Im proud to officially announce the 2006 US Olympic Jumping Team. After an intense first half of the winter, and all of our international and domestic competitions, the qualification period is complete and the list is official.

Your 2006 US Olympic Ski Jumping Team;

1) Alan Alborn - most World Cup points
2) Clint Jones - most COC points
3) Tommy Schwall - 2nd most COC points
4) Anders Johnson - 1st place after domestic qualifiers
5) Jimmy Denney - 2nd place domestic qualifiers

Its a great team of US Ski Jumpers; with Alan Alborn, our veteran at 25 and his 3rd Olympics leading the team. Clint and Tommy have both qualified for their 2nd Olympic Games, and Jimmy Denney and the youngest Nordic Olympian ever, Anders Johnson at 16, are 1st time Olympians. Each of these 5 jumpers have worked closely with me the past year, and have shown they are the ones who will represent our Country, and get the most out of the Winter Olympic Games experience.
Its a great representation from the regions around the country, Alaska, Steamboat, the Central, and for the first time Park City and the legacy of our 2002 Olympics, are paying dividends. All of our regions around the country can feel proud of these guys, and know they contributed to building our Olympic Team; from Hanover, NH to Anchorage, Ak, and every jump and program in between.

Alan and I just returned (last night at 1am) from World Ski Flying Championships in Kulm, Austria. It was a great event, with amazing jumping by the Norwegian team, over 100,000 fans for the weekend, and a guest appearance by Mohammad Ali! We sang Happy Birthday to him, as he toasted his second favorite sport, Ski Flying (who knew??). Alan had some very good jumps, but not the right air to gain that extra foot of lift needed to fly that last 20m, and was 34th. He is very close to coming through and jumping up many pages on the result sheet. I had planned on bringing our top four jumpers, to ski in the Sunday Team event, but at the last minute they had to fly to the COC in Japan, to assure their spots on the Olympic Team. The door was wide open that day, and it would have been great to field a US team at Ski Flying.
We are in town for about 24 hours, and will fly to Sapporo Japan in the morning. With the level Alan is skiing at, its important for him to keep up with the world cup level, as we prepare for the Olympics next month. the other 4 members of our team will travel to Steamboat for US Nationals, and keep developing their skills here at home.

I will gather everyone up starting next week for two pre-Olympic training camps; first in Park City, and then a few days of acclimation in Lillihammer, Norway. It will be great to get all 5 guys together, and start the final surge up to the Games. We have a great strategy to maximize our training time, and use our resources to get the best preparation for Pregalato. One of our biggest 'aces in the hole', is that Pregalato is at 1500m, considered a high-altitude jump there in Europe. Park City is even higher, which is normally a hindrance for our team, but in this case, it will be a perfect way to get an edge that the Euros cant. Something I love to see, for a change!

We are underdogs heading into an event of this level, by no means favorites...but in the American spirt, we are inspired by this challenge, and will come into Italy and the 2006 Winter Olympic Games ready to peak at the right time, and surprise the world!

Take care and keep the faith

Corby Fisher
Head Coach
US Ski Jumping Team