It has been two years since St. Thomas has had an alpine ski racing club, but sophomore Holton Sailer and junior Kyle Schnichels are ready to change that.

The two met in Scooter’s in February, when Schnichels overheard Sailer commenting on the Olympic skiing playing on the television.

“Skiing’s one of those things I just can’t help talking about,” Schnichels said.

The two struck up a conversation and began talking about the absence of an alpine ski racing club on campus.

Schnichels skied for his high school, Academy of Holy Angels in Richfield, Minnesota, and was an assistant coach for the 2016-2017 season. The team’s coach suffered a serious knee injury, leaving him unable to be on the hill for majority of the season. This increased Schnichels’ involvement, this experience taught him how to set courses for racers, a skill that will be needed with the alpine ski racing club.

Sailer skied for East Ridge High School in Woodbury on a team that partnered with the United States Ski Association. He also raced on a team at the ski resort Afton Alps growing up.

“Last year was the first year in a long time that I hadn’t been racing at all,” Sailer said. “I’m looking forward to having that community feeling that comes along with a team again.”

With their backgrounds and desire to bring this club back to campus, they decided that they could be the ones to revive the St. Thomas Alpine Ski Racing Club.

While still in the early stages of the process, they are starting to prepare now for next winter.

Several steps are involved with the declaration of a club on campus. They need to get at least 10 club members, find a manager or adviser and draft a club constitution.

Currently, Sailer and Schnichels are working on finding club members. They are hoping to set up a table at the 2018 fall semester club fair to spread the word and find more interested students.

One of their goals is to get the club sanctioned under the United States Collegiate Ski Association. The USCSA organizes races for over 200 colleges, making it one of the largest ski racing conferences in the US.

In order to be under the USCSA, the club will need to be one of the top two finishers in the regional championship in Marquette, Michigan.

The two are interested in having the club encompass more than just racing.

“In the big picture, I would love to hold ski tuning clinics or ski lessons for students that want to be involved but lack experience,” Sailer said.

As clubs are required to complete service hours to receive funding from the university, Sailer and Schnichels talked about the club helping out at high school races by being gate judges, race starters or doing course maintenance.

Taylor Shupe can be contacted at shup9397@stthomas.edu