Former Canyon Gas Station Goes “Green”
Talk about a transformation. In the last year the venerable Canyon Service Station on Entrada Drive in Santa Monica Canyon has gone from looking grim to being “green.” Architect Scott Prentice has completely restored the original 350-sq.-ft. adobe structure which he uses as a reception and meeting area for his three-person architectural firm. With windows on three sides, the room is filled with natural light. The only furnishings are a round table and two chairs. A hallway leads to the 500-sq.-ft. addition where Prentice works with his two assistants. Soft turquoise and construction models dominate the large, open room which looks out onto a lap pool that has a fountain designed to drown out any street noise. The pool, which is solar heated, is also enjoyed by Prentice and his family, who live next door to the former gas station. Asked how he likes having an office so close to home, the architect said, “It’s sure nice to be able to walk to work” and “beats working out of the garage.” What initially attracted Prentice and his wife Glenda Rovello, a trained architect and production designer, to the single-story, ranch-style house which they bought in 2001 was “the parking for five cars,” he jests. Since then they have doubled the space of their home to accommodate their growing family: Henry, 10, and Will, 7, who attend Canyon Elementary School half a block away. Originally from San Diego, Prentice received his architectural degree from Cal State Pomona College, and then studied in Florence and Milan before returning to the U.S. His 10-year-old firm does commercial work and is currently restoring some residences in the canyon. “I have been encouraging green elements for several years now,” Prentice said. “Unfortunately, they are often the first to get cut which is regrettable given the savings in the long run.” CANYON HISTORY FOR SALE When the Marquez family, the original owners of the Rancho Boca de Santa Monica land grant, put the historic gas station up for sale in the fall of 2003 residents rallied to try and buy the lot, which at 17,000-sq.-ft. was one of the largest in the canyon. Included in the sale was a 2-bedroom, 100-year-old clapboard house with a big fenced-in yard, as well as the vintage station which had been in operation since 1922. Because the property was zoned R-1, the gas station needed a conditional use permit to operate in this residential neighborhood. Brian Clark, who was leasing the station from the Marquez family at the time, spearheaded the campaign with local realtor and canyon resident Frank Langen. Fearing the station would be torn down or relocated, they proposed having the structure declared a historical landmark and maybe turning the house into a history museum featuring archival photos of the area. However, in a surprise move, the Marquez family chose to sell the lot to neighbor Chris Hoffman, an attorney who lives on Amalfi Court for close to the $2.3-million asking price. Shortly before the sale closed in May 2005 the station itself–the original adobe structure–was declared a historic cultural monument. Like everyone else who lives in the canyon, Prentice said he followed the unfolding drama over the future of the gas station. Then when the opportunity came to purchase it he pounced. He paid Hoffman, who tripled the size of his own yard in the deal, $500,000 to acquire 4,000-sq.-ft. which, luckily, abutted Prentice’s lot. Technically, all the transfer in ownership required was a simple lot- line adjustment. “The fact that I already owned the property next door put me in a unique position to acquire the lot,” explained Prentice, who said he had no real concern about the land being contaminated as he had already studied soil reports before purchasing his home at 521 Entrada. Rehabilitation Efforts Prentice’s restoration of the original adobe structure and adaptive reuse efforts apparently more than meets the standards of the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design program (known as “LEED’). There is radiant heating in the floors and a computer-controlled lighting system. The architect is particularly proud of the reuse of the concrete which once covered most of the service station lot. A ton of it was recycled and used to build a retaining wall. He has also planted a dozen trees and drought tolerant plants. His new office is expected to soon receive its official “green” certification. “Since the station is designated a City of Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument, we had to adhere to the strict guidelines laid out by the U.S. Department of the Interior’s standards for the rehabilitation of historic structures, with additional oversight by the city’s Historic Preservation office,” Prentice explained. “Our goal was to restore the structure to its original 1924 state, as mandated by the guidelines. It took about a year to get the various approvals and then four months to build. This project has turned out as lovely as I thought it would.’
She’s a Finalist in Super Bowl Contest–Seeks Your Vote Now
Photo by Rich Schmitt, Staff Photographer
Everyone knows that the Super Bowl is about more than tackles and touchdowns. Many viewers stay glued to the screen between plays so they don’t miss the million-dollar commercials that often are better looking or funnier than the average ad. This year, Palisadian Kristin Dehnert will be watching closely for her own 30-second spot, “Check Out Girl,” which she wrote and directed for the Doritos “Crash the Super Bowl” challenge, a first-time contest that invited consumers to create their own commercials. Dehnert is one of five finalists–and the only female–selected by Doritos judges from more than 1,000 entries. Viewers determine the winner by voting online (www.crashthesuperbowl.com) through January 19. The winning ad will be unveiled on national television during the first quarter of Super Bowl XLI on February 4. “I was pretty blown away at the opportunity because it’s the mack daddy of all stages,” says Dehnert, a location manager and scout for commercials with a passion for writing and directing. “If you are going to direct, act in a commercial, produce it’whatever’it doesn’t get any bigger than the Super Bowl.” Dehnert learned about the competition last fall and created four no-budget commercials with her producer friend, Leann Emmert. “Check Out Girl” features a spicy grocery store cashier checking-out a customer who is buying bags of various flavors of Doritos corn chips. Their shared passion for Doritos unfolds in a comical and flirtatious dialogue. “I got quite a kick out of the fact that Doritos had so many flavors with so many great names like Blazin’ Buffalo & Ranch and Salsa Verde,” says Dehnert, playfully rolling the ‘r’ of ‘Verde’ off her tongue the way the check out girl does in her commercial. “So I thought it would be great to play off all these flavors. And I thought a grocery store would be a great place to showcase the product and have this interaction between two total strangers.” The two leads are played by George Reddick, an aspiring actor and friend of Dehnert’s whom she calls “naturally hilarious,” and Stephanie Lesh-Farrell, one of about 20 people who answered a casting call for the commercial. Dehnert’s friend and casting director Carol Rosenthal volunteered her time to hold the mini casting session. “Stephanie came in and she had her pigtails and she had on an apron and a name tag upside down,” Dehnert says. “She completely knocked it out of the park. We were rolling, we were laughing so hard. She was so funny.” Dehnert and her small cast and crew, all of whom worked without pay, shot the footage for “Check Out Girl” during an all-night (11 p.m. to 5 a.m.) shoot at Super A Foods in Eagle Rock. James West was the cinematographer and Kindra Marra edited the commercial. Dehnert says that while all four spots received good responses, “the one that was the touchdown was ‘Check Out Girl.’ I think what was so neat about it was that it appealed–and it appeals–to a range of ages. Little kids who have seen it are running around yelling ‘Giddy up!’, high school students think it’s a riot and people my parents’ age think it’s hilarious.” A Chicago native who graduated from the University of Illinois in 1991, Dehnert says she was also inspired by her friends’ humor. “I think my friends are, by far, the funniest people in the world. They’re the best people to bounce ideas off of. They’re like my mini audience, so I know if I’m doing it right.” Besides being “pretty darn funny,” Dehnert believes her commercial stands out because of clever product placement. “We purposefully put Doritos and Pepsi [under the same umbrella as Frito-Lay] in the background. You couldn’t swap out the product because the commercial is all about the flavors and the product you see.” Just for making it into the top five, finalists are each awarded $10,000 and a trip to Miami to attend the Doritos Super Bowl party. The national publicity has already opened doors for Dehnert, who has meetings set up with production houses about the possibility of her directing some commercials. “Location managing and scouting is my day job,” Dehnert says. “I’d love for writing and directing to become my new day job.” Dehnert broke into the film business as a non-paid location-scout intern on the 1994 movie “Blue Chips,’ starring Nick Nolte. She continued doing location work on films in Chicago until about 1996, when she moved to Los Angeles to work on “Contact.’ Dehnert, who has lived here for about 10 years, says her favorite day of the year is the Fourth of July in the Palisades. “My friends joke that, one day, I’m going to be the honorary mayor of the Palisades.” Dehnert made her writing/directing debut with an award-winning short film, “Underground,” a political thriller that screened in over 60 international film festivals and won 11 top prizes. She then tried her hand at writing/directing a series of no-budget TV commercials for a car dealership in Oregon. Two of the spots won the Gold and Silver Awards for “Best Use of Humor” at the 2006 Summit Creative Awards. The Doritos contest is Dehnert’s first commercial competition. “Another cool thing about the competition is that it’s so ‘childhood’ to me,” she says. “And it’s so all-American–Doritos and the Super Bowl. Everybody has had orange fingers from Doritos.” ——————- Reporting by Associate Editor Alyson Sena. To contact, e-mail: newsdesk@palipost.com
Westside Politicians Push Democratic Agenda
New roles mean more power for Waxman, Kuehl and Brownley
Spurred by Democratic victories in the November election, the elected leaders representing Pacific Palisades began this year with big ideas to transform state and federal policymaking’and key leadership positions to realize them. A Democratic takeover of the House this January means chairmanship of the powerful Oversight and Government Reform Committee for longtime Westside Congressman Henry Waxman. The party’s gains in state politics and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s reinvention as a moderate have meant greater positions of influence for State Senator Sheila Kuehl and recently elected Assemblymember Julia Brownley, both Santa Monica residents. Waxman has represented West L.A., including the Palisades, since 1972. His influence on policy took a hit when the Democrats lost control of Congress in 1994. But a Democratic resurgence last November coupled with his work to fortify a weakened committee has made him one of the nation’s most powerful Democratic legislators. The committee that Waxman now chairs is officially charged with overseeing nearly every branch of the federal government, including the presidency. When Republicans chaired the committee during the Clinton Administration, they spent more than 10 days in hearings on the use of the White House Christmas card list. In an interview with the Palisadian-Post in his Westside office in October, Waxman said that if were elected chair, he would be no less zealous when he investigates the ‘waste, fraud and abuse of taxpayers’ dollars’ by the Bush administration. Now, armed with subpoena power and a larger staff of full-time investigators, Waxman could be a nightmare for the administration, political analysts say. A Time article in late November was probably only half joking when it dubbed him ‘the scariest guy in Washington.’ He announced last week that he would begin to hold hearings beginning on February 5, and it is expected that he’ll investigate the Administration’s awarding of no-bid contracts to civilian contractors like Halliburton in Iraq, Afghanistan and post-Katrina New Orleans. While Waxman’s has become a ‘lightning rod’ for conservative criticism, the congressman is also under pressure within his own party. ‘I’m very excited about him heading the Government Reform Committee because he has a background of conducting very thorough investigations,’ said Marcy Winograd, a Palisades resident and president of Progressive Democrats of Los Angeles, who ran unsuccessfully against Congresswoman Jane Harman in last year’s primary. ‘At the same time, however, I and other peace activists want him to vote to stop the funding for the Iraq war, and at this point he said he can’t pledge that he’ll do that.’ Winograd and other anti-war activists marched outside Waxman’s office in December, calling on him to oppose any ‘surge’ in U.S. troop levels to Iraq. She also wants Waxman to subpoena President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld about the use of faulty intelligence to justify the Iraq War. State Senator Sheila Kuehl’s recent election to the chair of the Health Committee places her at the forefront of California’s healthcare debate. She has represented eastern Ventura County and western Los Angeles County, including the Palisades, in the Senate and the Assembly since 2000. During that period, the senator has sought to revolutionize state healthcare. Healthcare costs in California exceed almost every other state and nearly one in five residents lack insurance. Last year, Kuehl’s bill SB 840 sought to replace private health insurance in California with a single, government-managed insurance fund. The bill promised to guarantee access to affordable healthcare to all California residents by cutting high administrative costs and using the state’s purchasing power to negotiate with pharmaceutical companies. Both houses of the state legislature approved the bill, but Schwarzenegger vetoed it in September, citing the high costs of creating a ‘new bureaucracy.’ Since his reelection in November, the governor has aggressively touted his intent to extend health insurance to millions of the state’s uninsured. And many political observers credit the success of Kuehl’s bill in the legislature with motivating the governor’s vocal embrace of healthcare reform this week. Kuehl plans to use her new position as Health Committee chair to shape any future healthcare plan. There are currently three other competing healthcare plans proposed by Schwarzenegger, State Senate Pro Tem Don Perata (D-Oakland) and Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez (D-Los Angeles). ‘The governor wants everyone to buy into insurance whether they’re working or not,’ Kuehl told the Post by telephone on Tuesday. ‘The two Democrats want to work toward establishing that working people have insurance. My job is to bring together these plans and make them work for California. We can’t have a barebones plan with $5,000 deductibles. ‘I will continue to develop the single-payer plan that I wrote because it’s the only universal plan,’ Kuehl said. Assemblymember Julia Brownley’s new position as chair of the Education Finance sub-committee will help her to fulfill her campaign promise of increasing public education funding, she said. The former president of the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District was first elected to the Assembly in November. Brownley’s committee exams the fiscal impact of all state law on all public education, including the Cal State and UC systems. Few pieces of legislation come from the committee, but it does help to direct the priority of education spending. ‘My job is to articulate what the Assembly’s fiscal priorities are for education,’ Brownley told the Post on Monday. ‘My priority is for the schools with the greatest need to receive the most financial support. I also want to have a razor-sharp focus on closing the achievement gap.’ The governor presented his budget proposal for the 2007-2008 fiscal year on Wednesday, and Brownley said that she and her staff will ‘rip that budget apart to understand every nuance of that budget.’ —————– Reporting by Staff Writer Max Taves. To contact, e-mail: reporter@palipost.com
Caden Ezralow Is ‘First Baby’
Photo by Rich Schmitt, Staff Photographer
Caden Ezralow, born on January 3, is the First Baby of 2007 in Pacific Palisades, continuing a tradition started by the Palisadian-Post in 1954. He and his parents, Marc and Gayle, will receive more than 70 gifts from local merchants and business owners, including toys, an engraved sterling silver baby spoon, clothes, free haircuts, flowers, dry cleaning, restaurant certificates, and a $50 savings bond. Gayle Ezralow’s due date was January 11, but a month earlier her obstetrician, Dr. Toni Long, told her she had started to dilate, which meant the baby would probably come sooner. In late December, Gayle had contractions and her husband drove her to St. John’s Hospital, but labor didn’t progress and they went home. On New Year’s Day, they went to the hospital again. ‘I had contractions and I didn’t feel well,’ Gayle says. Once again the contractions stopped and the Ezralows returned to the Palisades. On January 2, their 8-year-old son Bryce had a play date with a friend. ‘I was worried because I didn’t feel the baby moving,’ Gayle says. When the friend’s mom, Ryoko Nadeau, came to pick up her son, Gayle told her, ‘I need to go to the hospital.’ Gayle called her husband and told him that she was going to St. John’s, but told him ‘Don’t worry, I don’t think it’s anything.’ He asked her if it was okay if he went to the gym. ‘Sure,’ she said. This week he said, ‘We’d already been to the hospital twice and I thought it was another false alarm.’ Nadeau drove Gayle to the hospital, and when they arrived, Gayle said, ‘Let me just sit for 10 minutes.’ Then she went inside and the nurses told her that she was in labor. Marc had just parked his car in the gym parking lot when he received another call to come to the hospital. At 4 p.m., as soon as Gayle lay down in her bed, the contractions started. ‘We’ll have this baby by nine,’ said Dr. Long, whose estimate was off by a bit: Caden Marc Ezralow entered the world at 12:58 a.m., weighing 8 lbs. 3 oz. The couple, who also have a six-year-old daughter, Riley, agreed that they didn’t want to know the baby’s sex before the child was born. ‘It was the hardest thing in the world not to find out,’ Marc says, ‘but we accomplished it. As it was being delivered, I knew it was a boy by the little face. Caden looks like a mixture of my son and daughter.’ The couple had picked out two girls names, Avery or Elle, but hadn’t decided on a boy’s name, so for two days the baby didn’t have a name. Marc searched on a Web site for prospective names. Since he and Gayle both liked Irish and Celtic names, he specified that name origin and got a list of names. ‘The name Caden just jumped out at us,’ Marc says. The couple decided to give Caden his father’s name as a middle name, but were worried that their older son might feel slighted, so they told Bryce that they would change his middle name, Nathan, to his grandpa’s middle name, Marshall. Grandpa and the parents were thrilled with the idea, and then Bryce weighed in. ‘Don’t you think that’s kind of silly to change my name after eight years?’ Bryce asked. His name will stay the same. The siblings are thrilled about the new baby. ‘When Bryce found out I was going to have a baby, he said, ‘Thank you so much!” Gayle says. ‘Now that Caden’s at home, all they want to do is hold him.’ Gayle says that having a third baby is already a different experience from her first two, who were born 21 months apart. ‘I’m enjoying it and I don’t take it for granted. I feel like this is such a treat for me to have this baby. He’s a lucky little guy because he has a lot of love to come home to.’ Marc has lived in the Palisades for 15 years and Gayle has been here for 10 years. Two years ago, Gayle and the two children lived in Park City, where Bryce trained with the U.S. Ski School, while Marc commuted back and forth every weekend from the Palisades. They decided it was too tough for the family and moved back to the Palisades. Both children attend Village School and mom keeps busy with volunteer work. Marc is a managing partner in his family’s real estate investment firm, Ezralow Company. He also co-produces feature films under the banner of Revolution Films, which has produced ‘Sleep With Me,’ One Tough Cop’ and ‘Locust.’ ‘I can’t tell you how many people called to tell me about the Post’s contest and told me to call,’ Gayle says. Fortunately for the Ezralows, their baby was born 12 hours earlier than Sawyer Liam Karish, the son of Jeff and Erin Karish.
County Extends Beach Parking Lot Deadline
After meetings with managers of Gonzales Construction, Inc. this Tuesday, County officials expect that its contractor will not complete the repaving of its eastern parking lot at Will Rogers State Beach by the end of the month, as previously scheduled. County officials do expect that its pre-February deadline will hold for its two other projects, including the renovation of the L.A. County Lifeguard’s Headquarters. Having rebuilt its exterior, construction crews are installing the electrical system as well as finishing its interior. The adjacent public restrooms have been redesigned and largely reconstructed. The barebones interior is nearly complete and crews are laying tile on its roof. Construction began in December 2005 with the expectation that the County’s $12-million project would be complete by May 2007. But the discovery of a city-owned sewer main in the beach’s eastern parking lot delayed construction for four months there and has continued to slow work on the lot, said Mike Patel, one of the County’s project managers overseeing construction. Although County crews fortified the sewer main to prevent damage during construction, crews are not using regular-size equipment to grade the eastern parking lot because they could damage the main. Final grading of the lot began this week, prior to paving. Refurbishment of the County parking lot west of Gladstone’s hit a snag in mid-December. Ground water was discovered at a higher level than expected, which delayed construction until this week. The parking lot there is expected to be completed by the end of February, one month later than scheduled, Patel said. ————– Reporting by Staff Writer Max Taves. To contact, e-mail: reporter@palipost.com
Adele A. Toth, 81, A 56-Year Resident
Adele Alice Toth, a Pacific Palisades resident since 1950, passed away on January 4 after a long illness. She was 81. Born on December 2, 1925 in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, Toth moved West with her family the same year that ‘All About Eve’ premiered at Grauman’s Chinese Theater, and a Caesar salad at Musso & Frank cost 35 cents. She took advantage of everything that 1950s Los Angeles had to offer’movies, dancing, dining and weekends at the beach. Toth spent most of her career at The Rand Corporation. In later years, she was a member of the Palisades Garden Club, an avid Lakers fan and a regular visitor to Acapulco, Mexico. Above all, she treasured her family and they her. She is survived by her sisters, Marge Sharer of Pacific Palisades and Dolores Slate of San Clemente; brothers Dennis, with whom she lived in the Palisades, and Ronald Toth of Van Nuys; three grandnieces and a nephew, and many loving friends. A memorial service will be held on Saturday, January 13 at 11 a.m. at Pierce Brothers Westwood Village Memorial Park (310-474-1579). In lieu of flowers, donations can be made in Adele’s name to the nonprofit Lange Foundation, an animal rescue group, 2106 S. Sepulveda Blvd., Los Angeles 90025.
Carl Gebhart, 80, Stockbroker, Bridge Player and Rainmeister
Carl G. Gebhart, a longtime resident of Pacific Palisades and official rainmeister for the Palisadian-Post for a decade, passed away yesterday, January 10. He was 80. Born in Santa Monica, Gebhart grew up in Beverly Hills and was educated at USC and the Harvard Business School. He was a stockbroker in downtown Los Angeles for 50 years, an avid bridge player and a devoted father and grandfather. He is survived by his three daughters and nine grandchildren. A memorial service will be held at the Palisades Presbyterian Church, 15821 Sunset Blvd on Sunday, January 14 at 2 p.m. For any further information, call (310) 454-0366.
Richard Brenneman, 85, Scientist, Producer and Poet
Former Palisadian Richard Brenneman, a scientist by profession and poet at heart, passed away at a nursing home in Long Beach on November 16. He was 85. Born in Pottsville, Pennsylvania, on March 28, 1921, Richard was the youngest of four boys (Phil, Bud, Jack and Richard) born to Robert and Florence Brenneman. The four brothers lived with their mother, Uncle Lou, and the grandmother matriarch of the family, Emma Brenneman. His Uncle Lou was like a father to Richard. His father, a patent attorney, had a law office in New York City and spent much of his time there. Richard was a champion wrestler in high school, in the 165-lb weight class. He won the high school state championship using what would become a trademark ‘keylock hold.’ Richard’s heroics were featured at the Brenneman’s Hollywood Theater in Pottsville, where the short films of ‘Dick Brenneman and his Mat Men’ were shown. He earned a wrestling scholarship to Lehigh University, and was the team captain in 1942. He was an Olympic alternate in 1940, but the Games were cancelled because of World War II. He was later inducted into the Pottsville Sports Hall of Fame. Richard served in the Army in Intelligence, in charge of displaying the position of battles and troop movements. He was honorably discharged on June 26, 1946. After graduating with a B.S. in engineering from Lehigh University, he later earned a M.S. in sociology and a Ph.D. in industrial sociology from the University of Pittsburgh. Richard had a rich and varied career, which included working as a coal mine engineer, a steel production foreman, and a professor at the University of Pittsburgh, USC, UCLA, and Cal State L.A. He worked for NASA during the height of the space race and was director of the Indoctrination Center where system training and research was conducted by The Rand Corporation. He hosted two early public television science shows called ‘Innovations’ on Channel 28, and ‘Science Safari’ on cable television. He served as executive secretary to the City of Los Angeles Committee on Utilization of Space Technology. Brenneman moved with his family to Pacific Palisades in 1955 and lived here for more than 30 years, and lived in Los Angeles for 51 years. He said his true calling was music and poetry. He wrote numerous musicals, songs and hundreds of poems, and produced two musicals, including ‘The Schizophrenics’ at Theatre Palisades. His legacy lives on in his poetry that he wrote until he could longer hold a pen. His Web site is www.501poems.com Richard is survived by his brother Jack of Chambersburg, Pennsylvania; his first wife Mary Lou Brenneman, M.D. of Manhattan Beach; and his children (all of whom graduated from Palisades High School): Gayne Brenneman, M.D. (husband Robert Slay, M.D.) of Palos Verdes Estates, Donna Brenneman-Barry (husband Christopher) of Pasadena, Jim (wife Dawn) of Torrance, and Heidi Brenneman-Dowd (husband John) of Hawaii. He was most proud of his grandchildren–Tyner and Cara Rayne Brenneman-Slay; Raymond James and Victoria Emma Brenneman-Barry; Suzanne Brenneman; Allison, Kate and John Richard Dowd. A memorial service will be held on Saturday, January 13 at 1 p.m. at Green Hills Memorial Park, 27501 Western Ave. in Rancho Palos Verdes. Phone: (310)) 831-0311. For further information please contact: Donna Brenneman-Barry at donnabarry@alumni.usc.edu or (310) 251-8288.
Snowboard Champ in the Making
Sam Mercer, an eighth-grader at at Carrabassett Valley Academy in Maine, just returned from two weeks of early season snowboard training in Saas Fee, Switzerland. ‘I’ve skied since I was two and I got into snowboarding when I was nine because my older brothers and sister did it,’ said Mercer, whose family moved from Huntington Palisades to the Riviera last summer. ‘I first started at Beaver Creek in Colorado and loved it. You can do more tricks.’ Prior to enrolling at Carrabassett Academy, Mercer attended Brentwood School. He found out about Carrabassett when it was mentioned on the news last year in association with one of the school’s alumni, Seth Wescott, won the Snowboardcross gold medal at the 2006 Olympics. ‘There are different events’Boardcross, Halfpipe and Slope Style,’ he said. ‘I like Slope Style best because it’s rails and jumps.’ The 14-year-old shows rare dedication to his sport, practicing six days a week when there is snow and cross training in the summer months by skateboarding, jumping on the trampoline, running and lifting weights. ‘No matter what you do there’s still stuff to learn,’ Mercer said. ‘Right now, I’m working on my backside 360s. My goal is to become a pro and make my living snowboarding.’ As much as he loves Carrabassett, located at the base of Sugarloaf Mountain, Mercer’s favorite place to practice his craft is right here in Southern California’at Bear Mountain in Big Bear. Mercer, who rides a Burton Dominant because he likes the feel and durability of that particular board, most admires pro Danny Davis, who has appeared in several movies. Mercer enjoyed his trip to Switzerland with his school teammates. ‘Saas Fee provides great early season conditions that allowed Sam and his teammates to prepare for competitions in early December and strengthen the bonds between athletes and coaches,’ Carrabassett Coach Chris Clark said. Mercer and his teammates experienced another culture and the value of speaking and understanding another language while completing their normal schoolwork on the trip. Carrabassett Headmaster John Ritzo said the main goal of the fall camps is for student-athletes to establish goals, enforce fundamentals, and help coordinate a balance for their academics, athletics and physical conditioning. Founded in 1982, CVA is a fully accredited co-educational boarding school for grades eight through post-graduate. Notable alumni include Wescott, Bode Miller (silver medalist in 2002), Brenda Petzold (bronze medalist in 1998), Kirsten Clark and Emily Cook. In 25 years, CVA has produced 10 Olympians, 71 national titles, 16 NCAA All-Americans, one overall alpine world cup title, two individual alpine world cup titles, 20 national team members and six world champions. Mercer has never been seriously hurt snowboarding, although he understands the risk involved in such a dangerous sport, where speed and height on jumps is critical. When he’s home in the Palisades, Mercer enjoys skateboarding and going to the beach.
