SkiTAM Attendees Stuck in Colo.

A blizzard that socked Denver Sunday left dozens of attendees at the annual SkiTAM fund-raiser stranded in Vail, Colo., and Denver International Airport.

“The people who tried to fly out on Sunday didn’t get out,” SkiTAM social director Susan Burgstiner said.

Many SkiTAM attendees arrived in Denver last Wednesday, after leaving the National Show in San Francisco.

Despite the weather in Denver, SkiTAM drew 957 attendees for the event, which ran Thursday-Sunday, up from 848 last year. Officials Monday were still counting the money raised over the weekend, but they expected it to exceed last year’s total.

Outdoor Life Network’s “dream team” of announcers and former Olympic Games skiers Picabo Street and Chad Fleischer crushed the other 71 teams from cable networks, hardware vendors and cable operators Saturday in a slalom race.

Time Warner Cable executive Jim Doolittle won the award for best crash when he took out Time Warner colleague Amos Smith during the race.

Also making news at SkiTAM was cable pioneer Trygve Myhren. The U.S. Olympic Committee said Myhren, former CEO of American Television and Communications Corp., would be a top ambassador at next year’s Paralympics in Torino, Italy.

SkiTAM will return to Vail next March.