While most eight-year-olds were cozied up watching some Disney movie on the couch in the winter, Kylie Willis was out participating in skiing competitions. At the age of one Kylie was out in her yard trying to ski with plastic skis her dad bought her ‒ and has loved the sport ever since.

Skiing isn’t seen as a big sport on the Cape because of the geographical issues, like hockey or football, but Kylie’s dedication shows her love for it. During the weekdays she is skiing with her ski academy ‒ which includes 10 people ‒ for half of the day and attending school during the other half. On weekends, her whole ski team of 200, ski regularly. Besides that, she said that she will “go to the gym 3 times a week, and has basement gym to work out the other 4 days.”

Since the beginning of her racing career, Kylie has won a good number of medals and competitions. She placed first in one race, and 2nd in “a ton”. At the championship in New Hampshire last season she placed third in slalom. This year she is continuing with these specific races and plans on sticking with them.

Last season, she and her team went to the Canada – America race (which is the second highest race you can make at that age). This year she is hoping to go and improve her performance compared to last year. She placed 25th in giant slalom (GS) and 11th in slalom ‒ and both races were out of 100 people. Her goal this year is to go to the largest race available in Park City, Utah. Currently she is competing in the Eastern Division.

This year she is attending Franconia’s ski club’s ski academy. The academy begins on December 15th, and goes until April. For her academy, her coaches are Steven “Bucket” Roberts, Ryan Welch, and Eric Price. “I’ve known I wanted to do it for over a year.” said Willis. Willis has also known these coaches since a young age and is excited to spend the season training with them to achieve her overall improvement.

With her ski academy going from December to April, missing so much of her classes here is going to be a challenge – especially with AP Human Geography coming back in time for the exam in May. She says that she is managing and being sent plenty of work to keep up with all classes — though at some points it is challenging without the exact teacher there for help.

While not being world-wide famous, her ski team is the oldest one in the US. Ski stars like Bode Miller and Julia Ford have come up from the ski team at Franconia. Kylie said that she looks up to these skis stars, and strives to be the next Picabo Street. With her current continuous improvements she is on her way there.