NENSA Strives To Stay ‘Ahead Of The Curve’ In Creating Opportunities For Para Nordic Skiers In New England

In March, three teenagers — one from Maine and the other two from the Midwest — competed at the New England Nordic Ski Association (NENSA) Eastern High School Championships in Holderness, New Hampshire.

The Eastern High School Championships is considered the premier event for high school cross-country skiers in the New England and New York area. Even though the event has a large field made up of teenagers from multiple states, there was something noteworthy about these three Nordic skiers.

They competed as standing skiers because of physical impairments to their limbs. A few years earlier, a teenager raced at the Eastern High School Championships on a sit ski.

“Our goal is to keep offering opportunities, and if the word spreads, eventually more (adaptive athletes) will find it and more will come,” said Fred Bailey, NENSA’s event manager. “More athletes may want to go from just trying the sport to perhaps wanting to compete in it.”

As the umbrella organization for cross-country skiing in New England and the regional affiliate for U.S. Ski & Snowboard, NENSA hosts dozens of events — both educational and competitive — for skiers of all ages and abilities throughout the Northeast.

Over the past two years, NENSA officials have placed more of an emphasis on integrating Para Nordic skiers with able-bodied skiers. They’ve collaborated with U.S. Paralympics Nordic Skiing on everything from learning ways to make their events more accessible to providing adaptive athletes with specialized ski equipment.

“We’ve been thrilled to identify as many opportunities as possible to include and welcome Para Nordic athletes,” said Heidi Lange, NENSA’s executive director. “We have a lot of infrastructure in place already, so to adapt our events in order to include and support these athletes, in most cases, is something that we can make happen with the right sort of knowledge and awareness.”

In December, Eileen Carey, director of U.S. Paralympics Nordic Skiing, gave a presentation at NENSA’s annual Event Organizer and Technical Delegate Training Seminar in central New Hampshire. She spoke about ways to better incorporate Para Nordic skiing into ski events hosted in the region.

BethAnn Chamberlain, a development coach with U.S. Paralympics Nordic Skiing, has found ski equipment for adaptive athletes to use. In addition, Paralympic gold medalist Dan Cnossen, who lives in Massachusetts, has attended several NENSA events as a guest.

“So much of this is about exposure and awareness,” Lange said, “and I think that we have a role to play in just creating awareness of these opportunities and growing the sport by providing those opportunities.”

NENSA officials decided to focus even more on integrating Para Nordic skiing into its regional events and ski clubs after a major change to the sport was announced in 2022. That year, the International Paralympic Committee transferred governance of Para Nordic skiing, Para alpine skiing and Para snowboarding to the International Ski and Snowboard Federation, better known as FIS, the organization that also governs the able-bodied disciplines.

NENSA had a Para Nordic skiing program around a decade ago, but it dissolved because of a lack of funding. However, the NENSA staff started having conversations about ways to get more involved in adaptive skiing after FIS became the sport’s governing body.

“Once we got the note from Eileen and from FIS that Para (Nordic) was going to get rolled into FIS as the governing body, (it was) like, ‘Oh, well, we need to understand how to support these athletes because the expectation at some point is there’s going to be more of them at our events and we have to host concurrent events,’” Bailey said. “So as a region, how do we do that efficiently? And so there’s still a learning curve for sure.”

Lange said Bailey has worked closely with event organizers to think about special considerations for Para Nordic skiers, including easier access for them at race venues and course designs that will work for sit skiers.

NENSA, meanwhile, has helped introduce Nordic skiing to adaptive athletes in an effort to grow the sport.

A year ago, NENSA held a ski clinic in Concord, New Hampshire, to teach individuals with physical impairments how to ski. In addition, the organization has a program called Nordic Rocks, which teaches elementary school students about cross-country skiing.

One of the schools that participated in the program this year had a student who needed a sit ski to get around on snow. As a result, NENSA found a rental sit ski that the student could use to ski with the rest of the class.

“We’re trying to be just ahead of the curve enough, so that we can set the athletes up well for success,” Bailey said. “So when they get here, they feel like they’re part of the community and the events are for them as well. They’re not just an afterthought. They’re fully incorporated.”

Alex Abrams has written about Olympic and Paralympic sports for more than 15 years, including as a reporter for major newspapers in Florida, Arkansas and Oklahoma. He is a freelance contributor to USParaNordic.org on behalf of Red Line Editorial, Inc