Liberec, Czech Republic - Four U.S. women will ski jump Friday in the FIS Nordic World Ski Championships in Liberec, finally reaching the pinnacle of their sport. It’s the first Nordic World Championships in which women are allowed to participate, 15 years after the first woman forejumped in the Olympic Winter Games in Lillehammer, Norway.


This event is the most significant competition in all of the women jumpers’ young lives. It marks the first complete and gender equal Nordic World Championships. Advocates for women's ski jumping hope that it will demonstrate to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) that the women ski jumpers have earned the right to be included in the 2010 Vancouver Games, as recommended by the International Ski Federation (FIS). Ski jumping is the only event in the Olympic Winter Games that does not allow women to compete. A discrimination lawsuit against the Vancouver Organizing Committee seeking to overturn the IOC's decision to exclude women's ski jumping from the 2010 Games is currently pending in the Supreme Court of British Columbia. The women want an injunction saying they should be included, and if not, then the men shouldn’t be allowed to jump either. The hearing is set for April 20, 2009.

“These women have been waiting to go to the World Championships since 1998,” says Deedee Corradini, president of Women’s Ski Jumping-USA and former mayor of Salt Lake City leading up to the 2002 Olympic Winter Games. “This is a critical and important step for them.”

The four women representing the U.S. in the World Championships, all from Park City, Utah, are:
  • Lindsey Van, 24, who is ranked No. 2 in the world. She holds the hill record for both women and men for the longest jump at Whistler Olympic Park in Vancouver. Van has been a leader in the sport since she exploded on the international scene in her pre-teens. She ranked in the top three in the Continental Cup standings in 2005, 2006 and 2007.

  • Alissa Johnson, 21, who is ranked No. 13 in the world. She has ski jumping in her blood. Her father was a U.S. Nordic combined coach and her brother, Anders, competed in ski jumping in the 2006 Winter Olympic Games in Torino, Italy. Johnson is positioned to end the season ranked in the top 10 jumpers in the world.

  • Jessica Jerome, 22, who is ranked No. 15 in the world. Jerome fought back after a devastating ACL injury sidelined her for the entire 2007 season. She has 12 Continental Cup top three finishes and is a six-time women’s U.S. national ski jumping champion.

  • Sarah Hendrickson, 14, who is ranked No. 18 in the world. On Feb. 7 she surprised her veteran competitors by besting them all with a Continental Cup win at Zakopane, Poland. The daughter of a jumper, Hendrickson is the youngest Nordic skier ever to be named to the U.S. Ski Team.
These young women say that they feel honored to take part in this long-standing tradition of elite athletic competition. They’re also excited to “take to the hill” to compete in this historic first Nordic World Championships. An American has never won a ski jumping medal in the championships or in the Olympic Winter Games.

Participating in the Olympics still remains a dream for these women. Van and Jerome are Plaintiffs in the current lawsuit along with eight other current and retired ski jumpers from Austria, Norway, Slovenia, Germany and Canada.

“A precedent does exist for the IOC to reverse its decisions even at the last minute,” Corradini says. “Only a short time before the 1984 Los Angeles games began, the IOC allowed women to participate in the marathon.”