Presque Isle JOQs - Part 1

J2 Boys Semifinal Sprint

This weekend the CSU Jrs made the long haul up to Presque Isle, ME for the 1st big races of the 2009-2010 ski season.  Without much snow time under our collective belts it was going to be interesting to see how everyone faired in the far north.  We arrived Friday at about 3:15, just in time to move stuff into our wax room, change and get on our skis for a cold and windy shake down ski after the long ride up in the two 15 passenger vans that we rented.  The view of Katadin was breathtaking on the way up and I saw 3 bald eagles while I was driving!  We were crammed in pretty tight so everyone was glad to get out and stretch our legs and lungs and preview the sprint courses for Saturday's races.  With the sun hitting the horizon at 3:35, we mostly skied under the lights for about 30-40 min. trying to get the right line on the switchback corner at the bottom of the fast downhill.  Tomorrow's races would be interesting! 

The qualifying round went off in the morning and CSU faired well with Alex Jospe and Chris Stock qualifying for the elimination rounds in the J1 and OJ age group, while  Corey Stock, Eli Hoenig and Hamish McEwen qualified in the J2 age group.  Both Alex and Chris were eliminated in the quarter-finals.  However, all three J2s advanced to the A final races.  Corey Stock took off in her final as the sun was heading down, but was dogged by a very persistent Heather Mooney, who managed to draft for the whole race and sneak by Corey on the finish straightaway.  In the boys A final Eli Hoenig jumped into second place at the start and finished a strong third, while Hamish McEwen, a first year J2, raced very well to take 4th place.

It was a very good day for CSU, especially considering that much of the competition has been on snow a lot of late.  Stratton has been on snow for 2 weeks at Mt. Ste. Anne, Burke has been out west, many groups got on good snow at Thanksgiving.  We got on 500 meters at Weston!!!

A few photos from the sprints.

Alex in the Quarterfinals, smiling about her fast skis

Nick and Isaac on the final climb to the stadium