February 3 2022 Race Results

Good Afternoon Ski Racing Fans, Coaches and Athletes:

Attached are the race results from last night's race. We brought 88 athletes to Welch to compete in our last Metro East Conference Race of the season. Results were solid, with some nice end-of-the-season move-ups from some of our younger racers.   

Congratulations to Gabby Harritt and Charlie Smith on their victories. Congratulations to the Washburn Girls for finishing first in team competition. The depth of the team is impressive. They finished first even though two of their top four skiers had bobbles on their first run and finished outside the scoring. Reese Kuehn finished sixth overall and second for Washburn. Amelia Moertel had a terrific result, finishing third for Washburn and ninth overall. The Voyakin sisters (Mila and Eva) continue to move up in the results, finishing 17th and 14th respectively. And Dana Smith continues to impress after missing last season due to a knee injury (not from skiing however). Dana finished 15th. Sierra Krueger-Wolfe finished first in the JV Girls scoring with Hayley, Elsa, Evalie and Phoenix filling in the rest of the top five.   

For the boys, Charlie finished first, Erik Arnold second, Andreas third, and Jonas fifth. Great skiing boys! Unfortunately, the Southwest boys could not hold off the Hastings boys for the win. When scoring includes the top eight of ten, eight racers need to put two CLEAN runs together. As the girls' showed, it doesn't necessarily matter which eight do so. So, we are going to practice this.

Tonight and tomorrow, I want every athlete to treat each run as though it is a race run. For tonight, the girls will take their first run on lane 4, the boys will take their first run on lane 5. Switch lanes for the second run. I want everyone to focus on finishing both runs cleanly. Then, do it again. Lane 6 will be a corridor of some sort where you can take your practice runs in between race runs.  

One final thought: to be successful in competition, you need to be confident. You do not need to have a false sense of confidence, but an earned sense of confidence. If you have been attending practice, absorbing the feedback that your coaches give you, and putting in the miles on skis, you have done what it takes to earn your confidence. Now bring it to the course sets on race day. Be determined, but also be confident. You have done everything thing you need to do to be as successful as possible on race day. So, attack the course knowing you can ski it just as well on race day as you do in practice.  

I want to thank all the parents who worked the race. Terrific job in very extreme conditions. When I drove out of the Welch parking lot, my truck read negative 11. No wonder I felt chilled to the bone.  

See you tonight.  Rope tow gloves tonight.  
Rope tow gloves tomorrow morning as well.  
Still room on the buses to attend our last supplemental training session. Sign up here:
Supplemental Training

Mark