Update 18: Week Twelve (Monday, January 27 2019)

Good Morning MAST Families:

First, as you know, school is cancelled today, which means that practice is cancelled as well.  I did send an email to the MPS Assistant Athletic Director to see if we can get permission to practice, but I have not heard back from him.  For now, consider practice cancelled.  If that changes, I will let you know.  If you can get out to ski during the day today, I encourage you to do so.  You can free ski on your own.  Work the drills.  Everyone should know what to work on.  Given the cold temps moving in, I suspect that we will lose more training days this week.  If the forecast for windchill temps holds, we will likely not be training on Wednesday, and we may have to cancel Tuesday as well.   The race on Thursday at Welch is already cancelled.  Welch is closing Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.  If we can train Thursday, we will. But Thursday is not looking good either.    The Hyland JV race is still a go.  

Second, the MAST banquet is scheduled for Sunday, March 17 at St. Stephen's Lutheran Church in Bloomington.  Sabena Svedahl is chairing the banquet this year--THANK YOU SABENA!!!   She is looking for other parents who would be willing to help plan and execute the banquet.  If you are interested in helping, please contact Sabena.


Third, I apologize for the delay in getting out race results from last week.  We had a fantastic two days of racing on Thursday and Friday.  In the Hyland JV race on Friday, Sam Leahy Johnson and Chloe Cumming skied to first place finishes to claim the first race victorious of their short careers.  Congratulations Sam and Chloe.  Other impressive results on the girls' side: rookie Kate Moore finished 2nd, Chloe Bitney 6th, and Caroline Claeson 9th.   The boys had a great day as well, placing ten athletes in the top fifteen.   Rookie Alex Barbatsis finished 3rd, Deven Svedahl 4th, Aiden Jurek 8th, Kai Lamb 9th, Lewie Bent 10th, Braeden Dahmes 11th, Levi Ehlers 13th, Maximus Davis 14th, and Alex Graff 15th.  Well done boys.   

The varsity had a busy two days, skiing in TWO invitationals. Like the JV, the varsity teams performed very well.   On Thursday, the teams traveled to the Gitchi Gummi Invitational at Mt Du Lac, which is just across the border near Superior, Wisconsin.   Cold temps and gusting winds did not zap the spirit of competition in our skiers.   Elsa Peterson placed first in the girls' competition,  Rachel Tanner 4th, and Ahnika Berg 8th.   MAST also had three boys in the medals with Luke Conway finishing 2nd, Zach Bion 4th, and Oliver Mueller 6th.   In the team competition, the Washburn Boys came out victorious when all the points were added together for their top four finishers: Luke, Zach, Willem Robertson(14th) and Augie Bent(15th).   Most impressive, all eight Washburn boys skied two clean runs on Thursday.  Great job boys.  The Southwest girls also came out victorious, beating a strong girls' team from Brainard.  Scoring for SW were Elsa, Rachel, Addie Streble and Avery Taylor.  Congratulations girls.

On Friday, the competition moved to Afton Alps for the Afton Invitational.  The competition was fierce with some of the State's best alpine teams entered. This would be a good test for our skiers.   Rachel Tanner and Ahnika Berg both skied exceptionally well again to finish in the medals.  Out of 135 girls entered, Rachel finished 2nd and Ahnika 10th.   Also finishing high, Addie Streble place 15th and Anna Smalley came in 21st.  The Southwest girls placed 4th in the team competition out of 17 teams, and Washburn placed 7th.   On the boys' side, Luke Conway put down two impressive runs to place first out of 140 boys.   And the Washburn boys placed third in the team competition behind perennial State Meet qualifiers Minnetonka and Stillwater.   

Athletes, please join me in thanking all the coaches and parents who made this racing marathon possible.   We had the varsity at Mt Du Lac on Thursday, JV training at Hyland on Thursday, varsity racing at Afton on Friday, and JV racing at Hyland on Friday.   To pull this off, we needed to split our paid and volunteer coaching staff.  Everyone stepped up and helped out.  Thanks a million.  And thank you to the parents who helped work the races at Mt Du Lac and Hyland.   Your assistance is deeply appreciated.  

Make the most of your day off. After shoveling your driveway and sidewalks, and your elderly neighbors', tune your skis so they are ready to go this week, get ahead on any homework you can, and go skiing if you can get there safely and with your parents' permission.

I hope to see you tomorrow.

Mark