COLERAINE, Minn. (csssaints.com) -- Sunday it wasn't mother nature that thwarted the scheduled events. Mt. Itasca's 2km loop had great snow coverage and surface, but a broken groomer stopped short the efforts to set track for a classic race. The end result was a second straight day of freestyle racing, albeit on a different course configuration.
Freshman
Sam Boardman (Woodbury, Minn./East Ridge HS) stepped up to lead the Saints in the absence of
Reitler Hodgert (Bend, Ore./Summit HS ) who went back to school
Saturday night to prepare for final exams. Boardman, who admittedly has not excelled at distance ski racing, wasn't discouraged by the longer course
Sunday, posting the fifth
fastest time overall and top collegiate result in 31:00.5.
Chris Parr (Eagan, Minn./Eagan HS), a soon-to-be-eligible skier for the Saints, won the open race in 30:17.6. Xavier Mansfield of Loppet Nordic Racing and Anders Sonnesyn of Wayzata finished second and third in 30:29.4 and 30:54.0 respectively.
Junior
Gerrit Garberich (Brainerd, Minn./Brainerd HS ) delivered arguably his most competitive performance as a Saint in sixth
overall and second
collegiately, just four seconds behind Boardman, while
Jake Richards (Callaway, Minn./Detroit Lakes HS ) rounded out the top three Saints finishers in 11
th overall and fifth
collegiately. No college team scores were taken.
"I'm pleased today with a visible improvement in energy by the team," said Saints head coach
Chad Salmela. "I'm never all that married to the results we post this time of year, but we looked kind of flat yesterday whereas we had a tick up in energy today."
Salmela was happy to see new faces leading the Saints charge in Boardman and Garberich. "Both Sam and Gerrit skied quite well today and that fires new people up to take charge on any given day."
Boardman feels the training focus as a new Saint is helping him succeed better already at longer distances. "I have never really been able to ski well beyond 7km [in race distance] and what was today, like 11, 12 kilometers? That's nice to see."
The Saints take a break until the U.S. Nationals get underway in Houghton, Michigan,
January 3-9.
