Gold medalist snowboarder and skier help make history for LU Club Sports team

Demonstrating faith over fear is paramount for members of Liberty University’s ski and snowboard team, which had its most successful showing to date at the United States Collegiate Ski & Snowboard Association (USCSA) National Championships in Lake Placid, N.Y., March 8-12. Women’s senior snowboarder Emory Orlando and freshman skier Lauren Harder helped bring home Liberty’s first national team titles.

Orlando earned golds in both the Slopestyle and Rail Jam events, and Harder led the women’s skiers to a  1-2-3 sweep  in Rail Jam, with sophomore Josie Rich taking the silver medal and freshman Isabella Tinney the bronze. Orlando and Harder led the women’s ski and snowboard team to an impressive four national titles, in rail jam and slopestyle events for both disciplines.

Head Coach Isaac Gibson said Harder, from Charlotte, N.C., and Orlando, from Libertyville, Ill. (near Chicago), have made tremendous leaps of faith in their time at Liberty.

“Just watching Lauren ski throughout the year, she is very fearless and has been able to progress very quickly,” he said. “She’s just so courageous in doing new tricks on the rails and on the jumps has always gone far bigger than the others. Emory’s the same way, never afraid to go really big, and that’s a huge separation factor that judges look at in Slopestyle — the amplitude of jumps, which is able to give them an edge on the rest of the field.”

For Liberty’s gold medalists, the year-round Liberty Mountain Snowflex Centre was a factor in helping them rise above any fears and master some new skills in their sport.

“Emory and Lauren have quite similar backgrounds,” Gibson said. “Orlando pretty much came in with zero freestyle experience. Everything she’s learned has been on Snowflex and the last couple seasons on snow. Lauren grew up going out to Colorado to ski (downhill), and it wasn’t until she came to Liberty that she started freestyle skiing, which is pretty common among our student-athletes.”

Equipped with an aerial awareness trampoline and Bag Jump air bag, Snowflex provides an excellent training ground with safety nets for skiers and snowboarders with little to no freestyle experience to fine-tune their stunts and tricks and progress rapidly in the sport.

As they perform acrobatic maneuvers and tricks on the slopes and rails, showcasing style points and serious airtime on aerial stunts and spins, the two have drawn upon their creative flair derived from their dancing experience.

“Both come from dance backgrounds, which really helps with a lot of the movements you do in skiing and snowboarding,” Gibson said. “Being very disciplined in their dance practices has allowed them to excel in freestyle events.”

Harder is majoring in sport psychology with a minor in dance. To help stay in shape, and expand her dancing repertoire, she participates in Liberty’s hip-hop dance ministry, D-Trex.

“Dance is something that I’ve been consistent with for most of my life,” she said. “I tried all these different types of sports throughout high school, but I stuck with dance and skiing. Dance definitely helps with my balance in the Rail Jam if I try to hit a skinny rail.”

Both Harder and Orlando overcame injury to capture their gold medals.

Orlando almost didn’t get to compete in the Slopestyle event after colliding with one of her teammates at Whiteface Mountain on a training run two days after winning the Rail Jam.

“The day before the Slopestyle competition, I was riding with my friends and one came behind me and accidentally clipped my shin,” she said. “I spun around, fell on my face, and blacked out. I didn’t remember being on the hill at all.”

She had a CT scan and was cleared by the doctor who checked for concussion.

“I felt off the next day, was still dizzy and disoriented, and had a headache, so I didn’t do the run or the tricks I was planning to,” Orlando said. “But I have my factory 360 (spins) on lock and knew I could land that trick even if I felt sick doing it. So I threw that on the first jump and was banking on the fact that another girl wouldn’t land that trick. I was hoping that was enough because that was all I had.”

She recorded a high score of 84 on her second run to finish ahead of Sierra Nevada University’s Darcy Saint (82.17) and Margaret Galloway (81).

It was a perfect way for Orlando, who will graduate with a B.S. in Business Administration: Marketing Analytics in December, to complete her collegiate career.

“I love the environment at Liberty and the mission statement, how it grows and pushes students out into the world with a biblical mindset, but also a pragmatic mindset,” Orlando said.

She is also pursuing a B.S. in Business Administration: Green and Sustainable Management and wants to stay in the snowboard industry and use her degrees to further conservation, as she has through the Protect Our Winters (POW) movement.

Harder broke two metacarpal bones on her middle and ring finger on her left hand during a Jan. 28-30 team trip to Loon Mountain (N.H.) and wasn’t able to compete in regionals to qualify for nationals. After receiving an injury exemption, however, she was determined to compete in Lake Placid just two weeks after having surgery on her hand. She wore a hard cast under her ski glove.

“The first thing I thought was, ‘I don’t need my hand; I just need my legs,’” Harder said. “I’ll grab with my right hand. It’s not a question — I’m competing at nationals.”

She enjoyed meeting skiers from all over the country, as far away as Nevada and California, and fellowshipping with her teammates in a competitive environment again.

“A lot of times you can get discouraged if you’re not landing your jumps, so it’s good to have that community where we can keep encouraging each other and keep growing closer to Christ,” Harder said. “Just spreading that love and positivity makes a difference.”

Harder plans to become a sports psychologist with a professional league, such as the NBA, NFL, NHL, MLS, or Major League Baseball.