10K Freestyle results and Day 1 team standings (PDF document)

Bozeman Daily Chronicle Day 1 recap/article

Saints senior Bjorn Bakken (Duluth, Minn./Marshall School) saved the best race of his senior season for the NCAA Championships, clocking a 15th place time of 32 minutes, 14.1 seconds in the men's 10-kilometer Freestyle race this morning in Bozeman, Montana.

Glenn Randall of Dartmouth College stunned CCSA superstar Marius Korthauer of Alaska-Fairbanks to take the victory in a time of 30:37.3 to Korthauer's 30:38.8.

Bakken had been training for the high altitude of Bozeman (4,793 feet above sea level) by training in even higher (6,036 feet) Big Sky, Mont., since last week before coming 'down' to the site of the NCAA meet early this week to recover from his altitude training and acclimate to Bozeman. Duluth, by the way, is at 1,220 feet of elevation.

Early on in today's race it looked like St. Scholastica's lone skier at the Championships was well out of contention, coming through the 2K mark in 30th place.

There was a plan, though, and Bakken's played out beautifully.

His effort increased after the course's first lap and at the 5K mark he'd moved up to 19th. By the 9K mark he was 16th.

The Freestyle event is a staggered start (as opposed to the mass start 20K Classic on Friday) and with 1K to go, the race favorite -- Korthauer, who started 1:30 behind Bakken -- was closing in on Bakken.

A determined Bakken held off the Alaska-Fairbanks skier, crossing the finish line in 7th place with the race's best 12 skiers in the field still to come. Only eight of those 12 bumped Bakken down the results when they finally finished the 10K course.

After day one of the men's and women's Freestyle event, St. Scholastica sits in 16th place overall with 25 points. Colorado leads second place Northern Michigan by a 186 to 153 margin.

"We were really concerned at 2Km because (Bakken) was just so far out so early," said Saints coach Chad Salmela. "But we also knew his strategy, knew he'd start slow and pick it up on the second lap. There's just something about a championship as a coach that unnerves you, though," he added.

"On the second lap he looked so much better compared to the field. At this altitude everyone looks horrible, pretty much, but Bjorn looked 'less horrible,'" said Salmela. "It simply was a beautifully executed strategy that worked. You want to have your best race of the season at NCAAs, and Bjorn did just that. It was just a great day!"

Bakken wound up being the third Central Collegiate Ski Association (CCSA) finisher behind only Korthauer (2nd overall) and his teammate Vahur Teppan (8th overall). Of all skiers in the race, Bakken was the fifth fastest American and third best D-III finisher.

The all-division (NCAA I, II, and III) championship continues on Thursday with the men's and women's slalom. Bakken hits the trails again on Friday for the 20K Classic, and the championship concludes on Saturday with the men's and women's giant slalom events.