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Sarah Burke Foundation honours two more young athletes

Dog lovers have a new way to support the foundation in the name of the Squamish freestyle skiing pioneer

Seven years after her death, Squamish's Sarah Burke is still helping others.

Two young athletes, Kye Matlock, 16, and Kailey Bogart, 13, have won 2018 Up & Coming Scholarships from the Sarah Burke Foundation.

Matlock is a skier from Crested Butte, Colorado and Matlock is a surfer and snowboarder from Hawaii.

Both are awarded $7,500 from the foundation, which has given away almost $100,000 since its inception.

 

The non-profit organization was launched by her family after Burke,  the four-time Winter X Games champion and ski halfpipe pioneer died Jan. 19, 2012 following a fall in the superpipe in Park City, Utah on Jan. 10.

Her husband, Squamish's Rory Bushfield, told The Chief on Monday that his original hope was that the foundation would be able to continue and give away as much as it has and more.

"We work hard at keeping it so we can keep doing this," he said. "We are the only foundation of its kind to give away that much money to action sports athletes."

The winning youth are chosen as much for their spirit as for their talent, he said.

"We are just looking for somebody who looks like they are having the most fun and they may not necessarily have the means to continue or to go as far down the path as they want," he said. "That is how Sarah was. She was always trying to give back. Of course, she was competitive, but she would ruin her run to stop and help someone else. She was never that cutthroat a competitor. It was more about having fun and helping her peers."

Burke successfully convinced the IOC to add slope style skiing and half pipe skiing to the Olympics.

Asked what Burke would have thought of the many women who now succeed in the once male-dominated sport she pioneered, Bushfield said she would have been blown away.

"I think she would be very proud of how the girls have stepped up," he said. "They just keep getting better, like  [American professional snowboarder] Jamie Anderson. She just keeps getting better and better."

Bushfield,  himself a professional skier, filmmaker and reality TV star has founded a  dog food company, Dex Knows Best with a  portion of the sale from each bag sold going to the Sarah Burke Foundation.

 "The dog food comes to your door, you never have to think about it again," he said.

Burke had found Dex under a car and gave her to Bushfield.

The dog is his constant companion. The idea for the company came out of a problem he needed to solve.

He would forget to pick up dog food for Dex, and not realize until meal time when he went to feed her.

 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Puppyhood. #iknowbest

A post shared by Yung Dex (@yungdexthegreat) on

"I would feel so bad about it. So, I tried to solve that problem along with raising some money for the foundation and keep dogs happy and make it easy for their owners."

Dex has her own Instagram account — @yungdexthegreat — but it isn't getting the love the dog deserves, Bushfield said, with a laugh.

For more on the foundation, go to sarahburkefoundation.com/.

For the dog food, go to dexknowsbest.com.

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