The JO Selection Committee reserves the right to not select an athlete for the team if an athlete does not meet the standards of the athletes’ code of conduct. If a selected athlete can not attend the JO's then the spot goes to the next athlete on list. For a detailed description and examples of the Selection Process, CLICK HERE.

Petitioning:

A racer who could not qualify through the above method because of conditions beyond their control (such as illness, college team commitments or family emergency) may petition the Far West JO Selection Committee to attend the Junior Olympics.

The petition is limited to one typewritten page and should include
1) The reason the athlete could not meet the qualifying criteria.
2) Results from other races, which represent a standard comparable to level of the FW JO qualifying races.

Submission: Petitions sent to the Far West Office (P.O. Box 10046, Truckee, CA 96162) must be postmarked by February 15th, 2006.
Petitions may be turned in to Race Registration at ASC by noon on SATURDAY FEBRUARY 18th, 2006. DO NOT HAND PETITIONS TO COACHES.
Petitions may be e-mailed to:  info@farwestnordic.org to arrive no later than noon on Saturday, February 18th.

Junior 3 Athletes

Junior Olympics is a competition for J2 athletes and above. J3s are encouraged to race in the Far West Qualifiers to gain race experience. J3 racers will be timed and be in the results, but shall not be counted or scored in the Team qualification or selection procedure.  In exceptional circumstances a 2nd-year J3 athlete may petition to attend Junior Nationals if they have qualifying times against the J2 field.  Such petitions will be judged on space availability on the team, athlete’s maturity and general readiness, impact on the team, as well as performance. 

Selections to the 2005 Junior Olympic team shall be announced on February 18th, 2006 at Auburn Ski Club, and shall be published immediately upon announcement.

In order to race at Junior Olympics athletes must be current members (in good standing) of Far West Nordic and of USSA (and not any other USSA division).

JO qualifying this year will have an additional step compared to previous years. The first step is the same as last year; ski in three of the 4 qualifiers and have a qualifying time in at least one skate and one classic race (see details above for how to do this.)

The second step is new. The United States Ski Association allows a quota of 21 men and 21 women per division to compete at the JO's (not including automatic qualifiers-see above.) For the first time in Far West history we feel we may have enough fast skiers who qualify that we might bump into that quota cap. So how do we decide who goes? Outlined above is how athletes will be ranked in their respective age classes. The higher you are ranked the more likely you will be chosen for the team. Because we don’t know exactly how many J2, J1, and OJ athletes we will take until all of the qualifying races are over, it can be difficult to know if you are safely high enough on the ranking list to be chosen. A minimum of 5 J2s and 5 J1's will go in each sex and the rest will be determined by how many participants have been in each age class. If you are ranked in the top 5 of J2 or J1's you are in a pretty safe place for selection. However, even this is not guaranteed because of the possibility of a “Coaches Discretionary” athlete being added to your age group.

Lets look at a few examples. Lets say there were a total of 20 male J2 athletes and 30 male J1/OJ athletes who participated in the qualifying races. This would make a ratio of 40% J2 and 60% J1/OJ. SO 40% of 21 is 8 J2 athletes and 60% is 13 J1/OJ athletes. Now lets assume there are two OJ coaches discretion athletes and 1 J2. This would mean we would go down the J2 ranking list and take the top 7 athletes plus the one discretionary athlete to make 8. On the J1/OJ ranking list we would go down and take the top 5 J1's (because of the minimum requirement to take at least 5 J1's) and then we would keep going until we had reached 11 athletes from the ranking list, plus the two discretionary athletes to make 13. It all seems confusing, but the bottom line is that you need to concentrate on skiing fast in a total of three races in order to be high on the ranking list. These examples are not meant to scare anyone away from trying to qualify; quite the opposite. Far West feels that this criteria will capture those athletes who train hard and focus on making the JO team.

The Far West website will continually update the results from the qualifiers and the updated ranking lists. The Far West coaching staff will also be able to help you know how you are doing as the qualifying races progress. If you train hard and smart you can make the JO team!