Apple Pie In Sun Valley

At the training camp for Olympic ski prospects in Sun Valley this month, everyone was watching Jill Kinmont (left). She was worth it. Last year, at 18, she became the only person ever to win the women's National Junior and Senior slalom in the same year. This year she looked like prime Olympic material, and George Macomber and Christian Pravda, special coaches at the camp, kept a close eye on her as she swung through the practice gates on Baldy Mountain. Every other man was watching because she was easily the prettiest girl in the place.

All this attention was a bit embarrassing to Jill, a snub-nosed blonde who seems to think everyone is wonderful, and who skis simply because "it's so much fun."

She also likes to win. Back home on her father's guest ranch in Bishop, Calif. she is making sure the Olympic Committee won't forget her. Her training program, an appalling dose of self-discipline, includes quarter-mile sprints, deep knee bends and hopping like a halfback through automobile tires spread out in her back yard. Six days a week she heads for Mammoth Mountain to run the slalom gates. And at day's end, Jill packs off to baby sit for transportation money to the most exciting meet of her life—the U.S. Olympic tryouts in Vermont and New Hampshire in the middle of March.

Chatting with girls in early morning outside lodge, Jill laughingly shares a joke with two other Olympic hopefuls.

BUNDLING UP, JILL GETS AN ASSIST FROM BUDDY WERNER, JUNIOR CHAMPION IN '53, '52 AND A TOP PLACER IN WORLD MEETS

Chatting with coach Christian Pravda, Jill discusses day's plans. He was an Austrian ace who turned pro to teach at Sun Valley.

Riding bus to ski area, Jill feeds candy to Werner. Like Jill, he hopes to win a spot on the 1956 U.S. Olympic squad.

PRETTY SKIER AIMS AT OLYMPICS

Warming up in hut on top of mountain, Jill backs up close to improvised stove.

Puffing into ski mitten, Jill joins other skiers for an afternoon of practice.

Brother-Sister act of Skeeter Werner (left), Jill, Buddy Werner, and Bob Kinmont (right) heads down mountain. Bob and Skeeter have also won national junior titles.