Middlebury Carnival

Check out the PICTURES from the Midd Carnival!

http://connorhuntphotography.shutterfly.com/nordicskiingpictures

If anyone would like to order prints from any of the races send me an e-mail at cjhunt09@stlawu.edu with the carnival, picture name(s), and size(s) you would like.

Pricing:

4x6 - $5.00

5x7 - $6.00

Wallet (4) - $8.00

8x10 - $15.00

11x14 - $20.00

16x20 - $32.00

Deals for buying 2+ prints

*I can also do acrylic and canvas prints, e-mail me for more info

Dartmouth Carnival

The PICTURES are up from the Dartmouth carnival, check them out!

http://connorhuntphotography.shutterfly.com/nordicskiingpictures

final two weekends

The forecast refuses to get better as we go into the final two weekends. To be honest I don't think this can end soon enough. If all we had to do was go to races then fine as Trapps and Craftsbury should hold snow through the next few weeks just fine. The real hassel is keeping the training going in between without running everyday or driving a lot.

It looks like Caroline has an NCAA spot pretty well locked up after he 7th and 12th place finishes last week. Eric, Adam, Austin and Leah have an outside shot but need to have great races in the last 3 qualifiers. Regardless it will be difficult to find on snow training before heading out to Bozeman.

I am interested to see the conditions at Craftsbury where Williams had to move to this weekend. It sounds like it is better than Trapps which is pretty impressive considering the lack of natural snowfall. It is rather disappointing to have the relay cancelled this week, I think everyone was looking forward to it but so be it, I understand the difficulties and costs in moving races and am glad I just didn't have deal with it this year.

Skiing on campus

Snow in the North Country has been...nonexistent this year. We've still only skied at Higley once, but thanks to a grant we received earlier this year the team purchased a snowmobile and some equipment for a campus loop on our soccer fields. It proved to be pretty useful yesterday and today. Everything in sight is snowless and bare for miles, but in the far corner of the soccer practice fields is a patch of snow that has sat in the shade all winter and retained some of the white stuff. Yesterday Bob took out the new gear and groomed us up a small but very skiable stretch of fresh corduroy. The perfect amount of snow for some fast relay races and speeds, and it was refreshing to ski right from the equipment room without any van time. It'll be even better when we have enough snow to make a full course on campus.

Impressive breakthroughs for Caroline and Eric

The UVM races/Eastern cups were once again probably about the largest field of xc ski racers in North America, nearly as many entrants I think as US Nationals, it is an impressive event to be sure. As for our team Caroline demonstrated that she can ski with best in both disciplines and at the shorter distances posting career best 11th place finishes both days and is now solidly in qualification contention for the NCAA championships, Leah also showed some improvement after a rather frustrating day on Saturday to place in the top 25 for Sunday so she still may find the form she had last year. On the men's side the biggest story was Eric's breakthrough race in the 10K classic on Saturday where he finished 15th. While he was not able to repeat this on day two he still fared well in the mid 20s. We are headed back to Trapps tomorrow for Dartmouth carnival which had to be moved. Weather looks interesting with temps in the mid 30s the next two days before plummeting overnight on Friday and staying in the single digits for Saturday. Our skiing has worked out during the week with trips to Paul Smiths to ski on some really great trails, skating only but very fun and challenging. Travel time about 1hr each way. I am starting to give up on seeing much more snow, just glad we have somewhere reasonably nearby to train.

Pictures are up from UVM carnival

Click HERE to see pictures from both days of the UVM carnival!
http://connorhuntphotography.shutterfly.com/nordicskiingpictures

Delayed thoughts on weekend #2

I think the UNH weekend was an improvement over Bates for both team results and individual performances. In the sprint races our two men's qualifiers Teo 15th and Eric 19th had career best EISA finishes even though they did not advance. Caroline 22nd was our only female qualifier but a great result for someone who is admittedly not a big fan of sprint racing. Day two was rough on a lot of racers in terms of crashes on very challenging icy conditions. Adam had a career best 16th place finish a very impressive result against a deep men's field rounding out scoring were Eric 27th and Austin Meng 51st, both had crashes but were able to move back up the field late in the race. The women finished 5th, our best team result this season, with Caroline 14th, Leah 20th, and Kelsey 48th.

Getting on snow has remained a challenge. Gatineau was great on Sunday although the drive is rather long for midweek. On Tuesday we had suprising decent conditions at Higley our usual training site but the warmup and rain today pretty much destroyed it. We might check Paul Smith's VIC tomorrow as it is only a 1 drive.