Midd skiers hit the slopes flying in Maine Carnival season gets started with a solid third place finish at Bates

Author: Kellen Florio

After three months of on-snow preparation the Middlebury alpine and nordic ski teams finally kicked off their carnival season with a respectable third place finish at the Bates Carnival, held on Jan. 21 and 22. Tallying a total of 718 points, the UVM Catamounts claimed their first carnival since the 2003 season, edging out Dartmouth by 33 points and Middlebury by 76.

Leading the men's alpine squad in Friday's Giant Slalom at Sunday River was junior Dave Coriell in fifth place with a time of 1:57.07, 1.6 seconds off the pace set by Dartmouth first-year Evan Weiss. Weiss was joined on the podium by fellow Dartmouth classmate David Chodounsky in second and UVM first-year Greg Hardy in third. John Rusten '05 turned in a 10th place finish for Middlebury, followed by Joey Swenson '08 in 15th, Peter Phillips '05 in 16th and Alex Tarberry '08 in 17th. First-year Clayton Reed nailed his first run to move into fourth place, but had trouble and skied out in the afternoon run.

The men's total of 73 points from the Giant Slalom landed them in fourth place behind Dartmouth, UVM and UNH. Commenting on their sub-par performance senior co-captain Peter Phillips noted, "We had some trouble adapting to the unusually straight and open courses. There was hardly any margin for error, so one minor error could lose the race."

Head alpine coach Forest Carey added, "Because of the easy course sets, more guys were in the mix than usual, making it even more competitive."

Sophomore Lindsay Brush paced the women's side in the Grand Slalom with a sixth place finish in 2:03.25, 1.7 seconds behind UVM's Jamie Kingsbury. Making her collegiate debut, Middlebury first-year Krissie Poehling '08 took seventh place in 2:03.37 after posting the third fastest second run time. Tara Martin '07 followed Poehling with a 15th place finish, while co-captain Jess Smith '04.5, Dorothy Muirhead '08 and Anna Furney '08 finished in 17th, 18th and 21st, respectably.

The men avenged their fourth place Giant Slalom performance with an excellent showing in the Slalom on Saturday where they finished on the heels of Dartmouth in second. Rusten and Reed turned in stellar efforts for the Panthers, finishing in a tie for second place with a time of 1:49.41, once again behind Dartmouth's Weiss.

In second place after the first run, the pressure was Rusten to deliver a solid second run, starting 29th on an extremely challenging course set by Coach Carey.

"[Coach Carey] knew that we would be able to separate ourselves if the course was technical, so all of us knew it would be tough going into inspection," commented Rusten. "The rumors were flying at the top of the course that no one was making it. The key is to be able to take it with a grain of salt and trust what you saw during inspection."

After listening to course reports from Carey and Assistant Coach Jon Schaefer, the men skied with confidence and produced excellent second run results. In addition to Reed and Rusten in second place, Coriell claimed sixth and Phillips vaulted seven places to finish in 17th.

"My run was just a fight. I nailed the top section and came to the difficult part and battled through it," Rusten recounted, "It was neither pretty nor did it feel good, but that's the battle you have to fight to make it down sometimes."

UVM continued their traditional dominance in the women's alpine events by taking three out of the top four places in Saturday's Slalom. Smith led the Panthers in seventh place with a combined time of 1:38.12, 3.2 seconds behind UVM's Amy Cochran. Brush finished two-tenths of a second behind Smith in ninth place, while Martin turned in a solid 11th place finish. Poehling and Muirhead finished the day in 19th and 22nd, respectably. First-year Megan Hughes '08, who is expected to make a big impact on the carnival circuit this winter was competing at the World University Games in Innsbruck, Austria, and will return to action with the Panthers at the next carnival.

Overall, the alpine squad was disappointed with their results, but still encouraged by some performances. "Given our record breaking results from last season, we clearly had high expectations coming into this weekend," commented co-captain Phillips. "Despite some strong individual results, the team as a whole didn't perform as well as we know we can."

Carey added, "It's a new year and we have a different look than we did a year ago. There were some flashes of brilliance this weekend, and some other things we need to work on. Last year we caught a lot of breaks and this time we were not so fortunate, but it all evens out in the end."

"It was great to see Clayton, Joey and Krissie perform so well in their first carnival," continued Carey.Combining their young talent with our established core of veterans should give us some solid results as look build on this weekend."

The men's and women's nordic teams took on the fast, icy trails of Black Mountain of Maine for their segment of the Bates Carnival last weekend.

Due to frigid temperatures on Friday, the men's 15km freestyle and women's 10km freestyle were pushed back a day and the classical relays slated for Saturday were cancelled.

UVM dominated both the men's and women's races placing five skiers in the top six in the men's race, and three in the top four in the women's event. Middlebury junior Garrott Kuzzy thwarted Vermont's bid to sweep the top five spots by racing to a fifth place finish in 37:59.4, just over one minute behind winner Ethan Foster of UVM.

Junior co-captain Jake Whitcomb also scored for the Panther with a solid 13th place finish in 39:48.8, followed by Jimmy Ades '08 in 15th, Matt Johnson '08 in 28th, Dan Skold '07 in 37th and Wes Hines '08 in 38th. The men's strong effort resulted in a second place finish overall behind the deep Vermont squad.

Kuzzy congratulated the UVM men for a strong race and added, "It's still early in the season, however, and we're training to ski fastest at the Middlebury Carnival (Eastern Championships) and NCAAs at Stowe in early March. They should enjoy their victory, but realize that Middlebury is coming back stronger and tougher than ever."

Battling sickness, Panther nordic women struggled to live up to the reputation they have established over the past several years, finishing seventh out of the 10 competing schools. Jenny Jorvig '06 led the Middlebury women in the 10km freestyle in 14th place with a time of 32:11.3, just under two minutes behind UVM's Kate Crawford who topped the podium with a time of 30:17.9. Newcomer Erin Pittenger '07 was the next Middlebury finisher in 23rd, followed by Taylor Leach '06 in 24th and Evelyn Dong '07 in 33rd.

Despite falling short of his expectations, Whitcomb was encouraged by the performances of the rookies and is optimistic about next week's potential. "Our five newcomers, Ades, Johnson, Hines, Pittenger and Joy Erdman '08 have proved to be invaluable additions to the team this year. We came away with some strong finishes as a team even though we were missing Claire Anderson '06, Erdman, Beau Baldock '07 and Tom Wisdom '05. Barring sickness, we're ready to up the ante this weekend at the St. Michael's Carnival."