We have just arrived back in Marquette after a busy couple weeks on the road. After Mount Itasca we drove over to Hayward to race the last set of long Super Tour races in the Midwest before the sprints in Madison and the Birkie. Maria, Heather, and I stayed at Juli Lynch and Chris Ransom’s beautiful home for the week up in Seeley. It was great to stay with them because they are two incredible athletes as well as amazing people. I thought we skied a lot before I realized how much Juli and Chris ski and snowshoe with their dogs everyday! On top of that, they both volunteered at the races over the weekend putting in days from 7am until 4pm. Juli and Chris also have two awesome dogs and three rowdy cats. It was a packed house and we would not have wanted it any other way.
The sprint started off the week of races on Wednesday, but we were really looking forward to the 5/10km classic on Saturday and 10/15km mass-start skate races. In order to prepare for these races Maria, Heather, and I cooked for a group of 14 people at Juli and Chris’ on Friday night. Juli and Chris said this was the second big group they had ever had at their house for dinner. The one other time was Thanksgiving of this year. The crowd included: Lapham Ladies Juli, Donna Hoelz, Annie Riendl, Sandy Sugden, CXC teammate JoJo Winters, one of Heather’s best friends from APU Katie Ronsse, one of Juli’s close friends Deb, and three Peak Nordic racers.
On Saturday, I was able to have the best race of my season thus far. It is always fun to race on the Telemark trails because I have raced there since my junior high days. I really enjoy the World Cup courses we use, and I was able to have a great day. I won my first Super Tour, and to have it occur in Wisconsin, two hours from my hometown was really exciting. It was a tight race with three or four of us tied for first after 5km. I was then able to pull ahead in the last few kilometers to win by around 15 seconds. The team as a whole also did really well with all the men and women finishing in the top ten of a very elite field. Maria ended up in 8th on the day. Results HERE!
Sunday brought quite a crazy mass-start race for both Maria and I. The course did not seem to ever be wide enough for the amount of skiers racing and there were quite a few crashes. Unfortunetly, Maria ended up getting in quite a tangle with about 2km to go which cost her a shot at the podium and ended up in 6th. I ended up getting stuck in traffic for most of the day and had to settle for 6th in the final sprint to the line. Once again the CXC team had a good day to end the weekend. Results HERE! All the photos below were taken by Maria’s uncle Bob who came over from Winona to watch Maria race!
Maria in a small group after the crash.
Maria chasing the leaders with Kristina Trygstad-Saari.
Maria after the crash.
Maria.
Maria in the 5km classic.