Elite Skiing group offers snowsport enthusiasts real-time interaction on Facebook
Elite Skiing is the offspring of Terry Godbout, a Coeur d’Alene resident and ski instructor who follows the international scene closely. Last spring he was looking forward with anticipation to InterSki, a quadrennial gathering of snowsport instructors from around the world, usually held at an iconic or exotic location. This year it was held in September at Cerro Castor, a ski resort in the Argentine province of Tierra del Fuego.
“InterSki fills a need for international communication in the sport that seems to be lacking,” Godbout said. “I thought, why should we have to wait four years? With all this stuff we have available to us now we can do it in real time. It’s just amazing how this thing has resonated around the world.”
Godbout made his first Facebook post on May 4. Elite Skiing reached 1,000 members in 24 days. Since then, the group has averaged about 1,000 new members a month. Earlier this week the total was more than 7,300 members. The content is painted in broad strokes, with posts by a variety of species: freeskiers, new schoolers, racers, ski jumpers, instructors, backcountry skiers and patrollers.
At least 47 countries are represented. Most members hail from North America and Europe. However, Elite Skiing has members from South Korea, Japan, China, Russia, Eastern Europe, Nepal, India, Iceland, the Scandinavian countries, South America, Iran and South Africa.
“The communication on the group’s page seems to transcend geographic and political boundaries,” Godbout said. “It’s a real time way to learn from others in distant countries. Most of the posts and comments are in English, as it’s either everyone’s second language or the members are skilled in using Google Translate.”
According to Godbout, Elite Skiing was about to become the largest active skiing-related group on Facebook.
“There’s one group that has about 100 more members than we do,” he said. “But on Facebook you can see how many members a group has added in the past week. I think they added 17, but we’ve been adding about 300 a week. By (next week) we should be the biggest.”
When he launched Elite Skiing, Godbout had no idea that the group would grow so large so quickly. It’s gotten to the point where he spends from three to four hours a day moderating the stream of consciousness that flows 24/7 from all corners of the world.
“There are times when it will shoot off the rails, so you have to nudge it back on,” he said. “We’re trying to figure out some way to organize it better. There’s just so much content there. But I think people like the rapid fire way Facebook works.”
A large part of Godbout’s time is spent driving membership until he reaches his goal of 10,000. After that he expects Elite Skiing to be self-sustaining. He said the amount of high-quality content is growing along with the audience. But on Facebook, and social media in general, anything goes.
“I really don’t know where its gonna end up,” he said. “I’m kind of curious myself.”
If you have ideas for a topic for Bill Jennings’ ski column, contact him at billjski@gmail.com.