Friday, February 19, 2016

UVM Men, Dartmouth Women Emerge in Front After Tight Williams Carnival GS

On a slightly shortened GS hill at Jiminy Peak with another great snow surface, only 0.03 seconds separated the women’s podium and the top six men were within half a second in what proved to be possibly the closest alpine race so far this season. 

Dartmouth's Foreste Peterson
GS leader Foreste Peterson claimed her second GS victory of the year, this time by only 0.01 seconds over her Dartmouth teammate Kelly Moore. UVM’s Laurence St. Germain had the fastest second run to finish third, only 0.03 seconds behind Peterson. Fellow Catamount Mille Graesdal had her best GS finish of the year in fourth, and Colby’s Sierra Leavitt also had a personal best result in fifth, only 0.05 behind Graesdal.  Elise Tefre of UVM ended in the sixth position, just ahead of Dartmouth’s Hannah Melinchuck. Melinchuch had the second fastest second run to jump from the 24th start position to seventh, beating UNH’s Lisa Wesjoe by only 0.01 seconds. Colby’s Mardi Haskell finished back to back with Wesjoe for the third race in a row, this time in ninth to Wesjoe’s eighth, and Libby Gibson made sure that Dartmouth once again put four women in the top 10. Dartmouth’s Maise Ide capped a great day for the Big Green women as she jumped from bib 31 to 13th.

UVM's Dom Garand
As in the women’s race, the GS leader bib reigned supreme for the men. Dom Garand once again won a carnival GS as UVM put three in the top four finishers. Garand won by 0.10 seconds in front of Middlebury’s Rob Cone, who placed second for the second week in a row. UVM’s Morgan Megarry and Max Roeisland came in the third and fourth place positions, only 0.03 seconds apart from each other. Saint Michael’s Guillaume Grand won the second run to finish fifth, only 0.02 in front of Dartmouth’s Kevyn Read. Read had the second fastest first run behind Garand, but made a mistake second run to end the day in sixth. UVM’s Will St. Germain finished seventh, followed by Dartmouth’s Thomas Woolson. Bryan Cookson led UNH in ninth, only 0.03 seconds behind Woolson. Robert Overing followed up his great weekend at Dartmouth with a tenth place, and Saint Lawrence’s Kei Kullburg just missed out on the top ten from bib 23, only 0.04 seconds behind Overing. The Boston College mens team also had a great day as Carter Robertson and Keith Schuman jumped from bibs 51 and 42 to finish 14th and 16th, respectively.


Going into tomorrow’s SL at Berkshire East, UVM leads the overall team standings by 22 points over Dartmouth with UNH in third, a significant 64 points behind Dartmouth. But on a new venue to the EISA circuit, anything can happen.