In a Pacific Northwest region loaded with Winter Olympic talent, one Sammamish athlete has flown under the radar — at least in the country she resides in.

Obscurity certainly wasn’t an issue in Denmark for Yina Moe-Lange, whose name and picture were all over the Danish media late last week.

“A lot of family and friends have been calling me, saying they saw in the paper, or heard about me on the radio,” she said.

Moe-Lange, a 16-year-old Danish citizen, has lived in the United States since she was 4, and in Sammamish since her family moved to the area in 2005.

She was officially asked on Jan. 21 to compete for Denmark in the giant slalom and slalom skiing events at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.

“I didn’t know what to think, I didn’t really expect it,” said Moe-Lange, who received the news Thursday morning via an e-mail on her phone. “I jumped out of bed after I saw it and ran downstairs and showed my parents.”

The announcement not only came as a surprise to Yina, but her father, Danny.

“The likelihood of it happening was not that big,” he said. “There’s a tendency that you’re only going to send someone who has a chance of winning a medal.”

He said the decision to pick Yina was based on the idea of grooming a young athlete while looking four years down the road to the Games in Sochi, Russia.

“They are definitely thinking about 2014,” Danny said.

Yina also understands the scenario, but it doesn’t mean she isn’t excited to make the very best of the opportunity.

“I know that I’m not a contender,” she said, via phone from Mammoth Mountain Ski Area in California. “I also know it’s going to be an experience of a lifetime, so why not go?”

A fast starter

Yina, who currently competes with Team Alpental Snoqualmie, spent the first eight years of her life skiing in Tahoe, Calif.

She first put on a pair of skis at 3, in what started out as simply family fun. It was all downhill from there.

“It was very clear early on, around 6 or age 7, that she had a very strong talent for skiing,” Danny said, noting there was no family history of competitive skiing.

Yina was placed in a development program where she soon caught the bug, and first started dreaming about the Olympics.

“It kind of began after a couple of years of racing,” she said. “It was kind of like, ‘This is cool, I can do this.'”

Hard work and big dreams obviously paid off. At 16, Yina will be one of the youngest Olympians in Vancouver. Currently, only one competitor, Scott James — a 15 year-old snowboarder from Australia — is known to be younger.

“I didn’t think it would happen so soon,” Yina said.

Road to the top

Over the past year, Yina has prepared tirelessly for the opportunity to reach the Winter Olympics. She has trained in Chile, Germany, Austria and several other locations within the U.S. and Canada.

In December and January alone, she participated in 26 international races in North America, amassing 15,000 miles through the air.

“I definitely get tired, but I think we learn how to deal with it,” she said.

On top of her rigorous workout routine, Yina also balances her education. She is a junior at Chrysalis School, an independent learning facility in Woodinville. The decision to attend the private school came after missing 42 days of school her sophomore year at Skyline High School.

“We needed a school that would have much more emphasis on teacher-student relations,” Danny said.

Yina, who still has tons of friends on the Plateau, participated on the Skyline cross country team last season, and is expected to be a captain in the fall of 2010.

What’s next?

Yina will head off to Vancouver for the opening ceremony on Feb. 12, and stay with the Danish team in the Olympic Village at Whistler. She only knows one of the team members, but the adjustment shouldn’t be too difficult — she’s fluent in Danish.

“It’s kind of weird, they don’t expect me to speak Danish,” she said, laughing. “I’m a lot more Danish than they think.”

Yina will compete in the giant slalom on Feb. 24 and the slalom on Feb. 26 — a thought she admits is still sometimes difficult to fathom.

“All those experiences you see on TV look like so much fun, now I get to do it for myself,” she said.