Meet of Champions: Bedford, NH

Today at Meet of Champions the girls all had successful races! In the first race of the day, the classic 6.5 k race, all three came in the top five (Caitlin in 5th, Helen in 2nd, and Kate in 4th). It was a very close race; everyone was within a minute of each other. Although the waxing was tricky we managed to find a great mix of klister that gave both kick and glide, which can be rare while using klister. Not even the morning’s drizzle deterred us from having a good race day!

In the afternoon skate relays we were teamed up in pairs: Caitlin and Helen, and Erin Perryman and Kate. Yet again, both of these speedy teams took medals in the sprint! Kate and Erin came in second, and Caitlin and Helen came in third. In the end it was a fun and busy day full of waxing (we did our own race-site waxing), warming-up, and racing!

~Helen

The meet of champs was a great race for most of us. We all had a great time and spent a nice amount of time hanging around in-between races. For most of us classic distance was one of the most interesting courses we have skied in a long time, I know for me the downhills were some of the most fun and scary that I have skied down even after the S-turns at Oak Hill. The sprint relay was a fun cumulation of the regular season for a lot of us, since it was extremely short and very fun to be able to just go for it 100% for the whole race.

We had some great success at the race event though we weren't counted as high school competitors. Many of us scored in the top ten, which for such a challenging course is a nice feat. Many of the corners felt as if we were skiing a GS course, completely iced out on the inside and very sharp narrow turns.

Afterwards we all did our own thing to recover on Sunday. To the great pleasure of the Hanover High students we had a snow day on Monday. For some of us this was a godsend since the JO sprints were on later in the day. We faithfully watched our skiers from NE progress through the qualifiers, quarter finals, semi finals, and finally for the elite the finals that went until around 9pm eastern time.

-George

JO's Sprint

Yesterday's sprint went well for the New England team, with several age-group winners and a sweep of the J1 Girls podium (NE took the top five places!).  The qualifiers began at 1230pm, and all of the finals were raced under the lights.  Both Sam (9th J2) and Paddy (5th J1) made the top ten and All-American!

Paddy and Sam after Paddy's J1 Boys A final

Eastern Cup Final Weekend and Lead Up

by Isaiah

Holderness Preview
Last Thursday we rolled up at Centerra for a nice spring ski/ preview for the other nomenclative EC, the Cheri Walsh. Stepping groggily out of the polar bear, we were all ready to grab our skis and get going, except for Dennis, who forgot all his equipment. While he scrambled to locate skis et al, we broke out the tubes of klister which was the first time this year for some. Finally able to start skiing we headed out on the race course.  After many of Dennis's reminiscent moments and some other breezes of warm air we reached the famous four corners, the symbolic high point of the course. Here still trying to dial in klister zones on new skis, many took to the putty knife and reskiied the uphill to the corners. In true Ford Sayre spirit we raced the downhill onto the stadium.

The Silver Fox Trot
Saturday yielded ideal conditions for the fox trot. The snow was fast yet all the downhills remained skiable and the uphills stayed firm. Early starting J2s got the advantage of unfitted snow, while older kids were able to mosey along and relax for most of the morning. For me it worked out to arrive somewhat late, but still leaving enough time to see how the course was holding up before my warmup. My focus for the race was to race smart and have something left for the dam hill. With the strong head wind in some places. I managed to stay relaxed and it paid off with my best race so far this year. Also impressive were the J2s, all of whom were in the top 10, including a podium for Sam, a top 5 for Noah, and a big leap up the results for both Tucker and Kate.

The Cheri Walsh
Stepping out of the van at Holderness again, the warm breezes of Thursday were replaced by frigid gusts. A wonderful day to be waxing, the snow was cold and transformed, but also had some snow from the night. Fortunately the coaches were able to find something that worked well.  With the exception of some leaves in the tracks the course was fast and constantly demanded attention to keep up with the stride to kick double pole to stride to double pole to tuck rapid fire transitions. With George starting only 15 seconds behind me I had constant motivation to push and rightly so because I barely got across the line when he came into the final straight away. After the race was the team naming for Junior Nationals in Minneapolis, where Sam was named to the J2 team. On our way back home we made our annual stop at dunkin donuts, the one time we get to eat junk with Scottie around.

Thanks to Dan and Dominic for the photos from the Cheri Walsh!