ARMENIA: YEREVAN AND WASHINGTON ENGAGE IN SNOWBOARDING DIPLOMACY
ews/articles/eav030410.shtml
3/04/10
The White House has sent two high-profile American freestyle
snowboarders as emissaries to Armenia, the US State Department has
announced.
Amber Stackhouse, 30, and Erin Comstock, 32, have been dispatched as
athletic envoys by the State Department. Their mission in Armenia is to
"engage . . . youth in a dialogue on the importance of an education,
positive health practices and respect for diversity," according to
the State Department.
During their March 3-7 stay in Armenia, the pair will visit the
capital, Yerevan, and the ski resort of Tsaghkadzor, where they
will demonstrate their skills, conduct clinics and judge a snowboard
cross event, a competition in which groups of snowboarders race along
a course.
The two envoys’ athletic accomplishments include Comstock’s 2008
win in the Abominable Snow Jam contest, a summer invitational at
Mt. Hood, Oregon, and Stackhouse’s first-place finish in the 2003
American Snowboard Tour. Both snowboarders have film experience,
the State Department noted in its news release. Neither competed at
the 2010 Vancouver Olympics.