Carving out slope success

April 15, 2005

CASEY RESSLER/Valley Life editor

Desi Diselrod's parents may just have to renovate their Valley home, because at the rate their 14-year-old daughter is going, the Diselrods are going to need a separate wing just to house her trophies.

Despite only snowboarding competitively for the last three years, Diselrod has burst onto the scene nationally. From April 2-9, she competed in the Youth Woman division at the United States of America Snowboard Association's national competition in Copper Mountain, Colo., and she came home with quite a haul.

"I was pretty confident going down there," Diselrod said.

That confidence - as well as her considerable talent - was rewarded. She won a gold medal in slopestyle, which includes jumps, rails and quarter pipes. She also added two bronze medals, in both the half-pipe and boardercross events.

The big news for her, however, was the fact she took first place in the overall combined ranking and the triple overall ranking, as well as second place in the Overall Freestyle rankings.

Those divisions include scores from every discipline of snowboarding, rewarding those who are well-rounded.

"A lot of people just focus on either the alpine events or the freestyle events, but I do them both," Diselrod said. "Definitely, slopestyle is my favorite. I love doing tricks."

There are five events in a snowboard competition - slopestyle and half-pipe (which count as freestyle events), slalom and giant slalom (which count as alpine events), and boardercross.

The overall combined rankings take into account the competitor's scores in freestyle and alpine events, while the triple overall rankings take into account all five events, covering alpine, freestyle and boardercross disciplines.

"Three medals and three plaques - I thought that was awesome," Diselrod said.

The success at the national event came on the heels of another awardsfest for Diselrod - from March 11-13, she competed at the Western Region Championships of the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association, in Jackson Hole, Wyo., where she won gold medals in the half-pipe and slopestyle events. That event is part of the Chevrolet Evolution Tour, which makes stops at resorts around the Lower 48.

Diselrod started snowboarding competitively just three years ago, as an 11-year-old.

She entered her first competition at Alyeska Ski Resort and enjoyed success, and her interest only grew. Now, she is snowboarding every weekend.

"We go down to Alyeska or up to Hatcher Pass," Diselrod said. "I do rails in my yard, and the trampoline."

Two years ago, in her first national competition, held in Sunday River, Maine, Diselrod took fourth place in the triple overall standings and placed as high as third in individual events. She has competed in numerous state-level competitions at Alyeska, and has won several gold medals.

Despite having a lot of success on the snowboard, Diselrod is hardly a single-sport athlete.

She also plays volleyball and softball, as well as some basketball in her limited free time. She recently found out she made the Colony High School varsity softball team as a freshman.

"She was pretty excited about that," her dad, Dan Diselrod, said. "We're proud of her. She's a good kid."

If you ask her to pick her absolute most favorite sport, though, she'll hesitate.

"I don't know. I love them all," Diselrod said.