December 20, 2011 (Rumford, Maine ) – Black Mountain of Maine had very ambitious plans for the start of this winter season. Those plans included hosting a snowmobile hill climb, opening their alpine trails and hosting the US Cross Country Ski Championships. Given the record-breaking warmth of the late fall, and temperatures too warm to make snow, it would have been easy to expect a lot of cancellations.

Not this year – and not at Black Mountain.

This year Black Mountain of Maine has 8 new, high capacity fan guns from TechnoAlpin, SMI, Lanko and Johnson Control to go along with the existing fleet of 6 fan guns. To ensure that they had the power to keep theguns running Black Mountain also has a number of portable generators on loan from Pineland Farms, Milton-Cat, PC Construction and Cianbro.

“The extraordinarily warm weather has created challenges for every New England business that depends on snow,” said Andy Shepard, President of the Maine Winter Sports Center, which owns Black Mountain. “But the US Cross Country Championships is a an important opportunity for the town of Rumford, the Chisholm Ski Club, Black Mountain and the whole State of Maine to put its best foot forward. Not being ready was not an option. These companies recognized the importance of this event to the State, understood there was a role for them to play and have stepped up in inspiring ways.”

Temperatures turned cold on Friday night and stayed cold through the weekend, allowing the mountain to make a lot of snow. Temperatures are expected to rise tomorrow afternoon throughmid-day Friday, but then drop again into good snowmaking weather through the weekend. The original plan was to open the alpine hill December 26th and have the cross-country trails ready by December 28th and we are on schedule to hit those dates.

Black Mountain and the Chisholm Ski Club are hosting the US Cross Country Championships for the second consecutive year and faced extreme weather challenges last year as well. “We had snow early last year, lost it a few weeks before the races and never really got good snowmaking temperatures leading up to the event,” said Carlie Casey, Chief of Competition for the Championships. “This year we wanted to make sure that through technology and planning, we were giving ourselves every possible chance to put on good races. Thanks to some really great volunteers and some very generous corporate sponsors, we have that this year.”

For more information on Black Mountain click HERE.

For more information on the US Championships visit: www.uscrosscountryskichampionships2012.org/