Complete Results

IROWNWOOD, Mich. – St. Scholastica junior #Eleanor Magnuson# posted another strong early-season performance Saturday, leading the Saints women in seventh place overall with a time of 14:40.1, at the Grandview Wolverine Challenge.

Magnuson finished 31.6 seconds behind winner, Carolyn Freeman of the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay in a time of 14:08.7. Northern Michigan duo, Ingrid Fjeldheim and Christina Turman finished second and third in 14:18.4 and 14:20.7 respectively. CSS senior #Julia Curry# finished 25th overall in a time of 15:33.5, and freshman #Brooke Adams# finished 35th in 15:48.8 to round out the top three Saints finishers. The Saints trio finished sixth, 18th, and 23rd, respectively, among college skiers.

“Overall, we took a step in the right direction, but it's still really early,” said Saints head coach #Chad Salmela#, of his team's performance today. “It's always hard to not race where you know you can, which is the case for most of this team right now, so a lot of my job for the next few weeks is keeping everyone on track with their progression to race fitness and not get too wrapped up in results right now.”

With the bulk of NCAA qualifying still over a month away, Salmela is keeping the current results in focus of the bigger picture. “Things don't really start to matter for this team until late January. We have to be hot then, and that's still a long way off. This team on the whole is very young and we've had to revamp some very basic training pieces over the summer and fall, and the simple truth to this approach is it's going to take some time and some racing before we start seeing what they can do. Every race is important right now, not for results, but for purposes of the big picture of the season.”

The Saints race a 10km classic on Sunday in Ironwood, before a hiatus from team racing until the U.S. National Championships the first week of January. The Saints' National Championship team will be named Monday.