If you like to bounce, the wait is over.
Squamish’s new trampoline and athlete conditioning centre, Airhouse, is set to fully open early in the new year, but the public area opened Saturday.
Bouncers of all ages can slip off their shoes and bounce on the big trampolines to their hearts’ content. Parents can also plan birthday parties at the facility.
The grand opening for the 6,000-square-foot training centre will be held Jan. 19.
Once fully open, the centre, located on Commercial Way in the Squamish Sea to Sky Business Park, will offer training for athletes including training with air certified Canadian Freestyle Ski Association coaches.
Trampoline work allows freestyle skiers in particular to progress much faster, according to Rodney Wilson, the owner of Airhouse.
Wilson said training at a ski hill, an athlete may be able to do 12 practice runs in a day. On a trampoline, an athlete can practise 12 times in seconds, he said. “You can do that trick 300 times over until your muscle memory knows that trick. You can do it in your sleep. That is what the trampolines do for the athlete.”
The progression from dry-land training to trampoline to water-ramp training to snow is essential for athlete development, he said.
The trampolines at the centre differ from the ones in people’s back yards. There’s a trampoline wall where the jumper lands on her or his back and runs up a trampoline wall. There’s also a super trampoline and four other trampolines hand woven by Dave Ross, who was head coach for many past Canadian Olympic trampoline teams.
The jumping surface of the super trampoline, which Wilson said is the biggest available in the world, is 20 feet by 10 feet.
Seasoned freestyle athletes constantly train on trampolines, he said, and until now, elite athletes in Squamish have had to leave the community to access a facility.
“This is an athlete development centre that has previously only been available to professional athletes from Red Bull and those places, and we are bringing it to the public” in Squamish, Wilson said.
Another aspect of the centre will be the feeder programs for athlete development. “With our Jump Acrobat, learning for trampoline programs that are going to be brought in right from ages three to adult, we are going to also have a feeder program for whether they decide to go into trampoline, whether they want to do it recreationally or whether they want to go to the freestyle world with the skiing and snowboarding,” Wilson said.
Squamish’s two-time freestyle skiing Olympian and long-time coach Tami Bradley will be training athletes at the centre and also opening Sweat Studios in the facility. Bradley and a team of fitness instructors will offer a series of conditioning and dance programs.
The first Sweat Studio classes will be Jan. 4, she said.
“It reaches every age demographic,” Bradley said. “There are modifications for everything.”
Parents can drop off their kids for some bouncing and take in a class, Bradley said.
She will also continue her athlete coaching out of the centre. Training at the centre will be run with the Play Better philosophy, Bradley said.
“It’s to teach our kids we aren’t just necessarily trying to win as a team, but we are trying to become better people as a team,” Bradley said. Among other things, the Play Better program has teams earn and raise money for a charity of their choice rather than individually rewarding them for successes.
The centre was something Wilson and Bradley’s friend, the late freestyle champion Sarah Burke, had talked about, so after she died in an accident, Wilson said he took up the mantle of making it a reality.
A super trampoline at the centre has been named after Burke, and members of her family plan to be on hand for the grand opening.
**Please note, this story has been changed to remove a factual error made by Wilson.
