Contact: Felipe Mares 925-5548 Media Contact: Carolyn Gonzales 277-5920

February 17, 2003 UNM ATHLETIC TRAINING STUDENT INTERNED AT WINTER X GAMES Felipe Mares, a senior in the University of New Mexico's athletic training program, recently returned from a trip to the Winter X Games in Aspen, Colo., where he put his skills into practice as an intern at the ESPN sponsored event. Mares, son of Ruben and Berna Mares and a 1998 graduate of Taos High School, was invited by his instructor, Susan McGowen, to be a part of the 20-member medical team providing assistance to 280 athletes from around the world participating in ESPN's Winter X Games. "It was an invaluable educational experience," Mares said. "It provided us with the opportunity to use our skills and develop confidence." The Winter X Games are truly Xtreme: all kinds of snowboarding competitions - superpipe, X, and slopestyle; Moto X - motorcyclists performing stunts off snow jumps; ski slopestyle and snow cross - snowmobile racing. The X games offered the interns a chance to see injuries unlike those they normally see in high school and collegiate athletics, said McGowen. "We had a heel fracture on a skier who came off a jump onto a table [ski run] and cracked her heel," Mares said. Normally skiers break the tibia just below the knee, he said. Another athlete, a snowboarder, broke her wrist trying to brace herself in a fall. They also treated concussions, cuts, bangs and bruises, he said. "You might see one ACL [anterior cruciate ligament] injury as a trainer. We had three in one day at the X games," he said. Mares, who will graduate from UNM in May, said that he plans to get certified as an athletic trainer. He's applied to physical therapy school at Texas Tech and wants to become a licensed physical therapist. Mares played baseball at the New Mexico Military Institute in Roswell. His training skills and his love of the game gave him the opportunity to intern as an athletic trainer with the Atlanta Braves farm club in Florida during spring training last year. "Athletic trainers and physical therapists work to help athletes avoid injury as well as rehab existing ones," Mares said. Mares' also plans to get certified in strength and conditioning with a goal to work with baseball players. "Many professional ballplayers spend winters in Phoenix. I would like to set up there to work with strength and conditioning, as well as rehab, with pro ballplayers," he said. Mares is ready to go the distance. # # #

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