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Good Evening MAST Families:
EVERYONE is invited to come ski together at Afton Alps this Saturday, February 22nd. It's the second annual MAST Family Ski Day. Bring anyone and everyone who'd like to come. It's a casual event where parents, siblings, athletes, coaches, and alumni meet up and enjoy non-race skiing. Click on the link for more information and to let us know that you are coming. MAST Family Ski Day at Afton Dear MAST Athletes, Parents, Coaches and Fans:
What a wonderful year! Fourteen and a half weeks together, six days a week. I am deeply grateful to our coaches, parents and athletes for such a fantastic season together. Athletes: Thank you for your enthusiasm, hard work, cooperation, and commitment. Parents: Thank you for your support, both for your athlete and for our efforts to produce an alpine race team. And coaches; thank you for your tireless work on and off the hill to provide the best training and racing experience day in and day out anywhere in Minnesota. My gratitude runs deep. State Meet Re-Cap The MN State High School Alpine Championships were held at Giants Ridge on Wednesday. As you already know, fifteen MAST skiers qualified to compete at the State Championships. These skiers gave it everything they had both in training on Tuesday and in the race on Wednesday. Washburn Senior Luke Conway put down the fastest times on both the first and second runs to earn an impressive victory over a tough field of skiers. Junior Oliver Mueller also had a superb result, finishing on the podium in fifth. For the girls, Elsa Peterson took third place and was only 35/100ths of a second behind the winner. Congratulations Luke, Elsa, and Oliver. MAST has never put three skiers in the top five at State before, so consider yourselves record breakers. Here is a link to the StarTribue story on the race: STATE MEET STAR TRIBUNE COVERAGE Other notable performances: Addie Streble skied very well to finish 25th and earn All State Honorable Mention honors and Willem Robertson skied two very consistent runs to finish 29th. Augie Bent put down two clean runs to finish 53rdand Meghan Abel finished 61st, with Gabby Harritt right behind in 62nd place. Like Gabby, Emmet Sutton was skiing in his first State Championship. He kept the nerves at bay and demonstrated great technique and tactics to finish in 62nd place. Owen, Ryan and Wilson each had one good run and then had to fight through a mistake on the other run. Regardless, they skied very well on the runs they finished cleanly and that should be the memory they preserve for themselves. Owen’s mistake came on the first run and he battled disappointment to ski a very fast and impressive second run. Way to stay mentally strong Owen. Finally, seventh grader Lucy Renz did what the sixth seed racer is supposed to do for her team. She finished both runs cleanly and scored valuable points for her team after Avery and Elli went down on the first run. The Washburn boys finished sixth in the team competition and the Southwest girls finished fifth. Our alternates Jaxson Moore, Andreas Drekonja, and Eleanor Noble-Schueller provided much needed cheer and support for our fifteen competitors. Thank you alternates. You did a stellar job supporting your teammates all day. Finally, thank you parents and coaches. You put a ton of work into making this experience exceptional for everyone involved. Please know how appreciative I am for all of your support and hard work over our three-day adventure. Training runs from Tuesday and race runs from Wednesday as well as the State Meet Award Ceremony are on Sprongo. Check them out. Boys individual, girls individual, and team race results are attached. The 20th Annual MAST Banquet: Tuesday, March 10 Our banquet will be held this year at St. Joan of Arc Church on Tuesday, March 10. We had to change venues this year to accommodate our larger team size. Please mark this date on your calendar. I suspect that we will get going around 5:30 or so, but final details will be announced soon. We do need help with the banquet. Lots of help. Sabena Svedahl is our 2020 Banquet Chair. Please contact Sabena if you can spare some time to help make this a truly special night: ssvedahl@me.com. Keep Skiing My heart aches because we are unable to continue skiing together. Joel tells me that there were 40-45 athletes at practice on Monday and Tuesday nights while we were away at the State Meet. That is such an awesome report. It means that many of you want to keep skiing as well. Obviously, we have a lot of Winter remaining and the ski slopes will stay open for another month or more. Please, please, please keep skiing. Have fun but also work on your skill development. You do not need to ski gates to get better. Work the drills you have learned this year. Watch your videos on Sprongo, identify some improvement goals that you can shoot to achieve in the next four weeks, and get out to Hyland with your season pass and continue your hard work. Go with a friend so you can work together to maintain and improve your skills. We are graduating a lot of seniors this Spring—five from the Washburn boys Section team and three from the SW girls Section team). We have some fast skis to replace next year on these teams. The opportunity is there for anyone willing to work hard and the hard work can start now. Look for an email from me in the next day or two listing drills with instructions plus some links to websites with videos on how to perform the drills. Missing Bibs If you have a MAST bib in your possession, please drop it off at my house or bring it to the banquet. Caring For Your Equipment In the Offseason Once you are finished skiing this year, you will want to store your equipment properly so that it is in good condition for next season—either for you to use or for you to sell or give away. Skis: Clean your skis. Give them a shower even. If you ski late into the Spring, your skis and bindings will get dirty. You can rinse of the dirt and grime under a nice warm shower. Dry them off with a soft cloth. Tune your edges and wax your bases. Give your skis a clean edge for storage so that any small rust spots are removed and any dings that are susceptible to rust over the summer are removed. Then put a nice coat of wax over the bases. Leave the wax on. Strap your skis at both the tip and tail and store in a dry, cool place. Do not store in a ski bag. Boots: take your liners out of your boots and let them dry thoroughly. Clean your shells inside and out with soap and water. Once everything is dry, put the liners back in the boots and buckle them up. Store in a dry, cool place. This was a tremendous season. I look forward to celebrating your successes at the banquet. Get you homework done in advance so you can enjoy the festivities unencumbered by school stress. More to come... Mark 612-275-8392 Good Evening Everyone:
The race results come to you from LaCrosse, Wisconsin tonight. I trust that everything went well since I received the results around 6:15. Congratulations to Augie Bent and Addie Streble for posting the fastest times and winning the 2020 Mpls City Alpine Championship. Congratulations to the age group champions. 7th/8th Grade Girls Champion: Gabby Harritt 7th/8th Grade Boys Champion: Levi Ehlers 9th/10th Grade Girls Champion: Vada Arbeiter 9th/10th Grade Boys Champion: Charlie Smith 11th/12th Grade Girls Champion: Addie Streble 11th/12th Grade Boys Champion: Augie Bent Thank you to all the coaches and parents who worked tonight's race. You folks are magnificent. Practice tomorrow. Keep skiing and keep improving and keep being outdoors and active and off your cell phones. Mark Good Evening Racing Fans:
Big day at Wild Mt. I just want to get the race results in your hands before you go to bed tonight. Great skiing everyone. Too much to re-cap so look for a more thoughtful report on the Section Champs over the next day or two. Congratulations to the Washburn Boys and the Southwest Girls for placing first and advancing to the MN State High School Alpine Championships. Congratulations to Luke Conway and Elsa Peterson for your Section IV Individual Champion titles. This was Luke's third straight Section IV Championship victory, a very difficult feat to accomplish. And Elsa attacked the courses today to win by over 3.5 seconds. Holy Cow! Congrats to Addie Streble for finishing 3rd and Oliver Mueller for his second place finish. Impressive. Also qualifying for the State Meet are: Willem Robertson (10th), Ryan Arnold (12th), Gabby Harritt (11th) and Avery Taylor (15th). The Washburn girls and the Southwest boys narrowly missed out on joining their teammates at State. Both teams finished in third place. So much more to report. Coming soon. For now, thank you to all of you for making this a wonderful day. Parents, thank you for all your support on the hill and behind the scenes. And thank you coaches for your dedicated work. Gary, Matthew, Daniel, Eleanor, Becca, and Joel all took off a day of work to coach today. Thank you coaches. More to come. Mark Good Evening Ski Racing Fans: Another wonderful race today. Here is a link to race results: https://www.live-timing.com/report.php?r=205997&rp=964959 If anyone can find a way to digitize these, please send them to me. Otherwise, you need to open one page of the results at a time and print each page separately. Also note that the girls results follow the boys. Thank you to ALL the parents and coaches and parent coaches who came out and worked the race, took photos, cheered, and helped transport our athletes. Our skiers were well supported today. Congratulations to Oliver Mueller and Elsa Peterson who both finished first today. They both put down two outstanding runs. Addie Streble placed second overall, posting the second fastest times behind Elsa on both runs. Other noteworthy performances today: Quinn Jurek --10th; Gabby Harritt --11th; Avery Taylor --13th; Kate Moore --16th; Sonia Svedahl --19th; and Meghan Abel --20th. Willem Robertson --7th; Charlie Smith --14th; Ryan Arnold --17th; and Simon McMahon --18th. The SW girls finished second in the team standings and the Washburn girls and boys both finished third. We had some more breakthrough performances today. Levi Ehlers put down two beautiful runs to finish 38th and Amelia Moertel and Reese Kuehn attacked the course to finish 30th and 31st respectively. As I told you all after the race, it was so fun to watch each one of you compete today. Even if you had a mishap on a run today, I was really proud of the way you skied today. You executed excellent tactics and much improved technical skills. Two more weeks remain of our season. Keep up the hard work. You can make one or two more breakthroughs before the season ends. Congratulations everyone. Hyland JV Race I have asked for a 2:30pm early release for all of you who are racing tomorrow. Attached is the early release roster I sent to the athletic directors on Wednesday. Here's who I have working the race tomorrow:
Saturday morning training: lanes 2, 3, and 4 at 7:45am-10:30am. Save the Date: Tuesday, March 10-- THE 2020 MAST Banquet The MAST Banquet will be held on a Tuesday evening this year. Yes, we will do our best to shorten it since it is a school night, but no guarantees-- so get your homework done ahead of time. Look for an email in the next few days asking for help with banquet planning and execution. Thanks everyone. Mark A few quick updates.
There is NO 3:30pm practice today-- Wednesday, January 29. Today’s practice will run from 5-7:30pm. We will be on Lanes B and C. If you are attending the Gitche Gumee Invite on Thursday, DO NOT COME TO TRAINING TODAY. Stay home. Tune your skis. Eat a healthy dinner. Pack your stuff. Go to bed early... as in 8pm. You need to be at Washburn at 5:45am on Thursday. We would like to try to depart at 6am or shortly thereafter. EAT BREAKFAST BEFORE YOU COME TO THE BUS OR BRING A SACK BREAKFAST. Gitche Gumee Participants: Make sure your parents have completed the Mt Du Lac Release of Liability. Follow this link: Mt Du Lac Release of Liability Gitche Gumee Transportation We have a 56- passenger bus scheduled to bring us to Mt Du Lac. We have 60 athletes in need of transportation. I did not want to order a second coach bus. A second bus would have been expensive, and we would have had a lot of empty seats. I don’t want to waste MPS money. I need at least two coaches on the bus, so that means we need at least six athletes to ride with parents. Parents, please send me an email if you can transport your athlete and possibly other athletes in your vehicle. I cannot direct people to ride with particular drivers, so if you can take another athlete or two or three, please make arrangements to do so directly with the other athletes and their parents. Just let me know the result please. Markrobertconway58@gmail.com Gitche Gumee Meals You will need to bring money to purchase lunch in the chalet and dinner on the trip home in Hinkley. Or, bring a sack lunch, supper. Bring a water bottle as well. Gitche Gumee Race Workers Many race worker positions are already filled for Thursday. We still need some gate judges and additional course workers if possible. Here is a link to sign up: Gitche Gumee Race Worker Sign UP HYLAND JV RACE If you are not attending the Gitche Gumee Invite on Thursday, plan to race in the Hyland JV race on Friday. You will be entered unless you indicated that you did not want to race in your intentions. TRAINING/RACING THIS WEEK Wednesday, Jan 29 5:00-7:15pm Varsity/JV Training Lanes B & C Thursday, Jan 30 Gitchi Gumee Invite at Mt Du Lac
6:30-8:45pm Varsity/JV Training Lanes 6 & 7 Friday, Jan 31 4:15pm Hyland JV Race. 1st Run Starts 5:00-7:15pm Varsity/JV Training Lanes 5 & 6 Saturday, Feb 1 7:45-10:30am Varsity/JV Training Lanes 1, 2, 3 2:30-10:30pm Supplemental Training @ Wild And Finally... Team Selections for the Section IV Championships @ Wild Mt on Feb. 5. The coaches have put their heads together and selected the 2020 Section IV Championship Teams. Some seeds are still up for grabs, so we are waiting to make our final seed selections after tomorrow’s race at Mt Du Lac. Regardless of the outcome, all athletes listed below are invited to attend the Section IV Championships. You will either be entered on the run order or attending as an alternate. Yes, some teams will have two alternates. IF YOU ARE LISTED BELOW, PLEASE EMAIL ME TO CONFIRM OR DECLINE THE INVITATION TO RACE OR SERVE AS AN ALTERNATE AT THE SECTION IV CHAMPIONSHIPS. markrobertconway58@gmail.com Southwest Girls Meghan Abel Elli George Elizabeth Noble-Schueller Elsa Peterson Lucy Renz Adeline Streble Avery Taylor Southwest Boys Erik Arnold Ryan Arnold Jonas Geere Calvin Lamosse Simon McMahon Eli Showalter-Loch Charles Smith II Isaac Trockman Washburn Girls Elizabeth Arbeiter Vada Arbeiter Chloe Bitney Gabrielle Harritt Quinn Jurek Nahlah Mkaouri Katherine Moore Sonia Svedahl Washburn Boys August Bent Luke Conway Andreas Drekonja Owen Hemer Jaxson Moore Wilson Psotka Willem Robertson Emmet Sutton MAST Boys Ian Mackimm Oliver Mueller MAST Girls Elizabeth Altheimer Anna Cardoso Berenguer Sylvia Isensee Elise Legler Athalia MacKimm Nicole Van De Weghe Elizabeth Walts February 1 Supplemental Training The coaches invite all Section IV Championship Athletes listed above to attend the final supplemental training session on Saturday, February 1. The cost is $55 and we depart from WHS at 2:30pm. The coaches want to focus their attention on the athletes who will be attending the Section IV Championships next week. Should additional training spots open us, we may expand the invitation to other MAST athletes as well. For now, I would ask all Section IV skiers listed above to register for the Feb 1 Supplemental Training. If you are unable to participate, please send me an email to let me know you cannot attend so I can invite other athletes if space allows. Here is a link for the FEBRUARY 1 SUPPLEMENTAL TRAINING SIGN UP. See you on the hill. Mark 612-275-8392 We had a fun day of racing at Afton on Friday. Our next big race is the Gitche Gumee Invitational at Mt Du Lac Ski Area. PLEASE open the attached spreadsheet to see if you were selected to ski in the Gitchi Gumee Invite on Thursday, January 30. IF YOUR NAME IS ON THE ROSTER AND YOUR PLANS HAVE CHANGED, YOU NEED TO SEND ME AN EMAIL IMMEDIATELY. DON’T TAKE A SPOT AND CANCEL LATE THIS WEEK OR SIMPLY NOT SHOW UP. We are taking 60 racers to form six varsity teams from SW, Washburn, and MAST. Team selections were based on recent results in training and races. Only those who stated their intention to race were considered. If you were not selected to ski in the Gitche Gumee Invite, plan to race in the Hyland JV race on Friday, January 31. At this point, if you are racing at Mt du Lac, you will NOT be racing in the Hyland JV race on Friday. The field size will be especially large on Friday, so I need to restrict the number of racers we enter from our schools. I want to make sure everyone who wants to race this week gets the opportunity to race.
Gitche Gumee Invite Parents of athletes attending the Gitche Gumee Invite: PLEASE READ AND ACT. WAIVERS.... like all the other ski areas, Mt Du Lac requires parents and athletes to sign a waiver. It looks like the Mt Du Lac waiver is an online waiver this year. Here is a link: Mt Du Lac Release of Liability I completed the waiver and it only takes two minutes. If you plan to attend and work the race or coach, you need to indicate that you will be participating. ALL coaches and parents working the race need to sign the waiver. PLEASE COMPLETE THE WAIVER TODAY! RACE WORKERS I realize it is a long drive to Mt Du Lac. Nonetheless, we need parents to attend and work the race as GATE JUDGES AND COURSE WORKERS (slipping the course). This will be our third year of participation in this race and one reason we are invited to attend is because we always bring race workers. Let’s keep it going. Please Sign Up To Work The Race Here: Gitche Gumee Race Worker Sign UP TRANSPORTATON We have a coach bus ordered. Unfortunately, it is not large enough to take all 60 athletes. I’m going to call tomorrow and see if I can reserve a second smaller bus. If it is not possible to get a second bus, I will need some athletes to ride with their parents. If we can get a second bus, I might be able to invite the parents to ride the bus with the athletes. I will let you know what I learn sometime tomorrow. GITCHE GUMEE MEALS All athletes need to EAT at home before loading the bus. Bring money to purchase a lunch at the hill. And bring money to purchase dinner in Hinckley on the trip home. HYLAND JV RACE Attached is a list of athletes who have indicated that they are available to race in the Hyland JV race on Friday and are not racing at Mt Du Lac. There is still time to enter this race if you have not stated your race intentions yet and if you are not racing in the Gitche Gumee Invite on Thursday. Mpls Alpine is hosting this JV race. We need to supply some workers.
TRAINING/RACING THIS WEEK Monday, Jan 27 3:30-5:30pm Varsity Training Lanes 6 & 7 5:00-7:30pm Varsity/JV Training Lanes 6 & 7 6:30-8:45pm JV Training Lanes 6 & 7 Tuesday, Jan 28 3:30-5:30pm Varsity Training Lanes 6 5:00-7:30pm Varsity Training Lanes 6 6:30-8:45pm JV Training Lanes 5 & 6 Wednesday, Jan 29 5:00-7:15pm Varsity/JV Training Lanes B & C Thursday, Jan 30 Gitche Gumee Invite at Mt Du Lac
Friday, Jan 31 4:15pm Hyland JV Race. 1st Run Starts 5:00-7:15pm Varsity/JV Training Lanes 5 & 6 Saturday, Feb 1 7:45-10:30am Varsity/JV Training Lanes 1, 2, 3 2:30-10:30pm Supplemental Training @ Wild February 1 Supplemental Training Look for a second email tomorrow evening with more information about our last supplemental training session at Wild Mt. See you on the hill tomorrow. Mark 612-275-8392 Good Evening:
Made it to Lacrosse with Luke. Just want to get the race results from Afton and Hyland into your hands before I put my head on the pillow. Thank you parents and coaches for all your hard work today. We brought 83 athletes to Afton. They were on time for the bus, eager to get on the snow, performed their warm up drills exceptionally well, focused well during course inspection, and race beautifully. Best of all, they cheered each other on with great enthusiasm. Parents: another fantastic lunch (and breakfast). I am overwhelmed by the support we get from you. Thanks for everything you do to make these events so much fun. Congratulations to Luke and Elsa on your first place finishes. Luke won by exactly two seconds over the second place finisher and Elsa also put a rather large gap between first and second place, winning by over a second and a half. Oliver Mueller finished sixth overall and Willem Robertson tenth. Eli Showalter-Loch and Charlie Smith had stellar performances, finishing 16th and 19th respectively. Augie Bent finished 20th which meant Mpls skiers occupied 6 of the top 20 places out of 135 racers. The Washburn boys finished third in team scoring behind Brainard and Stillwater who are two very good teams. The Washburn girls also finished third in team scoring. A very good performance less than two weeks before Section Champs. Addie Streble had an excellent day of racing finishing fifth overall and Avery Taylor had a great day finishing in 12th place. Quinn Jurek put down two strong runs to finish 16th and Gabby Harritt was close behind to place 19th. Congratulations to Nahlah Mkaouri for having two excellent runs today on a hard hill. Nahlah has been struggling all year to cleanly finish runs in practice and at races. Today, her persistence paid off. Way to stay at it, Nahlah. In the JV race, Chloe Bitney, Lucy Renz and Eleanor Vap skied aggressively and finish in 4th, 5th and 6th overall. Elle Miller (9th) and Anne McConville (10th) gave us five in the top ten. Great skiing girls. Callum White (9th) and Lucas Casperson (10th) were our only JV boy to finish in the top ten against a really deep Stillwater team. Also breaking up the Stillwater dominance were Jonas Geere (12th), Clement Finney (14th), Jack Bajek (18th), and Alex Barbatsis (23rd). The only teams to put boys in the top twenty five were Stillwater and Mpls. Never seen that before. At least we were able to break up their monopoly a bit. I was really proud of all of you today. You were focused on putting forth your best effort. That is all we coaches as you to do. Give us your best effort mentally and physically. Thank you for doing this. And back at Hyland, looks like Henry Moore had a great afternoon. Henry finished first overall. Good job Henry. Have a great practice Saturday. Keep getting better. Mark We have a race today. I sent a request to the high school athletic directors asking for an early release of 2:45 for students at Washburn and SW and the middle schools that feed these schools. I also asked for a 2:30 release for students from South, Roosevelt and Sanford. Again, if you son or daughter is in middle school, send a note to school with your child requesting the early release. Some athletic directors get these notices out to the middle schools and others don’t seem to get them in the correct hands. Everyone who indicated that they wanted to race today should be on the attached roster I sent to the ADs today.
We still need race workers for today's race—especially gate judges. My goal is to have six gate judges and use only three at a time so no one has to stand on the hill for both runs. Please sign up here: Jan 21 Race Worker Sign Up. The race begins at 4:30PM. Hopefully we will be cleaned up and off the hill by 7 or before. We also have a big race at Afton on Friday. Here is the schedule for the day. Afton Invitational Schedule 7:30AM Parking lot volunteers begin parking trailers and cars 9:30 Lifts open - Courses set 10:30 Workers’ meeting outside timing building 10:45 Welcome and racer meeting in finish area of Inga’s Run 10:55-11:25 Course Inspection 11:25 National Anthem 11:28 Forerunners 11:30 First Runs course reset as soon as first runs are complete 1:25-1:55 Second Run Inspection 1:58 Forerunners 2:00 Second Runs (reverse order within each seed) 5:00pm Awards in front of timing building I would like all athletes to arrive no later than 8:15am at Washburn High School. I strongly suggest that you arrive WEARING your gs suit. We have a lot to do when we arrive—boot up, bib up, warm-up. I want you to get a good warm up in before the race meeting at 10:45. Week Eleven Schedule Tuesday, January 21 Hyland Race (Varsity and JV) vs Wayzata, Mound West Tonka, Holy Angels, Lake Crystal Valley 3:45pm Inspection 4:30pm First Run Start Wednesday, January 22 5:00-7:30pm Varsity/JV (Lanes 6, 7) 6:30-8:45pm JV (Meet on South Chair for directed free skiing; Lanes 6, 7 at 7:15pm) Thursday, January 23 3:30-5:15PM Varsity (Lanes 7, 8) 5:00-7:15PM JV (Lanes 7, 8) Friday, January 24 Afton Invitational (Varsity and JV) 8:15am – 6:00pm Hyland JV Race 3:30pm Inspection 4:15pm First Run Start Saturday, Jan 25 7:45-10:30AM (Lanes A, B, C) 2:30-10:30PM Supplemental Training at Wild Mt For those not going to Afton, we have a JV race at Hyland on Friday, January 24. The First Run will start at 4:15PM. I will ask for an early release of 2:30 for South/Roosevelt athletes and 2:45 for everyone else. Parents, we need a few workers: gate judges, bib distributors and collectors, announcers. Please send me an email if you can help. Be sure you are signed up to race at Hyland if you are not going to Afton. Here is a link to state your intentions for the Hyland JV Race. Wild Mt Supplemental Training The next Supplemental Training is Saturday, January 25 at Wild Mt. Please sign up early if you would like to attend. Depart Washburn HS at 2:30pm. Return at 10:30pm. Bring a sack supper or money for supper. Soup is awesome at Wild. Here is a link to register for Wild Mt: Jan 25 Supplemental Training Registration. See you on the hill. Mark Conway 612-275-8392 Good Morning MAST Athletes, Coaches and Families:
Finally, I am able to announce the squads for the Afton Invite on Friday, January 24. Everyone: please check to see if your name is on any of the rosters. Some SW and Washburn students are skiing for MAST, so be sure to look under the MAST squads to see if you are listed. You will miss a full day of school on Friday so be sure to talk with your teachers on Tuesday about your upcoming absence. If you are unable to race, please email me as soon as possible. Thank you. Mark 612-275-8392 |
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