GRP Skiers Race at Davos World Cup and Sun Valley SuperTour

Kaitlynn Miller en route to a 3rd place finish in the Sun Valley SuperTour classic sprint (Photo Doug Stephen)

Green Racing Projects skiers had a successful weekend of racing on the SuperTour circuit in Sun Valley, ID as well as the third weekend of World Cup racing in Davos, Switzerland. Sun Valley was the final stop of the SuperTour before the holidays, while the World Cup continues on to Planica, Slovenia next weekend, though no GRP skiers will be in attendance there.

The Sun Valley races kicked off on Saturday, December 14th with a classic sprint. Three GRP men qualified for the heats, with Ben Lustgarten leading the way in 8th, followed by Akeo Maifeld-Carucci in 15th and Adam Martin in 22nd. Braden Becker just missed qualifying, finishing 32nd. On the women’s side, Kaitlynn Miller had a strong qualifier, finishing 1st, followed by Liz Guiney in 9th. Miller was able to ride her strong qualifying momentum all the way to the A Final where she finished 3rd overall. Guiney was 4th in her semifinal, and ended up 7th overall. Lustgarten also finished 7th overall, taking 3rd in his semi but just missing a lucky loser spot into the final. Maifeld-Carucci and Martin each took 4th in their quarterfinal heats and ended up 16th and 19th, respectively, in the final results.

The following day brought a 10/15k freestyle individual start race. The women started first on frigid, firm tracks. Miller skied to 9th place, followed by Guiney in 14th. The men started about an hour later, and Martin led the way with a 4th place, followed by Lustgarten in 6th, Maifeld-Carucci in 8th, and Becker in 9th, packing all four athletes into the top ten.

Meanwhile, on the World Cup, Caitlin Patterson raced in Davos, Switzerland. She competed in the 10k freestyle individual start on Sunday, finishing in 39th place. Her time was a little over 10 seconds from the top 30. The World Cup moves to Planica for a final weekend of sprint racing in Period 1, but as a distance specialist, Patterson will skip the races and return to the states to prep for US Nationals.

Next up for the GRP skiers are US Nationals in Houghton, Michigan, which begin on January 2nd!

Results from the SV SuperTour are available on SVSEF.org, and World Cups results are on FIS-ski.com.

Braden Becker in the classic sprint qualifier (Photo Doug Stephen)