The timetrials are over, and the season is here! Craftsbury hosted the first official races of the season for many in our club (Juniors and Masters alike).
On Saturday, the Rodriguez Sprints were a great showdown with the “Royal Court” format meaning every athlete not only raced the qualifying round, but three additional heats. If it weren’t for Bullitt Timing and their amazing electronic wizardry, there’s no way this could’ve gone as smoothly as it did.
Anders and Lorenzo with the Mansfield M sign
Making it all the way to the A-Final (for 4th and 5th overall) were Anders and Lorenzo, seen here starting off their round with the Mansfield “M” hand sign: someday, maybe this will be on the World Cup when the camera pans onto one of our skiers..?
Throughout a very long day of heat-after-heat, it was fun to see the matchups across clubs and age groups. What other race would feature MNC Alum Emma Page (skiing for UVM), versus current MNC skier Virginia Cobb, versus Tom Thurston?? And our club had several heats with multiple MNC suits, such as this one with Astrid and Paige:
Astrid and Paige putting some time into the competition!
On Sunday, the snow got wet but the air (thankfully) stayed dry until after the races had concluded. We had a busy schedule with 4 different mass start skate races. The men’s 10km was up first, with the women shortly after. 2 laps of the North 5km course is definitely a real wake-up call after shorter timetrials and a lot of skiing on flat manmade loops at practice.
Stella turns up to the steepest part of the course, right toward coaches corner.
The MNC crew raced well, although we identified a few takeaways that should help us next weekend in Waterville for the first Eastern Cup.
Racing a single lap of the 5km course were the U16s, who closed-out the weekend. Despite the shorter distances, both races came down to tight finishes for the top three!
Jonah taking it out hot! You can also spot Henry in the background!
Lea and Kate charging up the Screamin’ Mimi climb!
With a snow day for the school districts today, it’s safe to say everyone was thankful to have a nice recovery day without classes OR training (many of the HS teams train on Monday, so it’s hard to get that time off after racing weekends). Of course, having snow itself is a plus, as we should be able to enjoy skiing on some longer trails. We can NEVER thank the snowmaking and grooming heroes out there enough, but the real thing is always appreciated too!
Next up: the first Eastern Cup in Waterville, ME. Ironically, coastal Maine is not getting any snow from this storm, so all of our manmade lap training should really pay off in a few days time.
Tired and happy skiers!
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