HANOVER, NH & STOWE, VT - - For the fourth time this year, the Williams ski team finished in the top-5 of a winter carnival, finishing 5th at the 100th Dartmouth carnival. After day one, the team held only a slim margin over 6th place Bates, but a strong second day by both men's and women's nordic increased that gap and left the team with it's fourth consecutive fifth place finish.
The story of the day was the impressive rebound pulled off by the women's nordic team. After a forgettable 9th place showing in Friday's classic race, the team rallied for a fourth place in today's 3x5km freestyle relay. Captain Alice Nelson skied a strong first leg, tagging off in 3rd place, behind Dartmouth and Bates. Junior Sarah Tory skied her leg relatively even with Bates and University of New Hampshire, and tagged off to classmate Kirsten Johnson in a pack of places 3rd through 5th. Johnson was passed by Vermont's superstar anchor, Caitlin Patterson, but impressively skied away from Bates and UNH. Though they were the fourth team over the line, the women receive 3rd place points because the first two teams were Dartmouth squads (each school can only score one team).
The men's team benefitted from their depth today, finishing fifth in spite of yesterday's top finisher, junior Keith Kantack, sitting out with a fever. Dimitri Luthi skied the opening 5km, staying with the lead pack until Dartmouth and Middlebury broke off the front with under a kilometer remaining. In the second leg, Evan Dethier stayed with the chase pack, which consisted of Williams, Colby, St. Lawrence, Middlebury B, and Dartmouth B. In the final leg, St. Lawrence broke away from the chase pack and captain Alex Taylor was unable to hold off Middlebury, but skied ahead of Colby and Dartmouth B to a 5th place overall. Because there were two Middlebury teams ahead of Williams, the Ephs moved to fourth in the points allocation.
In the women's giant slalom, Williams had a respectable finish, but failed to reproduce the success they had this past weekend in Stowe, VT. Leading the way was freshman Geordie Lonza, who finished 8th. This is the third time this season that Lonza has skied in the top-10. The rest of the team struggled, though, with Kelsey Levine finishing 23rd and Emily Porter in 36th. The team's top-ranked skier, Laurel Carter fell on her first run. The team score of 71 points was good enough for sixth place.
The men's alpine team struggled today, unable to place anyone in the top-25. Sean Cummiskey led the team with a 28th place finish, just 0.07 seconds ahead of teammate Adam Carman, who finished 31st in the tight race at the Dartmouth Skiway. Captain Alex Dyroff rounded out the scoring, finishing 33rd. The men scored 58.5 points, which left them in 8th for the day.
Check back for photos from the
day.
