Depending on your current region of America, a local public radio station will cycle through various updates and statistics appropriate to that area. In Vermont you may be used to hearing regular updates on overnight frosts in cold hollows, Town Meeting vote tallys, and spring sugaring temperature swings.
Alaskan public radio often cycles between two prominent data points: the exact hours and minutes of light you’ll be getting that day, and the exact price per barrel you’ll be getting for Alaskan crude oil.
If you read this blog frequently, you’re used to a steady string of data points like double pole and Bolton test results, top Eastern Cup finishes, and Championship team selections. This post may not seem to different, but much like our country’s 49th state, everything here is on a bigger scale.
Results here represent the best in the country. The Junior National Championships. So when you read data points like Aidan Burt finishing in first place, it’s a step beyond your usual morning broadcast. When Ava Thurston stacks up three trips to the podium in her first Junior Nationals, our own VT ski world seems a bit smaller as the goals and targets climb higher. When Rose Clayton, Meredith Stetter, Aidan, and Ava come together to score a week’s worth of points that rank MNC as the 13th-strongest club in the whole country, our entire Club’s vision is broadened. America is starting to announce itself on the World stage, and our club is starting to announce itself to America.
Everything began early on a Thursday morning, when our group departed from a pitch-black East Coast to jet through four time zones and countless terminals. With a few extra pre-race speeds on foot through the Detroit airport, the Burlington group of Ava, Aidan, Sara and I made it safely to Seattle with 7 hours to kill. Meredith and Rose, meanwhile, were high above the clouds en route from Boston.
Just a couple of East Coast goons in Seattle
The layover in Seattle was a trip in and of itself. You couldn’t ask for a better pit-stop, with warm temps, the sun shining brightly (in America’s cloudiest city no less), and public transit that kicks butt. For a quick $3 apiece, the four of us shot downtown on an electric train and were munching on sandiwches and salad at Pike’s Place market for lunch. From there we ascended a long set of stairs to Storyville coffee, where we drank what was universally hailed as the best coffee we had ever had. We wandered down to Puget Sound, walked along some docks by the gentle waves, and stared up at art outside the museum…it was easy to forget we were heading toward the Arctic Circle for ski racing.
But the travel continued, and somehow by the miracle of clear skies we arrived at the Anchorage airport within 15 minutes of Rose and Meredtih walking off their plane. The group was united, and off to the Falconer house for dinner and a great nights sleep in comfy beds and wonderful hospitality. After three years in a row of Junior Nationals travel headaches, I was half expecting to wake up from all of this as a bad dream, jolted awake in turbulence somewhere over Ohio.
It was real, though. We were in Anchorage, sleeping in to recover from the travel and, before we knew it, walking a short three minutes out the front door for our first ski at Kincaid Park. And of course we bumped into a moose trailside in the first half hour. Did I also mention that all of our skis and bags eventually arrived, nobody got sick, and there was plenty of snow everywhere? It still all seemed too good to be true.
After skiing, we saddled up in a ’93 pathfinder, popped in a Brad Paisley cassette tape, and rallied down toward Lake Hood and the team hotel. You could say we rolled up Akaska-style.
After some training on course for a few days, things kicked off with individual start freestyle races on Monday. Anticipation and nerves were high, but the sugary
Meredith in the 5km skate race!
conditions favored the East Cost squad and the good finishes started racking up right away. Rose narrowly missed out on the top-30 for the U18 race, while Meredith scored her first Club points for the U20s. Aidan felt just a bit off, enough to slip just out of podium contention. Ava was even more in the hunt, as she clung to a 7-way tie for the lead through 3.5 kilomters. In the last 1.5k, the standings broke open but Ava hung tough for 5th place.
Turnagain Arm, viewed from the Alyeska tram
During our relaxing rest day, almost every New England skier hopped in the team vans for a trip down the Seward Highway into Girdwood and Alyeska resort. The drive down there along the Turnagain Arm was the first time I can remember when NO kid in the van had their face in a screen. The views out the window, with the early-afternoon sun and bright snow, were too good. Every twisting corner of the road brought bigger mountains as we snaked alongside the water. At Alyeska, we hopped in the tram to get even higher up and look out at the amazing landscape. It’s not just the racing that is memorable at Junior Nationals, and during years with epic locations and amazing opportunities you can’t NOT go take it all in.
Wednesday’s classic sprint was a major highlight of the week. All year, Aidan and I have known that this race was a key shot at a National title. The competition was easy to identify, and the two biggest challengers were on the mind all spring, summer, fall, and especially winter: Wally MaGill and Trey Jones. The morning qualifier didn’t do anything to ease the pressure: 1st place Wally MaGill, 2nd place Trey Jones, 3rd place Aidan Burt. The stage was set. The course was tough: a small climb out of the stadium, and gradual downhill, and then the crux: a brutally steep ascent of “Gong Hill”, followed by a screaming downhill into the stadium area. A sharp and dangerous lefthander brought everyone back to the final 100m dragrace to the line.
In the afternoon heats, the New England U16s dominated. Trey flew off course on the back stretch but still came through to advance. Wally won his quarterfinal by a wide gap. Playing things tactically, Aidan and Frost Mtn skier Elvis McIntosh skied together at the front, working together to eliminate space for others to pass and controlling the speed to conserve energy. The semifinals went much the same, and the final lineup put Wally, Trey, and Aidan all on the line together.
With a questionably-early and speedy start, Wally took the lead out of the stadium. Aidan found himself at the back of the pack. To make sure to catch the finish I waited in the lower area, which meant I had to pace anxiously not knowing what was happening on the major climb. But over the top, Aidan appeared out in front with the others left chasing. He rocketed down the descent, with Trey in hot pursuit.
It’s now worth a flashback to Lake Placid. In a classic race with almost identical finishing traits (long downhill, sharp corner into straight finish) earlier this year, Trey absolutely dusted Aidan by tactically holding behind and then, as Aidan doublepoled down the stretch, busting out a frantic striding technique to accelerate in front.
In Anchorage, at this National Championship, the scene was all too familiar. Trey skied up behind Aidan coming into the back stretch, and as Aidan kicked his double pole into gear, Trey switched lanes, pulled alongside, and began to stride. I have never lost my voice yelling so loudly, have never ran so fast alongside a skier, and never been as ecstatic as I was when Aidan held his speed in the last 50 meters and crossed the line for the win.
Knowing what it would come down to for so long, and seeing it play out in exactly that fashion, and taking the title that day was something you could not have written out better in a novel.
It was quite a hug in the finish lanes…I think Aidan and I both got a little emotional although I probably shouldn’t be admitting that publicly on the internet. It took a LONG time for what had just happened to sink in. Trey’s finish gave New England a 1-2 result, while Wally crossed the line in 3rd. With the race of his career so far, Elvis came across in 4th!
Your 2019 National Champion!
But we weren’t done, because just as Aidan’s final wrapped up it was time for Ava and Quincy to toe the line against their own version of the Wally Magill “ominous western threat”: Intermontain skier Logan Smith. Both Ava and Logan had advanced through the rounds by just skiing away from the competition on the big hill. Quincy had proved herself an absolute monster in the double pole dragrace finish.
In the final, both tactics were at play. Logan pulled away on the hill with Ava in hot pursuit. Quincy chased from behind. Logan put enough of a gap to hold off the Vermonters, and in the finish stretch Quincy totally motored to double pole past Ava. But it was another two New England skiers on the podium!
The day wasn’t without some heartbreak, though. Meredith advanced to the U20 heats, where she skied a great climb to land herself in 3rd position with a clear gap to 4th: enough to guarantee herself a top-20 result. But the sugary snow caught her klister and she ended up rolling and tumbling down the hill at the worst possible moment. Total loss of speed as her competitors sailed by. This was hard to watch and no doubt harder for Meredtih to endure, having known how strong she was skiing. But every experience is learning, whether it’s a win or a loss. No doubt this will fuel some fire this coming summer and fall during training…although Meredith is usually at no loss for fire with her training!
The classic skis and the klister stayed on for the mass start classic races on Friday. Things kicked off with the U16 guys, who helped set the tone for how the relatively gradual course would get skied in icy conditions: fast and hard from the gun. Trey skied wire-to-wire in the lead to take the win, while Aidan crashed out of contention around 4km. With fast conditions and a large tight pack, there was no way of getting back in the mix and he settled for 16th.
Now it’s worth another flashback to an Eastern Cup: Rikert, 5km classic U16 mass start. Off the gun, Ava skis away from the field for a convincing win. Her strategy? “Ski it like an interval start”.
So after getting the cobwebs out in the skate race and having a confidence-boosting 3rd in the classic sprint, Ava sent me a message the night before this race:
“Should I go hard from the start? And should I use my white bases?”
“Yes and yes” I replied
“Ok. That’s what I was thinking” she sent back, nonchalantly.
So that gun went off and up the first climb the battle would be clear: Logan Smith vs Ava Thurston. Both are 1st-year U16s, so this might be a scene to play out for a while now.
For U16s, your mass start seed was a combo of your first two races. With a 5th and a 3rd Ava earned the top bib for the mass start 🙂
They gapped the field, but every time Ava tried to make a move she realized she wouldn’t be able to break away from Logan (yet!). It came down to a sprint finish and Logan was just a bit stronger and more powerful. But this was a 2nd place finish!! And a serious gap to the rest of the field. There’s nothing like having the confidence to know you can ski with the best, but go home for the next season with a few specific goals to work on for the next showdown on the National stage.
In the U18 women’s race, Rose got to hold her own in one of the deepest fields of the day. The front of this race was largely controlled by skiers who had represented America at the recent U18 Scandinavian Cup and World Juniors. It’s worth noting something I’ve mentioned before here: we will always klister-up at practice and train on it. The last and most-grumbling resort from coach is to pull out skin skis or waxless. I’d much rather lose 20 minutes at the start of practice applying klister, just so we train on it, than give in. These are the days when that pays off and Rose skied a competitive race the whole time and at-or-ahead of several stronger NE skiers she hadn’t been close to in a while.
Rose skiing under “Spectator Bridge” approaching the finish
For Meredith it was a battle against skis, as she was using a borrowed pair that the wax techs hoped would suit the conditions better than her usual skis. Unfortunately the call backfired…sometimes you just gotta go with what you know. But on a stage like this sometimes you have to make game-time decisions and take a chance. One thing that was awesome about these two U20 races was watching some of the best tackle the same course. The power and efficiency this age group (many of whom are college competitors Meredith will race next year) was really a step above the rest of the day’s races! More ideas for the summer.
The final race day brought relays, skating through thick sugary snow so deep you couldn’t see your boots. Aidan was scramble leg for U16 Boys #1. He skis an aggressive race and tagged in a small pack at the lead. Unfortnately some bad luck in the final leg had Trey crashing out and dropping from 1st to 4th, so a repeat of last year’s title was not in the books. For Ava, teaming up with CSU’s Sophia Scirica and Quincy was a powerhouse team to bring home another podium! Meredith and Rose each skied 2nd legs, and had some of their fastest skiing of the week!
The end-of-week awards brought a few inspiring moments…first and foremost, Will Solow was awarded the prestigious Dave Quinn award! For this award each division nominates a skier exemplifying character and integrity in addition to success. Needless to say Will embodies those first two, and had the race week of his life to achieve All-American results (including 2 podiums) in every race.
Club scores were also tallied and individual awards presented. Whether it was for a National Title or for a relay leg tag-off, the experience of having “…representing Mansfield Nordic Club….” blaring over the loudspeaker countless times per day was inspiring and motivating. We’re really stepping it up, and in a big way.
In 2016 and 2017 each, we had 1 skier representing the club.
In 2018 we had 3 skiers scoring points for us (Aidan, Magda, Isaac) as the 27th-ranked club with a total of 135 points.
In 2019 we had 4 skiers scoring points for us (Aidan, Rose, Meredith, Ava) as the 13th-ranked club with a total of 355 points.
Next stop is the top 10, and at the awards I took a photo on my phone of the top-5 awarded clubs to remember what to keep shooting for.
Not everyone from this club qualified for Junior Nationals; and not everyone needs to. But as our club continues to improve on this National stage it’s the result of EVERYONE working together, whether or not they were on-the-ground in Anchorage, training hard for the last bit of the season, or competing themselves at the U16 or Eastern HS Championships. Our Juniors underwent a lot this year, successes and disappointments alike. Nobody can say their season was perfect, but everybody can be proud of what they accomplished from the first snowy, slushy ski up Stowe to the final, inevitable, grass-and-rock littered spring shred.
JNs crew: Adam, Ava, Rose, Meredith, Sara
Sara and I skiing out to the Pacific…and toward the future of MNC!
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