Poles Apart Teenage Skiers Glide To Success With Different Training Styles

With training schedules as different as their skiing disciplines, Erin Quinn-Hurst and Molly Maixner prove there is more than one way to succeed on snow.

Quinn-Hurst, a junior at Lewis and Clark High School, placed sixth in the 3X5 kilometer relay and 11th in the 5 kilometer classic race at the U.S. Junior Olympic Nordic Skiing Championships three weeks ago in Minnesota.

Maixner, a Gonzaga Prep sophomore, was third in the slalom, fourth in the Super-G and eighth in the giant slalom at the Western Regional J-II Olympics at the Alyeska Resort in Alaska in early March.

For Quinn-Hurst, skiing is a passion she hopes to turn into her ticket to the Junior World Championships.

Maixner, on the other hand, skis for the fun of it. Winning races is just the frosting on the cake or, more aptly, the powder on the piste.

Compare their different approaches: 17-year-old Quinn-Hurst has forgone other sports for skiing. At the peak of winter, she spends 14 hours a week pounding the trails at Mount Spokane State Park.

“As I decided to take skiing to another level, I wanted to focus more on the sport,” says Quinn-Hurst, explaining that she gave up soccer as a sophomore because she feared injuries might hamper her skiing.

“There’s a huge challenge, just challenging myself personally to see how much faster I can go,” she says.

And now Maixner: “I train only about twice a week,” the 16-year-old South Hill resident says. “Basically, running gates is just the most fun I have on skis.

“Out of all the competitors, I’m probably the only one who takes it this lightly.”

Despite their differing philosophies, the similarities between Maixner’s and Quinn-Hurst’s careers are striking.

Each began skiing when she was 3. After that, Quinn-Hurst joined the Bill Koch Youth Ski League when she was 8 years old, and Maixner began racing at Schweitzer when she was 5.

“Actually, you’re not allowed to start racing until you’re 8, but they let me in anyway,” Maixner says. “I totally wanted to emulate my brothers. They were like gods to me.”

Maixner’s brothers, Andy, a sophomore at Dartmouth College, and Ben, an LC senior, led the way in her family. The two no longer race.

For Quinn-Hurst, who has a younger brother who also competes in Nordic events, it was her father who introduced her to the sport.

Jon Quinn-Hurst remains one of Erin’s coaches.

“We’ve got a pretty unique relationship,” he says. “I put on my coaching hat and she puts on her training hat.

“We’re able to keep those roles really clear. There will be times when Erin will say, ‘I need my Dad now.”’

So what’s it going to take for Erin to reach her Junior Worlds goal?

“She needs to keep a solid training plan, not increase it too much,” Jon says. “The biggest thing is to realize that to be successful is going to be tough.

“I think if Erin sticks with her own plan, she’s got a really good shot at achieving her own goals.

“I’m saying that as a coach,” he said. “As a Dad, I’m really blown away by how dedicated she is.”

Like Quinn-Hurst, Maixner juggles skiing with honors classes in school. Quinn-Hurst has a 3.98 grade-point average; Maixner is a 4-point student.

Maixner also is president of the sophomore class at G-Prep.

Maixner’s success in Alaska wasn’t a surprise, says Schweitzer coach David Ojala. Because of her relatively relaxed approach to training, however, it is all the more astounding.

“It’s pretty remarkable that she has made the technical strides she’s made,” Ojala says. “What she has demonstrated is a good learning efficiency.”

Maixner believes her low-volume training schedule may in fact be what has preserved the joy in her skiing.

“I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that I didn’t burn myself out,” she says. “When people told me, ‘You’re doing well; you need to train more,’ I didn’t.”

Ojala says he might have pushed a kid with Maixner’s talent harder if she’d come along 15 years ago, when he coached racers on the U.S. Ski Team. Now, he says he realizes that skiing for her - and many other recreational racers - is just a part of their lives.

An important part but, still, just a part.

Last summer, when other racers her caliber were hitting the glaciers, Maixner didn’t ski. During the upcoming off-season, she says she may attend one of the racing camps at Mount Hood or at Whistler in British Columbia. Or maybe not.

Quinn-Hurst, on the other hand, has her training schedule set: strength training in the spring, roller skiing and running throughout the summer. There’s a high camp at Mount Bachelor in Bend, Ore., that Quinn-Hurst wouldn’t miss for the world.

But come next fall, both girls will be back on local snow, each in her own discipline, each with her own unique approach to achieving success, but no less in love with the sport.

“There’s a feeling you get skiing through gates you don’t get by just skiing down the mountain,” Maixner says.

Says Quinn-Hurst: “After a race, you can’t say, ‘Gee, that was great.”’ But hurting that bad and just giving everything you have, you know you’re alive.”