Shane McLean

Position:
Alpine
Height:
5-8
Class:
Senior
Hometown:
Steamboat Springs, Colo.
High School:
Lowell Whiteman School/SSWSC

Top Career Slalom Finish: Fifth (2014 Colorado Invitational)
Top Career Giant Slalom Finish: First (2012 Alaska Anchorage Invitational)

Honors

2012 First-Team All-RMISA
2013 First-Team All-RMISA
2013 CU Spencer Nelson Memorial Award (Ski Team, Overcoming Adversity)

Career at Colorado—McLean enters her senior season at Colorado established as one of the top giant slalom skiers in the country. She has 33 races to her credit and has finished 25 of them with 16 top 10 finishes, four podium appearances and one race victory. In 16 GS races in her career she has 10 top 10 finishes with all four podiums and her race victory coming in the discipline. Entering the 2015 season she has 24.89 FIS points in giant slalom and 30.47 in slalom.

2014 (Junior)—McLean continued her solid skiing in giant slalom action in 2014, earning two top 10 and two other top 15 finishes in the four races she finished on the season. She also made strides on the slalom side, earning her career best placement of fifth at the CU Spencer James Nelson Memorial Invitational at Winter Park. She had two of her best combined meets of her career back to back, first at Montana State, where she finished eighth in the GS and 12th in slalom, and then at the CU meet where she added a 15th place GS finish to her career best fifth place in slalom.

2013 (Sophomore)—McLean went from the youngster on a very experience women’s alpine team her freshman season to being one of the most experienced skiers as a sophomore with the departure of three All-Americans in Katie Hartman, Erika Ghent and Carolina Nordh. She was especially impressive as a sophomore in giant slalom races. In five GS races, she finished four and was in the top five each time with two podium appearances. She also showed improvement on the slalom side and in what turned out to be her final event of the season at New Mexico, she finished 12th and 13th in the two slalom races there. She was then sidelined with a concussion for the RMISA Championships and despite being the No. 3 women’s alpine qualifier out of the RMISA, she was also forced to sit out the NCAA Championships as the Buffs went on to win the NCAA Championship. She earned first-team All-RMISA honors for the second straight season and was also named the recipient of CU’s Spencer Nelson Memorial Award, given for overcoming adversity.

2012 (Freshman)—In a change of events that went from the Buffs likely having to rely on McLean heavily, the Buffs saw three seniors return with an extra season of eligibility so she was afforded the ability to add depth to an extremely deep women’s alpine team. She finished nine of 12 races with five top 10 finishes. After two solid ninth place results at the University of Colorado Spencer Nelson Memorial Invitational, she burst onto the scene at the Denver Invitational with a second place finish in the giant slalom race. She proved that was no fluke in Alaska as she won the giant slalom race as part of the Alaska Anchorage Invitational. While in Alaska, she also turned in her season best slalom performance, finishing 10th at the Seawolf Invitational. She earned first-team All-RMISA honors on the strength of her strong giant slalom performance. She was the No. 3 overall qualifier for NCAA Championships, No. 2 on the giant slalom list, although she did not participate.

Club—McLean skied for the Steamboat Springs Winter Sports Blue and has competed in FIS races since the 2007-08 season. Prior to coming to CU, she had skied in 178 such races and finished 131 of them. She had eight race victories, 28 podium, 31 top five and 48 top 10 performances in that stretch. She has competed in Nor-Am Cup races since 2008 and in 27 races, she has one top 10 finish and nine top 20 finishes in 27 races. She took sixth place in the Super Combined in Aspen in 2010. She has 10 races at the National Championship level with her best performance coming this past season in Winter Park with a 20th place finish in the giant slalom race. She has four top 20 performances, including a pair of 11th place finishes, at National Junior Championships. She won four National Junior races in 2008. She won a slalom race in Bormio, Italy, in February 2010, a month after winning a Super G race at Keystone. In 2011 at Snow King, Wyo., she won a giant slalom race. In 2007, she was named the SSWSC’s Most Improved, and then won the Ashley Stamp Memorial Award in 2008 and the Ned Grant Memorial Award in 2010. In 2011, she earned the Fastest Alpine Skier Award from the SSWSC. She qualified for J2 nationals both years she was eligible to and has qualified for U.S. National Championships each of the past three years. She was a member of the Colorado All-Star team from 2008-11 and was invited to try out for the U.S. National Team in May 2011.

High School—McLean graduated from the Lowell Whiteman School in Steamboat Springs, Colo., in 2010. There, she lettered in track and field, running the 800-meter dash and the mile run. She took fourth in regionals in the 800-meters and her best time in the mile was 5:48.

In the Classroom—McLean is majoring Studio Art at Colorado and is interested in design. She was a member of Lowell Whiteman’s honor roll three years and on the Dean’s list, as well.

Personal—Shane Diana McLean was born June 20, 1992, in Telluride, Colo., to Don and Christina McLean. She has a long list of hobbies that includes painting, reading, hiking 14ers, mountain biking, slack lining, knitting, yoga and hanging out with her brother and sister backpacking. She once held a job at the Steamboat Springs Pro Rodeo and after college she would like to be a sports psychologist, artist and a mountaineering guide.