Fayette County native Jessie Duda came away from the freestyle skiing Junior World Championships proud of her performance.

Duda, 19, of Brownsville was one of 12 U.S. athletes to compete against dozens of freestyle skiers from across the world at the Junior World Championships, held the second week of January in the Republic of Kazakhstan. She placed 8th in her specialty of moguls, 11th in dual moguls and ninth in team dual moguls.

Moguls is a form of freestyle skiing that involves athletes carving between mounds of snow scattered across a 200-meter slope. Advanced moguls skiers propel themselves off the mounds, flipping through the air.

Duda learned how to ski when she was just a 1-year-old at Seven Springs Mountain Resort in Somerset County. She was recruited on scholarship to Killington Mountain School — a high school ski academy in Vermont. Now, she trains under former Olympians and competes for Utah-based team Wasatch Freestyle while earning a degree from Westminster University in Salt Lake City.

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