Asheville, NC – Now in its 18th year, the Mountain Sports Festival (May 25th- May 27th) in Asheville, North Carolina, has become a staple of the Memorial Day weekend. Locals and visitors from throughout the southeast join to celebrate music, community, athletics, and local business while showcasing the unique mountain terrain and culture of Asheville, North Carolina, and its surroundings.
This past September, the all-volunteer board of the non-profit festival met to review and redefine the festival’s purpose. The new mission statement reads: The mission of Mountain Sports Festival is to promote and celebrate mountain sports, wellness, and community and to provide opportunities for all ages and abilities to participate.
To support the new mission statement, the MSF is creating a charitable fund that will be the primary focus of the festival’s fund-raising. The fund will have three components that are mostly oriented on helping and encouraging youth to gain access to and participate in sports such as running, biking, skiing, paddling and climbing.
The majority of the funds will go to support a new relationship with Streets to Peaks – a Maybin Mission program powered by Camp Grier. This program provides enriching outdoor experiences to youth with limited access to wilderness adventures. Through exciting challenges like rock climbing and whitewater paddling, program participants ages 11-18 learn to overcome obstacles, set long-term goals and imagine a future with endless possibilities.
Additionally, the fund will offer, on an annual basis, a Sponsor a Youth Athlete Grant that is to be awarded to a local youth athlete in need of financial support related to their sport. For example, a young mountain biker may need help with airline tickets in order to attend the USA Cycling Mountain Bike National Championships.
Finally, the fund will support the annual MSF Golden Backpacker Award, where the festival will recognize on stage an individual who has done a lot to advance the outdoor industry in the region.
About the Mountain Sports Festival
The Mountain Sports Festival, now in its 18th year, is a nonprofit event, free to the public and committed to presenting a well-balanced series of events and entertainment that encourages participation by people of all ages. The Mountain Sports Festival is organized by a volunteer group of community-oriented citizens dedicated to the presenting of a well-balanced series of events that encourages participation on all levels.
This past year, prior to the new charitable focus and with the help of local sponsors and vendors such as Prestige Subaru, Blue Ridge Outdoors, Diamond Brand Outdoors, Sierra Nevada Brewing, and Pisgah Brewing, the Mountain Sports Festival was able to donate generously to the Friends of Connect Buncombe and Asheville GreenWorks.
Are you interested in supporting their mission by being a sponsor, vendor, volunteer, or event participant at the 2018 Mountain Sports Festival? Please visit their website.
