Skiing Posts Solid Results

It may not have been home sweet home for the Dartmouth ski team, but the Big Green didn’t seem to care, as it won its relocated home carnival by over 50 points, leaving ninth-place Harvard far back in its snowy wake in Stowe, Vt.

But amidst the sea of green was the continued emergence of freshman Alena Tofte and the women’s nordic team, which placed sixth in the women’s 15k classic mass start race. The weekend before, Tofte had placed 18th in the classic event despite falling over. Nordic coach Chris City ’94 had estimated that she would have placed 13th or 14th had she stayed on her skis.

It seems that he was right, as Tofte finished 14th this weekend in the classic event in a time of 51:22.9, the first of two Crimson skiers to make the top 15 after zero had placed that high the weekend before. Tofte beat out classmate Esther Kennedy by less than a second.

“Throughout the race, Esther kept moving up and Alena was always a little behind her,” City said. “Alena passed her somewhere in the woods, and as she passed her she said ‘Come on, let’s go!’ She finished just a few strides ahead of Esther. It was really exciting to watch.”

Finishing third and fourth for the Crimson were senior Audrey Mangan and junior Cara Sprague, who placed 30th and 35th respectively. Their performances helped Harvard knock off Williams and St. Lawrence, regional powers whose campus layouts are far more compatible with the sport.

The women’s nordic team looked to build off its strong performance in the relay event before falling to ninth.

“It was 75% of a good race,” City said.

This time, it was Mangan leading the charge.

“She scrambled for us,” City said. “She was keeping up with the top skiers. Esther kept us in the same spot, Alena picked up a spot and ran out of gas—she’d given her all the day before.”

If the Crimson hopes to knock off schools such as Williams and St. Lawrence in more events and ultimately in the overall standings, the women’s nordic skiers will need more help. Harvard finished no higher than ninth in an event after the sixth-place finish in the 15k classic.

Luckily for the Crimson, it has a strong core of improving underclassmen who could help Harvard make that leap. Freshmen have stepped up early in their collegiate careers for a Crimson team that is looking to close the gap on the regional powers. Their performances and those of their teammates have helped Harvard coaches City and Tim Mitchell attract a strong recruiting class for next year.

“A lot of our skiers are young—underclassmen,” freshman Anthony Ryerson said. “So it’ll be exciting in years to come.”

One of these such freshmen was alpine skier Catherine Sheils who followed up her 18th-place finish in last weekend’s giant slalom with another strong performance. This one coming in the slalom, where Shiels took 22nd in both the first and second runs of the event. The freshman didn’t match the promise she showed in last weekend’s exhibition, where she placed third out of the collegiate field, but her performance was the strongest individual result the team had outside of the women’s nordic team.

Ryerson is another freshman who keeps improving. The Vail, Colo. native placed 41st in the 20k classic race.

“That was the best race of the season for me,” Ryerson said. “I started strong and then faded a bit. The last 12k or so I picked it up. I pleased with it.”

Ryerson bolted out of the start, racing with skiers who placed in the 20s. The freshman may have been overly ambitious, as he spent much of the first half recovering from the early push. But a small recovery was enough to rejuvenate him as he spent the second half of the race moving up through the competition.

“It was fun to watch him reel in skiers,” City said. “He was catching people who were tired.”

While the freshmen led many of Harvard’s events, it was a senior who paced the men’s Alpine team. Co-captain Chris Kinner had the Crimson’s highest finish in both events, placing 25th in the slalom and 41st in the giant slalom.

Meanwhile, the battle at the top remained between Dartmouth and University of Vermont, who traded events throughout the weekend. Middlebury, who finished third, managed to sneak in a victory in the men’s 3x5k freestyle relay, but it finished almost 200 points behind the league juggernaut Big Green, which could go undefeated for the second season in a row.

Dartmouth, which sends skiers to the Winter Olympics every four years, remains leagues ahead of the Crimson, but if the rest of Harvard’s skiers can match the performances of its women’s nordic team, the rest of the pack may not be so far off.

—Staff writer Christina C. McClintock can be reached at ccmcclin@fas.harvard.edu.