CABLE, Wis. – The Michigan Tech Nordic Ski teams placed second in the CCSA combined team standings at the Seeley Hills SuperTour/CCSA Invite in Cable, Wisconsin, on January 14 & 15.
The Huskies scored 236 points to claim second place behind the College of St. Scholastica’s 261 points.
Saturday, Michigan Tech took on the longest race to this point in the season with the 32km classic mass start.
Skylar Patten continued his long-distance success, being the first Husky to finish the race, earning third-place in the collegiate field.
Colin Freed was 11 seconds behind Patten to take fifth within the collegiate race, in a time of 1:30.52.
Three additional Huskies placed within the top-15 in the college race as Tryg Solberg (1:31.27) was close behind Freed, placing sixth.
Henry Snider (1:31.51) and Parker Courte-Rathwell (1:33.29), placed 10th and 14th, respectively.
Olivia Laven was the top finisher for Michigan Tech in the women’s 32km classic mass start, finishing 12th overall and sixth collegiately.
Following Laven were freshman Cat Stow (1:50.59) and sophomore Alice McKnight (1:51.42), placing 10th and 11th in the collegiate field.
“It was certainly a tough day though for the team, we had some tired athletes I think coming off for US Nationals,” head coach Tom Monahan Smith said. “It’s a telltale sign when we’re missing our two best gals that are competing in the University Games and we just didn’t have the depth that we needed to in the women’s field to really have a strong day as a team there.”
The coaching staff was pleased with the efforts in Sunday’s classic sprint.
“The team definitely came out firing on all cylinders and we had a much stronger day for the team today,” Monahan Smith added.
Marie Sølverud Wangen led the Huskies with an 11th-place overall finish to go with second collegiately in 3:47.87. Cat Stow finished seventh collegiately to be the second Husky through the finish.
“Ingrid deserves a shoutout for a top-20 qualifier result and one of her best races ever as well.” Monahan Smith said.
The men’s race saw seven out of ten Huskies make it to the top-30 heats, with Félix Cottet-Puinel having the fastest time of 3:14.79. No skiers would advance to the semifinals.
“We didn’t have any guys make it through to the semis but they all fought really hard races, skied really well and we’re really proud of the efforts that they gave from start to finish of every single one and I feel like every sprint race we’re getting better in the team,” Monahan Smith added.
The Huskies will recover from a couple of long weeks of racing before heading to the GANC CCSA Invite in Duluth, Minnesota, on Feb. 4-5.