DENVER — The beauty of Colorado stems from its mountains. But the mountaintop is not a place you’ll find ethnic color.
This weekend marks 50 years of "Soul On Snow." That’s 50 years that the National Brotherhood of Skiers (NBS) has worked to diversify the mountains.
NBS was founded in 1973 by Art Clay and Ben Finley. Since then, the mission has remained the same.
“And shortly thereafter we identified our mission and that was to identify, develop and support athletes of color that were going to win international and Olympic competitions representing the United States,” said NBS President Henri Rivers.
This year The Black Ski Summit will be held in Vail from February 4 to 11. An event and a historic location the organization has been planning for years.
“The excitement is overwhelming. The Vail resort is excited. Almost as excited as we are. We’ve got a great crew of volunteers that have come out early and put everything together. And we’re really ready to kick off a great week,” Rivers said.
Throughout the week on the mountain, there are several things to help Black people feel more comfortable and included on the mountains from game night, gospel fest, and even an R&B concert. The planning and coordinating takes a lot of effort.
“Without the 100-plus volunteers that we have working on this event, it would never happen. It’s a huge undertaking and it requires a lot of pieces coordinating and getting them all in sync to pull this off. So, I always commend our volunteers,” Rivers said.
But they are hoping to make the organization hopes to become more inclusive by changing the name to ‘National Brotherhood of Snowsports.’
The Black Ski Summit is a yearly event normally costing thousands. Unfortunately, that’s one of the barriers.
“We realize that money is one of the main barriers that stops them from doing it. And so what are ways that we can lower the price point to get people up to the mountains, while also making it fun,” said Denver Native Quincy Shannon also known as “Q.”
Since age 3, Q has been on the slopes mostly because of his mother and neighbors who were part of the Sippers n Sliders. This experience helped him fall in love with the slopes at a young age.
“Matter of fact, my first girlfriend was somebody I met on the back of one of those buses on my way skiing. And so skiing has always held a very close part of my life because it made up so much of my childhood,” Shannon said.
He returned to Denver after college to find not many Blacks were on the mountain. He found this as an opportunity to make a difference and created Ski Noir 5280.
“The main crux of that was to say, well, what are ways that we can become the next generation, the next generation of getting people up to the mountains, all of them previously were members of the slippers and sliders. And so they wanted to work with me on trying to get a younger demographic to really start working,” Shannon said.
Since then he’s created a monthly event called ‘Slide Thru Saturdays.’ One day out of the month he partners with Red Bull, I-70 Things, and CDOT to get blacks on the mountains. He provides a bus, gear, lessons, and a good time. The best part is it's all free.
“We get a group of individuals up, we take over the slopes that we come to, and we trick people into falling in love with something that I love so much,” Shannon said.
So far Shannon has taken busloads to Eldora and Loveland Pass. He is in the process of planning the trip for February.
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