It’s that time of year when the snow keeps falling, the temperature keeps plunging, the wind keeps dumping huge drifts in our driveway, and the skis start flying. It’s time for Friday night lights. No, not Friday night football lights, but Friday night ski jumping lights.
Five years ago the Westby Snowflake Ski Club decided to try ski jumping at night–on Friday night. It was a big success and this will be the fifth year of watching skiers fly off into the darkness of the night on the 118-meter Olympic-sized jumping hill. It certainly adds a whole new flavor to ski jumping. This year the Friday night lights tournament is, January 31. Saturday’s jumping is during daylight hours.
I can’t imagine what it must be like to push off and start down the inrun of the scaffold, picking up speed, while everything around you is dark except for the lights illuminating the scaffold and landing hill. It must be an exciting, surreal experience for the jumpers.
We attended many jumping tournaments when I was young. It was always an exciting time and I remember many of those famous ski jumpers from my youth. Billy Olson, Art Devlin, Willie Erickson, John Balfanz, Gene, Kotlarek, Dave Norby, and Westby’s own, Lyle Swenson. I bet not many people can name any of today’s ski jumpers. That’s too bad, because those old ski jumpers were heroes to us.
I remember seeing Lyle Swenson set the track as the first jumper off the new 90-meter hill after it was built. I remember when John Balfanz set the new North American record of 317 feet. I hope future generations can have similar memories about watching today’s jumpers in the original extreme sport of ski jumping. Of course, we always liked to see a few spectacular crashes too. I guess that’s human nature. It seems like there are very few falls these days. Either the jumpers have become more skilled or the less skilled are no longer in the sport.
Remember that poor ski jumper that fell on the scaffold, and went bouncing off the jump each week on “The Wide World of Sports” as they announced “and the agony of defeat.” He probably had a thousand good jumps, but that one disaster is what we saw and now remember. His falling focused attention on him and made him famous. That’s too bad.
Ski jumping is an extreme sport and we should be celebrating that guy’s courage to do what the majority of people would never attempt. These days, it’s hard to find anyone who ski jumps or has tried it in the past. When I was young, many of the guys around the Westby area jumped. Now there are so many organized sporting activities for kids, their time is limited, and very few try ski jumping. I was never very good at it, but we had a lot of fun and thrills. I was pretty good at falling too. I did a couple of spectacular face plants when I jumped too late that you’d have found exciting to watch. I still have my old jumping skis and boots, but don’t ask me to put them on and try it again. I’m not that dumb.
I should also make it very clear that I never attempted to jump on the big hills in Timber Coulee. Most of our jumping was on makeshift jumps that we made on the hills around our area. One of our best jumps was on a steep hill near Esofea. Unfortunately there was a stream running through the valley and we needed to get stopped before reaching the water. Rocks and trees were also a hazard. You’re probably starting to understand that my friends and I were in the amateur class when it came to jumping. We didn’t get to spend a lot of time perfecting what little skills we had, but we certainly had fun, and no one got seriously hurt, unless you count getting knocked out and seeing stars.
My brother, David, hits the takeoff on Severson Hill
We finally got the thrill of going off a real ski jump when we went up to the old Severson hill in Westby when no one else was around. If anyone had known we didn’t have any training on a real jumping hill, they would probably have chased us off. Some Westby area people may remember where that hill was. It was where the junior jumpers skied and had their tournaments. I don’t recall how far you could jump on that hill but think it was around 60 – 80 feet. Maybe it was more. I know it was plenty big for me.
I don’t think any of us would have received many style points. We were just happy to get to the bottom of the hill without killing ourselves. One thing I can tell you, ski jumping is quite a rush, even for those of us who did it to have some fun and also see if we had the guts to drop our skis into the tracks and let them start down the inrun. There was no putting them in reverse. Once you committed yourself, the wild ride was on. At least I never went bouncing off the takeoff like that poor TV jumper.
There’s nothing quite like flying through the air. I wonder what it would feel like under Friday night lights?
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