Sugar Mountain Adult Ski League SMARL ended its 20th Anniversary 2026 racing season with a bang as perfect conditions for racing and an exciting Awards Night of celebrating in the Sugar Mountain Lodge unfolded. Up on the slope, our reporter on the scene for the six Monday night races, Matt Leonard, said the vibe on the course felt Olympic as racers pushed to improve their end of the season points tally for an opportunity to earn a gold, silver or bronze medal for the 2026 season. “Once again the conditions were perfect, just like the last two weeks with this week being the faster yet,” said Leonard. “They made it quite a challenging course for the last race!”
After the race ended up on the slope, racers and guests made their way to the Sugar Mountain Lodge where a huge buffet was awaiting, prepared by Tony Broyles, General Manager of Sugar Mountain Food Services. The room was decked out for the 20th Anniversary celebration and wide screen TV was set up playing a slideshow of pictures of the previous seasons’ racers and teams. The awards ceremony began with Bill Leonard remembering a number of racers the league had lost over the last 20 years. Then Ken Ketchie spoke about the year 2006 when the league first started. It was the year that Twitter made its first debut and Facebook opened up its services to everyone, and not just college students. And everyone had flip phones in those days. Looking back over 20 years it looks like close to a thousand racers have participated in the league and there have been dozen upon dozens of teams. Research also revealed there have been five individuals that have participated in all 20 years of the league. Those five folks were presented with a plaque for that amazing accomplishment: Gunther Jochl, Sean McKee, Erich Schmidinger, Les and Cindy Brooussard and Ralph Polattie. And Bill Leonard was named Grand Poobah, as founder of the Race League and leading its efforts for these 20 years.
For the final event of the evening, Sean McKee announced the awards and winners for the ski and snowboard teams as well as the individual winners for men and women’s skiers and snowboarders categories.
As everyone was saying their goodbyes as they left, you could hear, “See you next year!”
First, Second and Third place Ski Team Winners
Gold • Silver • Bronze
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First, Second and Third place Snowboard Team Winners
Gold • Silver • Bronze
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First, Second and Third Men’s Ski Individual Winners
Gold • Silver • Bronze
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First, Second and Third Men’s Snowboard Individual Winners
Gold • Silver • Bronze
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First, Second and Third Women’s Ski Individual Winners
Gold • Silver • Bronze
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First, Second and Third Women’s Snowboard Individual Winners
Gold • Silver
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FINAL TEAM STANDINGS AFTER February 17 Race
Ski Teams
> Team Sugar 112
> Ski Country Sports 109
> Banner Elk Cafe 80
> Good Ole Boys 78
> Carve Crew 51
> World Cup Losers 39
> First Tracks 38
> Alpine Ski 37
Snowboard Teams
> The Lodge 85
> Snow Mads 32
> Alpine Snowboard 29
INDIVIDUAL RACE RESULTS FOR FEB. 17
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