PROJECT HUDAK: Powder Interviews Jen Hudak and Elana Chase
The athlete/coach duo of Jen Hudak and Elana Chase has been together for seven years, and the team is on a mission casually called “Project Hudak.” Chase coaches for Aspen Valley Ski Club, and was a member of the U.S. Freestyle Development Team for 3 years competing in Moguls and Aerials. She is fun and funny. Elana will out wit you with her comedy, but can get serious at any moment if her “kids,” like Hudak, need help. Hudak, 20, who won the halfpipe X Games bronze medal last season, is not only one of the top girls competing in freeride, but most might not know that she is a smart one, too, taking after her family. (Her dad is a prof at Yale, mom got a 1580 on SATs, and sister is getting masters in clinical psychology.) She loves dragon flies because they represent transformation (a process she has gone through), but maybe most importantly, both women are as nice as can be. The two, who are often seen training at the Utah Olympic Park splash pool in Hudak’s Park City backyard, just took off to spend the next two months training and competing in New Zealand to work on Project Hudak.
POWDER.com: How did you and Elana meet?
Jen Hudak: I was a sophomore in high school at Okemo Mountain School, and I had been on their ski team for I guess it had been my forth year at that point and we had this new coach. The freestyle team was sitting in our cafeteria area. There were six kids around this table and this one kid said, “Oh, I hear our coach is a hot blonde chick,” so naturally I felt threatened already. I was 15, and so we’re all waiting for this coach to show up. She showed up late, car trouble I think.
Elana: No. Absolutely not, Wendy Neal [head of school] did not tell me the right time to be there. (Note: they bicker like best friends about what really happened.)
POWDER.com: Was it love at first site?
Jen: Elana just wanted to motivate us to work hard, but it wasn’t love at first sight. You said this before [turning to Elana], you never picked favorites. It was just until I proved that I was going to work hard and was willing to commit myself to this that you put more time and effort into Project Hudak.
Elana: We also spent more time together because of the fact that you were willing to put more time in. …Therefore, by the end of the season you qualified for all the major competitions.
POWDER.com: How long have you been together?
Jen and Elana in sing-song unison: We’ve being together for seven years.
Jen: And nothing to show for it?
Elana: What?
Jen: Just kidding, just kidding. Like no baby or anything. We have a bronze medal from X Games to show for it!
POWDER.com: Both of you spend a lot of time at the Utah Olympic Park splash pool. How has it helped you improve?
Jen: The more time you spend in the air, the more time you spend spinning, it just helps you have a better awareness of where you are in the air, which is basically the most important thing. If you know where you are it doesn’t matter if you are doing a 9 or a 10 or over rotating a 5 or 7 or 9, if you know where you are, you will be able to land. There is not much landing involved with water ramping considering you are landing in water, but getting that feeling and trying to figure out where you are at all times … it’s kind of like a big experiment the whole time.
Elan: Air awareness is the biggest thing, so you can try all different ways to speed up slow down, spin and fix them if they are not going right.
POWDER.com: What is your biggest accomplishment, either in skiing or outside of skiing?
Jen: Overall my biggest accomplishment is that I’m actually still skiing to be honest. My first year out of high school, when I moved out to Utah for summer 2004 and lived in Aspen with Elana for the winter of 2005, I was in the hospital on average once a week. The total tally at the end was seven sets of x-rays, three MRIs, a cat scan and a life flight – in one season. I broke my thumb, I did something funny to my wrist, I had bone contusions at the end of my tibia and femur in my right knee and at the end of my tibia on my left knee, I partially tore my ACL, tore cartilage and meniscus on my right knee, broke my nose, tore the cartilage that holds my lungs together, separated my shoulder, bruised my rotator cuff, and probably had a concussion somewhere in there too.
Elana: And lost all vital signs, and that’s why they life flighted you, which was the kicker.