At 17, Girdwood's Katie Rowekamp is making waves in the Alpine ski world

Oct. 30—Katie Rowekamp is going big.Rowekamp, who is from Girdwood, has launched a career trajectory just as steep as Mount Alyeska's North Face, which she grew up skiing.At 16, she was named to the U.S. Alpine Ski Team, the youngest member of a squad that includes luminaries like Mikaela Shiffrin and Breezy Johnson.And last weekend, as a freshly minted 17-year-old, Rowekamp found herself at the starting gate among the modern titans of Alpine ski racing at the 2026 World Cup opener in Sölden, Austria."It was like a dream almost," Rowekamp said. "I showed up on the day of the race and there was the wall, you know, like the big, steep pitch. It was crazy. And the crowd in Sölden is nuts. It was definitely a very thrilling, exciting first World Cup."With a time of 1 minute, 10.07 seconds on her first giant slalom run, Rowekamp didn't qualify for a second run, missing the cutoff by less than a second as the 37th finisher with 30 advancing.Fellow American Paula Moltzan took the top spot with a time of 2:14.82 over two runs.While Rowekamp's weekend didn't include a second run, it's changed her outlook on what she may be able to accomplish this season."My goal going into the season was to get a World Cup start," she said. "I really wanted a World Cup GS start, and now that I've gotten that, I think that like I'm going to want to kind of make my goals bigger."She plans to split her time between the North American Cup, Europa Cup and World Cup when she's able to qualify for starts.Rowekamp's goals are expanding internationally, but her roots in the sport are quintessentially Alaskan. Her parents — her mother is a nurse and her father worked as a ski patroller — came to Alaska from Colorado more than two decades ago."They kind of just wanted me to like skiing and enjoy powder skiing mostly," she said. "They would pull me around the living room on a blanket with little skis on. Then they took me up to the magic carpet, and I did (Alyeska Ski Club) Mighty Mites for a while, and we would always do powder days."It wasn't long before Rowekamp's aptitude made it clear she could flourish in the sport. At age 12, she started at Vermont's Burke Mountain Academy, which counts Shiffrin among its notable alumni.The first two years, Rowekamp was only attending Burke for the winter term and was back in Alaska in the spring and fall. She said it seemed like a big jump initially, but she quickly found a groove both in training and at the school."It definitely like seemed like a big deal back then because it was like, 'Oh my gosh, like, I'm going to a real-life ski academy. I'm moving all the way across the country for this,'" she said.She continued to progress, and last year as a 16-year-old put together an impressive rookie season in FIS racing. The season included finishing second in the NorAm super-G standings, qualifying for Junior Worlds and some strong Europa finishes.Going into last season, she didn't have an expectation to make the U.S. Team. But she was named to the squad's C Team over the summer, its youngest member."I felt like pretty prepared for it," she said. "My coaches and my teammates, they're all super supportive. They've helped me move along in a way that didn't feel rushed or anything."The transition onto the C Team was a fairly easy process, with friends from previous competitions. But it was still a bit of a surprise that she was able to win a time trial that paved the way for the Sölden start."I was definitely a little nervous because I wanted to ski my best," she said. "This is one of the most-viewed World Cup races, and I wanted to show everybody what I have."As the youngest racer in the field, Rowekamp could have tempered her expectations. But she's always raced against older skiers and believes those competitive opportunities have helped her grow"I don't really think that my age really defines like, who I am as a skier," she said "I've never been like, 'Oh, it's OK for these girls to be faster than me because they're so much older than me.' I want to be faster than them, and my age isn't really an excuse for that."While Burke offered her intensive and proven training and coaching, the U.S. Team has given Rowekamp access to a whole other level of competition and experience."What I really like about it is I can learn so much from older girls too like Paula (Moltzan) and Nina (O'Brien) and all of the girls on the World Cup team," she said. "They have so much knowledge and experience that they can pass down.""I have a lot of time, and I am just trying to, like, take in as much as I can, appreciate as much as I can and learn as much as I can," she said.A big part of progressing in the sport is developing the right balance of aggression and focus."Ski racing is one of the few sports where you don't know how you're doing while you're doing it," Rowekamp said. "When you're in the middle of the course, you have no idea if you're two seconds behind or a second ahead."Rowekamp's parents were able to make the trip to Europe for her World Cup race last weekend, and she also received several congratulatory messages, including from friends and coaches at Burke and plenty of Alaskans."I got texts from all of my friends from my kindergarten class" in Girdwood, she said. "It was amazing. I went to school with them until like, fifth grade, and I hang out with a decent amount of them in the summer still. It was really nice to get the support from them. It was really sweet."