Last week the new batch of Peak Leaders trainees arrived for the Autumn Instructor Course in Saas Fee, Switzerland. Arriving from various destinations across the globe including U.K., Mexico and Greece, everyone was very excited and eager for the course to commence. Eager to get skiing and boarding all the trainees, despite feeling a bit tired from travelling, were up early on Sunday morning. The day before training commenced was the perfect chance to get their ski legs back and explore the glacier in perfect bluebird conditions.

Awesome day 1 in Saas Fee

The first week of training for many of the Peak Leaders was a big learning curve, with most of them being self taught or had only had childhood lessons.  Getting back to the basics of skiing and snowboarding, learning how to stand and balance was exciting and great fun. The weather all week was perfect conditions on nice grippy snow with the sun beaming down … who could ask for more!?

The commute to work is pretty epic

The training environment up on the glacier at the moment is incredibly inspiring, full of dedicated professional race teams including the awesome national Swiss and French teams. The trainees who were star struck by the talent of Lara Gut and Julia Mancuso, were privileged enough to train beside them on the glacier too.  Lets hope their professionalism and talent is wearing off on the trainees as BASI Level 1 nears.

Perfect training conditions in Saas Fee

There have been a few comedy crashes and ‘punter’ mishaps so far, some including Peter skiing over Max on a Tbar, other Max with his pink lipsalve falling over, and Jack, one of the snowboarders, trying to copy the pros by jumping on to a tbar once it was on its way and nearly wiping out the other person … very entertaining for everyone else in the group! The highlight for the skiers was witnessing Emma, one of the ski trainers, also fall over clumsily which sliding!

Premier League Training

Everyone is super motivated to make the most of the ten weeks they have in this amazing Swiss mountain village they are currently living in. With winter soon upon us, the trainees have been taking advantage of the summer weather after skiing down in the village. The boys have been playing 5 aside football down at the playing fields in the afternoon, with the girls doing great cheerleader routines on the side lines. Others have been hiking, swimming, running and of course sampling some of the mountain nightlife!

Saas Fee’s football pitches

The Peak Leaders trainees start their final week of training before sitting their course to become Snowsports Instructors the week after. They are ready, energized, and ready to rock … it will be a full on week of training to get ready for the level 1 but they are all pumped and ready to go! By next weekend they will be ripping up the glacier as BASI Level 1 instructors hopefully!  Stay tuned!