The race was moved on Thursday from Notchview to Prospect, because of dwindling snowpack at Notchview and continued rain and warm weather. Prospect Mountain graciously stepped in, and Chris Li ran the race like clockwork. Huge thank you to all the volunteers who made this race happen!
The waxing was straightforward-enough, but the job we ended up on was the slowest possible combination we could have chosen, on the day with the most skis to wax. Super duper thanks to the wax team for calmly getting through it all, for the athletes waiting patiently, and to the food table team for keeping those waxers fed and caffeinated!
The girls' classic race went first. The course started with a big hill, then went down the hill, and had about 2km of flat/rolling terrain that was really fast on a hard icy day like Sunday. Our girls universally displayed good energy up that hill, and then out-double-poled the competition, to sweep the top 10 and put 13 in the top 14. Having set the bar so high, the boys responded, taking 11 of the top 12 spots. Some of this was just having good skis and wax, but a large part of this success is because the athletes have been putting in the work, and now they're seeing results!
Next up was the skate race. Prospect staff went out and scrubbed one of the tracks with a snowmobile, and the surface was fast and granular. Girls went first again, and again, it was a show of strength, fitness, and technique. The top 10 were again all CSU skiers, and Ella would have been the 11th if she'd stayed on course (to be fair, the race was run with a real skeleton crew of volunteers, so where she went off-course it wasn't as well marked as it could have been). At the conclusion of the race, it was all five of our U16s named to the U16 team, and 12 highschoolers named to the EHS team!
The boys responded to the girls' challenge, taking 10 of the top 12 spots (and the top 5). All six U16s were named to the U16 Team (even though Noah was clearly still under the weather, and looked like he might pass out while racing), and all the rest of them made the EHS team (we did have one DNS, so he didn't make it).
A special shout-out to Elizabeth, who not only raced in the top 10, but gets to represent the state of Connecticut at EHS this year!
I only got photos of the boys in the skate race, but at least that's half the team...
Alex
Ayden, with Ben in tow
Ben
Cheer squad!
Connor
Devin
Dwight
Julian
Linden
Lucas B
Lucas D
Milo
Nick, with Lucas behind
Noah
Patrick
Sam
I missed getting a photo of Bryce, since I was just looking for the blue suits.
Extra kudos to Linden and Laura, for winning both races!
All around great day of racing. Thanks to everyone who made it possible!
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