As she pushed children strapped to wheeled luge sleds down a ramp and onto a makeshift course along a hilly Research Park street Saturday, U.S. Olympian Ashley Hayden recalled her own experience with Slider Search — the official recruiting program for USA Luge.
With some prodding from her father in the summer of 1995, Hayden — then a 13-year-old living in Massachusetts — traveled to Boston for a Slider Search clinic. The program had been advertised on local television, and organizers were swamped with some 20,000 luger wannabes. They selected 1,000 — including Hayden — for the weekend clinic.
"This was something different, and I saw it as a challenge," Hayden recalled. "There weren't so many kids doing it, so I was able to go back to school and say I did the luge." And her Slider Search effort on the Boston pavement? "I took out a cone and crashed into the curb," she said, laughing. "I left that day thinking, "That was fun and I'll never do that again."
But USA Luge coaches later called, offering more training in the national program and eventually a spot on the junior national team. The 1998 Junior World Cup champion, Hayden finished eighth at the 2002 Salt Lake Winter Olympics.
The same Verizon USA Luge Slider Search is in Salt Lake City this weekend, inviting youth ages 10 to 14 to try riding a wheeled training sled and participate in several physical-skills tests. Cost is $15 per youth, which includes the three-hour clinic, a T-shirt and a chance to interact with USA Luge coaches and Olympians like Hayden and two-time medalist Chris Thorpe.
Sunday's sessions are scheduled for 9 a.m. and 2 p.m., with walk-up registration available on Tabby Lane just south of the Fort Douglas Cemetery. Two sessions were held Saturday as well.
Hayden, Thorpe and USA Luge coach Jon Owen showed clinic participants the sport's winter gear and equipment and then, after fitting the youth with helmets, showed them how to lie on, ride and eventually turn the wheeled sleds.
After a couple of straight shots down a closed off downhill section of Colorow Way, the youth tried sliding through a simple cone-marked slalom course before taking off from a steeper truck-mounted ramp.
"I'm the one who went into the bushes," admitted 11-year-old Amanda Airmet, who joined 13-year-old stepsister Madeline Grant for the morning session.
And the most frightening thing about riding the wheeled luge at speeds of 25 to 30 mph?
"Going off the ramp," said Amanda.
Added Madeline: "And trying to dodge the cones."
After the sled runs came the fitness tests: 15 seconds to make as many chin-ups as possible, two tries at a standing long jump and a chest pass for distance with a heavy rubber ball — two kilos, or about 4.5 pounds, for the girls and three kilos for the boys. The latter tests explosiveness in arm and chest muscles that are used in the start of the luge event.
The clinic finished with the awarding of a T-shirt and a photo opportunity with Hayden and Thorpe — and Thorpe's bronze medal — won in the luge doubles at the 2002 Games. The youth will receive a letter next month explaining how they can be involved in local luge clubs and programs — with a select few possibly being invited to participate in on-ice clinics in the winter.
Of the nearly 1,000 youth who will participate in the Slider Search clinics across the country from Long Island to Los Angeles, about 150 will be invited to a several-day clinic at the Utah Olympic Park in Park City or in Lake Placid, N.Y., for more training and a possible shot with USA Luge's developmental team.
Thorpe, who grew up as a young teen sliding down a makeshift track in the Michigan woods and is one of the few remaining U.S. team members who didn't break in with the Slider Search program, knows the importance of the traveling summer recruitment program.
"There's plenty of luge talent out there," Thorpe said. "We just need to maximize that." And, as he pointed out across the Salt Lake metro area, he added, "There's Olympic potential out there in the valley."
Potential that is already being realized. Salt Lake's own Yukio Griffall, who got his luge start in a similar Slider Search clinic, is joined by teammate Dan Joye, from New York City, as the reigning junior world champions in doubles.
Owen, who oversees USA Luge's Western Region from Park City, lists off the residences of national-team members — cities and states from coast to coast.
"For such a venue-based sport," he said, "we've got a very national team."
E-MAIL: taylor@desnews.com