BY KAREN BOSSICK

Sun Valley’s Jake Adicoff is bringing home a World Cup Crystal Globe as the 2023-24 Para Nordic Visually Impaired World Cup Champion.

Adicoff, who grew up training with the Sun Valley Ski Education Foundation’s Nordic team, won the title by racing to two golds and one silver at the Prince George Para Nordic World Cup Finals in St. George, B.C.

Adicoff and his guide Reid Goble finished second in the 5-kilometer Individual Start Classic Race in the first on March 14. They followed that up with gold in the VI Skate Sprint on March 16 and gold in the 20K Mass Start VI Classic Race on March 17.

Adicoff had racked up two golds in Para Nordic World Cup racing earlier in the season.

“It’s pretty special,” said his mother Sue Connor.  “He hasn’t gotten the globe before because he hasn’t participated in all the events.”

Following the Super Tour Finals this week in Duluth Minn., Adicoff plans to head for FIS International Spring Series in Jackson Hole and Sun Valley, which will be held April 4-6. He plans to train in Norway this summer and is aiming for the 2026 Winter Olympics in Cortina-Milano, his mother said.

Meanwhile, John Steel Hagenbuch took gold in the 400-kilometer men’s free mass start race at the SuperTour Finals held this week in Duluth, Minn. Peter Wolter took 11th in that race and Jake Adicoff 26th.

Sydney Palmer-Leger took second and Mariah Bredal third in the women’s race.

The Sun Valley Ski Education Foundation team made up of Peter Wolter and Jake Aicoff took third of 15 teams in the Men’s Team Sprint B race, while Hagenbuch and his teammate Jack Lange finished eighth in the A race.

Hagenbuch took 25th in the Men’s Team Sprint, while Wolter took 29th and Adicoff 56th.

Sydney Palmer-Leger won second in the Women’s Classic Individual Start. Bredal took 13th in that race.

Hagenbuch won second in the Men’s Classic Individual Start and Wolter, 12th. Adicoff took 59th.

The Sun Valley Ski Education Foundation’s XC Gold Team had one of its best seasons in recent history with every athlete on the team competing in World Cup events, noted Adicoff’s father Sam Adicoff.

Team members have competed in Alaska, Vermont, New York, France, Norway, Sweden, Finland, British Columbia, Alberta, Germany, Italy and Switzerland and Minnesota, where the SuperTour Finals just wrapped up.

Peter Wolter just competed in his sixth World Cup race in the 20-kilometer Mass Start Free at the World Cup in Falun, Sweden. He finished 60th in a very competitive field.

Mariah Bredal finished ninth in the Engadin Skimarathon, a 42K Skate Marathon in Switzerland. She then followed up that success, racing to a third-place podium in the 54K skate SkoyteBirken in Norway.

Sammy Smith’s highlight came at the World unior Championships in February when she brought home silver for Team USA in the Skate Sprint. The high school student hopes to join her teammates one more time at the FIS International Spring Series in Sun Valley.

“The team has been spread across the World this March competing at World Cups, European Marathons, and Para Nordic World Cup Finals, so it’s nice to come together for the last three weeks of the season and finish out in Duluth, Jackson Hole and then home in Sun Valley,” said SVSEF XC Gold Team Head Coach Chris Mallory.