CNSC at the ADK mini tour
Quincy on her way to the W in the XCX race (Anna Schulz photo).
Alex on top of the masters men Climb to the Castle podium (NENSA photo).
Last Updated: 18.Sep.2019
Last weekend Lake Placid, New York played host to the inaugural Adirondack Rollerski Mini Tour. In this all-freestyle weekend, racers were treated to three competition opportunities: a 3k prologue, a 1.5k cross country cross sprint (XCX), and the five mile Climb to the Castle up Whiteface Mountain. Four CNSC juniors crossed Lake Champlain with Coach Anna Schulz for a combined race weekend/training camp. For the girls, it was Maggie McGee and Quincy Massey-Bierman and for the boys it was Jack Young and Greyson Davis. To make good use of the drive, the crew hiked on the Adirondack High Peaks on Saturday afternoon and ripped around on mountain bikes after Sunday’s race.
Saturday’s prologue was two loops at Lake Placid’s jump complex/rollerski loop. The course featured plenty of uphills and twisty downhills. Here, in the junior girl’s race, Quincy was 3rd and Maggie (who is quite new to rollerskis!) was 12th. On the boy’s side, Jack was 9th and Greyson was 12th. The XCX race was full of slalom turns, ramps, and bumps designed to test skiers’ agility and speed (and fearlessness I’d say). Quincy took top honors for the girls, while Maggie was 16th. For the boys, there were some friendly jabs and joking when Greyson was the quickest CNSC boy in 12th, followed only seconds behind by Jack in 13th.
Sunday brought the famed Climb to the Castle: five miles up a windy 8% average grade Whiteface Mountain. Saturday’s race results were combined to create Day One standings, which were used to develop Sunday’s start list. New for this year, the Climb to the Castle was pursuit start, using the combined time-back from Saturday’s races. Those who did not race Saturday or were more than five minutes back started all together in a wave. In addition to the CNSC crew, three GRP men biathletes competed in the grueling test: Jake Brown, Raleigh Goessling, and Alex Howe. In the junior women’s race, Maggie was 6th followed by Quincy in 9th. For the boys, Jack was 8th and Greyson was 17th. For the senior men, Jake was 2nd, Raleigh was 4th, and Alex was 8th. Of note, Alex was 1st in his newly entered masters age group!
At the end of the weekend, final results were tabulated for those that completed the trio of races, which for the Craftsbury group was the four juniors. On the girls’ side, Maggie was 6th overall followed by Quincy in 7th. For the boys, Jack was 8th and Greyson was 13th.
Congratulations to the juniors for completing the rugged mini tour and to the GRP men for braving the Climb! See full results here.