Though lying in the Wasatch Mountains shadow, the "Light the fire within" motto remains alive at Soldier Hollow. A legacy of memories continues for the nearly 15,000 people who make Utah’s Heber Valley their home. But, more important, Soldier Hollow still ignites Olympic dreams within youth and elite athletes by providing the continent’s premier training facility.

In 1988, Howard Peterson, the current general manager of Soldier Hollow, attended the Calgary Olympic Games as the CEO of the U.S. Ski Association. With only six U.S. medals, the U.S. Olympic Committee criticized its athletes for their poor results, even before the Games ended. Although Peterson thought the criticism came at the wrong time, he believed that the domestic bid process for future Olympic Games could create training opportunities for athletes and thus produce better results.

Shortly after Calgary’s closing ceremonies, Peterson served on a committee to choose America’s bid city for the 1998 Olympic Games. He helped pass measures that required bids to include a commitment to athlete training through permanent facilities. In 1989, the U.S. Olympic Committee chose Salt Lake City primarily because it promised a legacy for America’s athletes. Though it lost the 1998 final round to Nagano, Japan, the International Olympic Committee selected Salt Lake City to host the 2002 Olympic Games.

Contrary to the promises made of a permanent legacy, the bid documents set the Nordic venue location in a place called Little Dell. While that location would have been much closer to Salt Lake City than Soldier Hollow, it was in a watershed—a place that could not include any permanent facilities…not a toilet, not snowmaking, not even a building for the grooming equipment. Only trails cut into the sagebrush could remain.

When Peterson heard about Little Dell, he entered the fray. Eventually, the Salt Lake Organizing Committee (SLOC) relented to arguments that the site would be neither environmentally sound nor helpful in the future athlete training. After SLOC settled on Soldier Hollow, Peterson and his colleagues formed the Soldier Hollow Legacy Foundation to ensure that the venue would remain viable after the Games concluded.

Peterson’s first task included raising $1.1 million for the Douglas fir day lodge that now greets visitors and hosts events. Encouraging the design team to add easier trails and cutoffs was another. Officials from Calgary warned him that emerging from the 1988 Olympics with a system of only expert race trails was a challenge for them. Even before construction began, integrating easier trails into Soldier Hollow was a major obstacle.

Creating a facility that is both suitable for an Olympics and recreational skiers is impossible, without sacrificing to a large degree the first goal. The design team also lacked resources and enough suitable terrain. Where possible, they included legacy elements, such as the paved loop for roller skiing and permanent snowmaking infrastructure. Purchasing rather than leasing equipment was another major step toward making the venue viable in the long-term.

Amid construction, the Legacy Foundation signed a 20-year lease with the State of Utah, on whose land Soldier Hollow sits. Having put the venue infrastructure in a good position, Peterson shifted his focus to programming. In the late 1970s, he created the Bill Koch Ski League as his first job at USSA. At Soldier Hollow, he employed the same tactics. With former Nordic Combined athlete Dave Jarret, he formed Team Soldier Hollow, whose primary goal was to introduce cross country skiing to as many youth as possible, using the Olympic Games as a stimulus to make up for the lack of a tradition for the sport in Utah.

When the Olympics and Paralympics ended, Peterson and his staff took control of the venue. They scrambled to procure leftover supplies and resources from SLOC before it dissolved. Their acquisitions ranged from items as critical as a second grooming machine and wax cabins to things that would save money in the short term, like chairs and trash cans. The staff also added easier trails for recreational skiers and worked on the business plan, which has a tubing hill as its financial foundation.

That first spring, Soldier Hollow hosted a children’s festival organized by members of a charter school located at Sundance Resort. When the Sundance management changed, the company ousted the charter school at the school year’s end. Since the Soldier Hollow event had gone so well, a teacher from the school asked Peterson if he had any room. He recommended the competition building located in the venue’s center. After adding a few partitions, the Soldier Hollow Charter School opened in August 2002.

With an emphasis on the arts, environment and Nordic sports, the school integrates well with the mission of Soldier Hollow. The 66 students in first through fifth grades study science outdoors--raptors, bugs and grasses--in the venue’s immense open space. Over the course of a school year, the classes compete to see which can walk, ski and bike the most times around the half-mile trail that surrounds the building. At lunchtime, the students ski as part of the 150-member Team Soldier Hollow. While Soldier Hollow is a busy place during the fall, winter and spring because of the school, the venue also hosts dozens of regional and national athletes for training year-round. The University of Utah calls Soldier Hollow home once the snow is of sufficient depth. Last summer, the Italian cross country and Canadian biathlon teams both held training camps in the area. Most of the U.S. Biathlon Team also trained at the venue during the summer and fall. Algis Shalna, the head coach of that team, calls Soldier Hollow the "best altitude training site in the world."

Only 20 minutes north of the Heber Valley, in Park City, is the headquarters of the U.S. Ski Team. According to Luke Bodensteiner, USSA Nordic program director, the staff at Soldier Hollow go out of their way to make it an extremely athlete-friendly place. Trond Nystad, head coach of the cross country team, gathered his athletes in Utah for seven weeks this summer. The team frequently roller skied on the 4.2-kilometer loop and did bounding intervals on the other trails. He adds, "Soldier Hollow was critical to their preparation for this year’s Olympic Games because the venue sits at a similar altitude to the one in Italy."

Bringing elite athletes to the venue is one major way that Peterson promotes Nordic sports in Heber Valley. Lynn Adams, Heber City mayor and an avid master skier himself, believes that strategy has succeeded. The community has grown to accept and even admire Nordic athletes after seeing them train. People are no longer surprised to see Lycra-clad roller skiers slowing traffic.

In exchange for providing an excellent facility at no charge, Soldier Hollow requests that visiting elite athletes complete some form of community service in the area. Many choose to visit the charter school to talk about their Olympic dreams and accomplishments. From this, Peterson believes, there will be a spark. One day--perhaps from within the venue itself--an Olympic dream will foster. That would be the ultimate sign that the legacy of Soldier Hollow was more than just memories.

American biathlete Brian Olsen splits his time between Maine and Utah, where he spent time training at Soldier Hollow preparing for the upcoming Olympic Games. He maintains a biathlon-related website at www.frozenbullet.com.