By USSA

FELDBERG, Germany — Three American women finished in the top 10 Saturday at the first of two FIS World Cup snowboardcross races at Feldberg. Lindsey Jacobellis (Stratton Mountain, Vt.) had the top finish with a win in the small final for fifth place, Rosie Mancari (Anchorage, Alaska) was right behind her in sixth and Faye Gulini (Salt Lake City) was ninth.

It was a start-to-finish battle for the podium for the women. Italian rider Michela Moioli won that battle for the victory, World Cup leader Belle Brockhoff of Austria was second and Canadian Meryeta Odine earned her first World Cup podium in third.

Nate Holland (Squaw Valley) was the top finisher for the American men in 11th. In another thrilling big final, Pierre Vaultier of France was the winner, Spain’s Lucas Eguibar was second and Omar Visintin of Italy was third.

By Sarah D. Wire, Los Angeles Times
 
The phone in Rep. Tom McClintock’s office rang seven times in 10 minutes Tuesday afternoon.

“This is Congressman McClintock’s office, how may I help you?” the receptionist said again and again, scribbling down each caller’s name, address and comment. “This call means a lot to us. I’ll express that to the congressman.”

Members of Congress have been inundated with phone calls and emails in the scant weeks since President Trump took office, with staff answering two to three times as many calls and emails as normal.

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By Meghin Delaney, Las Vegas Review-Journal

Revisions to two state laws aim to make it easier for Nevada high school students to earn college credits or participate in internships while in high school.

The Senate education committee, the primary sponsor on both bills, heard proposed revisions to the dual-credit and internship programs Thursday.

“These two bills compliment each other. They can be viewed as a package,” said Matt Morris, the legislative director for Gov. Brian Sandoval.

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Valhalla is teaming up with the Lake Tahoe Golf Course for the spring production of “Women in Jeopardy.”

It is billed as a hilarious adult comedy written by Wendy MacLeod and directed by David Hamilton.

Divorcees Mary and Jo are suspicious of their friend Liz’s new dentist boyfriend. He’s not just weird; he may be a serial killer. His hygienist just disappeared. Attempting to get to the bottom of the mystery, imaginations run wild as the women try to discover the truth and save their friend.

Performances are March 24, 25, 30, 31 and April 1 at the golf course in Meyers. Tickets go on sale Feb. 15.

The Alpenglow Mountain Festival, a nine-day celebration of human-powered mountain sports, continues its three-part film offering on Feb. 21 with the ever-popular Winter Wildlands Alliance Backcountry Film Festival.

The event will take place at Granlibakken Resort in Tahoe City at 7pm. All ticket proceeds will be donated toTahoe Cross Country Ski Education Association Association’s Winter Discovery Center.

The festival provides a fresh line-up of cutting-edge films.

This year’s program includes:

·       Reflections

·       Lifecycle of a Powderwhore

·       AK Girls Way

·       SnowSchool

·       There on the Periphery

·       An Education

·       Season on the Brink

·       Pace

·       The Lost Sierra

·       China: A Skier’s Journy

·       Snow Artist.

Doors open 6pm and the festival of films begin at 7pm. Admission is $10 in advance online or $12 that night.

By Sage Sauerbrey and Alexandra Spychalsky, Moonshine Ink

The phrase of the year is “gray area” regarding the Golden and Silver states’ new green issues. Confused? So is everyone else. When California — the first U.S. state to outlaw marijuana, as well as the first state to approve its medicinal use — legalized recreational cannabis alongside Nevada last November, it commenced an unprecedented effort to define what that will mean on a legal, regulatory, and even cultural level.

Legally, California and Nevada share a few hard and fast laws as of Jan. 1, 2017. Both allow the recreational possession and use of up to one ounce of unconcentrated cannabis or 8 grams of concentrated cannabis for users 21 and older, as well as the cultivation of up to six plants, but the sale of recreational cannabis is still prohibited. This paradox will exist until the relevant regulatory agencies begin issuing licenses on the anticipated date of Jan. 1, 2018.

According to Alison Bermant, a lawyer who specializes in marijuana law in the Truckee-Tahoe area, there are “thousands of people growing marijuana in this community.” In spite of these numbers, Bermant says that she hasn’t had a cultivation case come across her desk in more than five years; all of her marijuana related clients are non-locals who were nabbed by one particular CHP agent for transporting illegal amounts of marijuana with the intent to sell. Bermant calls Interstate 80 one of the largest drug trafficking highways in the country, and Truckee is a convenient stopover town on the route to non-legalized states. Bermant says that many of the growers in this community are operating lawfully under Proposition 215, which permitted medicinal marijuana in California in 1996, but their legal protection has an expiration date.

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Snowfest Ladies’ Night Out Bunco Bash will raise money for the Gene Upshaw Cancer Center in Truckee, as well as for Tyler Whisler.

The 10-year-old Tahoe boy is being treated for a brain tumor. His dad, Allan, is a battalion chief with North Tahoe Fire Protection District; his mom, Jill, had to quit her hospital job to take of him.

The event is March 8 at 5:30pm at the North Tahoe Event Center in Kings Beach. Cost is $25. 

At least some people have kept their sense of humor through these storms. Photo/LTN

Updated 3:10pm:

Caltrans is projecting a 6pm Feb. 12 opening of Highway 50 between Meyers and Placerville. Traffic is expected to have one-way controls.

Interstate 80 is open in both directions.

Highway 395 in Nevada is open in both directions.

Elks Club has such horrendous pot holes that El Dorado County closed the Tahoe street. Photo/Kathryn Reed

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Highway 50 remains closed Saturday morning from 8.4 miles east of Pollock Pines at Ice House Road.

Caltrans has crews on the scene working to clear a major mudslide that crossed all lanes of the highway on Feb. 10.

The road has been open on and off much of this year because of ongoing avalanche control, slides and spinouts.

Interstate 80 is open to eastbound traffic, but expect delays. Westbound has been stopped since Friday because of a mudslide. Crews are also on scene there working to open the road.

Boulders in the road and an unstable hillside continue to have the Logan Creek Road area on the South Shore blocked, preventing South Shore travelers from getting to Carson City via Spooner Summit.

Highway 89 around Emerald Bay is also closed.

There are local roads in the basin that are also closed because of standing water or massive pot holes.

The good news is the sun should be out for the next few days. The potentially bad news is the temps are going to be warm, which will cause what snow is left at lake level to continue to melt. This in turn will add water to the already swollen creeks, streams and rivers.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report 

Lake Tahoe South Shore Chamber of Commerce’s After Five Mixer on Feb. 23 will also be a fundraiser for former board member and Getaway Reno Tahoe owner Todd Poth and his family.

The Poth’s 5-month-old daughter, Ayah, is currently fighting for her life at the Salt Lake Primary Children’s Hospital. In an effort to ease the family’s traveling and lodging costs, all proceeds from the event raffle will benefit them.

The mixer at that the Beacon restaurant in Camp Richardson from 5-7:30pm. The cost is $10 for members and $20 for others.

By Kathryn Reed

High school is hard enough for the average teen. Throw in poverty, neglect and physical disabilities and the outcome is likely to be less than positive.

Ultimately that wasn’t the case for two boys living and going to school in inner Cleveland. If it weren’t for Lisa Fenn, a producer for ESPN, Leroy and Dartanyon’s lives would likely have been remarkably different, and not in a good way.

“Carry On” is Fenn’s memoir of the time she spent with these two boys who eventually came to be like family.

It’s one of those feel good and gritty books all wrapped in one. At times I wanted to shake each boy to knock some sense into them. Fenn wanted to, too. She learned that their upbringing didn’t prepare them for things she took for granted. And while she didn’t come from money, her background was white, middle class – a far cry from what these boys knew.

I also wanted to shake Fenn. She broke a cardinal rule of being a journalist. You don’t become the story. She got too involved, crossed the line too many times. In the book she admits it. Eventually she moved on from ESPN.

Beyond life’s struggles, what binds Dartanyon and Leroy is wrestling and the fact each has a disability. One is blind, the other has no legs. Their friendship helps the other to succeed.

While there are a lot of books in this genre – athlete with a disadvantaged background succeeds – this has a twist with the role of Fenn. It proves how one person can make a such a dramatic difference in a person’s (this case people’s) life.

My book club read this for January. We all liked it more than we didn’t, and would definitely recommend it more for the story than the writing.

HarperCollins published “Carry On” in 2016.