It’s been a week since the Audi F.I.S. Ski World Cup brought some of the world’s fastest male downhillers to the slopes of Aspen Mountain.
There were two men’s downhill races last Friday and Saturday and a super-G on Sunday (the Friday race was canceled partway through the competition), but it wasn’t all men on the course.
Cheyenne Brown was one of the forerunners, skiing down the course before the racers began to ensure the track was safe and everything was ready to go.
The 23-year-old ski racer grew up on Donner Summit in California and now trains with the Aspen Valley Ski and Snowboard Club.
Brown said she considers the experience “one of the coolest” parts of ski racing, in part because it's it's an opportunity to ski "fast as you want" without the pressures of rankings and leaderboards.
“It's not like ‘oh, I hope I win,’ or ‘I don't want to lose,’” Brown said in an interview near the grandstands on March 3. The experience is also “great training,” she said.
Brown said she feels “so honored and so blessed” to have the opportunity to ski as a forerunner and learn from the competitors.
“I feel like a sponge, I'm just trying to soak it all in and really bask in the moment of how cool this is,” Brown said. “I know it's weird to have a lady forerunner for a men's World Cup. I mean, I feel very special, but … these are my heroes and I feel so honored right now.”
