer opportunity to allow me to travel and go someplace really unique and super far off the grid. This opportunity presented itself to be what I was looking for.\u201d<\/p>\n

Russell\u2019s second stint with Skiku will end this weekend. Then, in June, the second part of his summer travels will get underway when he heads to Australia where he will be the head cross-country ski coach for New South Wales Cross Country, a ski club similar to AVSC.<\/p>\n

The opportunity came about through AVSC Nordic program director August Teague, who spent four years with the Australian national team before returning to his roots in Aspen. This will be Russell\u2019s first time traveling to Australia. He\u2019ll return to Aspen in the fall to continue working with AVSC.<\/p>\n

acolbert@aspentimes.com<\/a><\/p>\n

via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AVSC’s Garrett RussellCourtesy photo Garrett Russell is always looking for unique travel opportunities, and his knowledge of Nordic skiing has opened many doors for him to do so. Russell, who is the Bill Koch Youth Ski League director for the Aspen Valley Ski and Snowboard Club, has spent the past week teaching in northern Alaska […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2442882","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-16 15:04:25","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2442882","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2442882"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2442882\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2442882"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2442882"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2442882"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}