Buffs Take Lead In Tight NCAA Championship Race

STEAMBOAT SPRINGS, Colo. — The 2018 NCAA Skiing Championship heated up Thursday under the sun at Howelsen Hill where the Colorado Buffaloes were able to take over the top of the leaderboard at the midway point of the national championships.

In the first Nordic races of the four-day event, Colorado won the women's 5K classical to start the day and then finished third in the men's 10K in the early afternoon. Overall, the Buffs scored 146 points Thursday and now has 276 total points after 4-of-8 events to hold a slim nine-point advantage over the Denver Pioneers who are right on the Buffs'tail.

"It is pretty exciting right now and no one is running away with the trophy," head coach Richard Rokos said.

Colorado earned four All-America honors on Thursday and saw two Buffs get up on the podium. Anne Siri Lervik, in her first NCAA Championship race, finished second in the women's race to start the day and then Petter Reistad also finished second in the men's race. Both earned first-team All-America honors; for Reistad it is his fifth career All-America honor (three first-team), but first time he got up on the podium in his third and final NCAA Championship.

Petra Hyncicova finished sixth in the women's race and Sondre Bollum seventh in the men's in his first NCAA race. Hyncicova, the defending classical and freestyle NCAA Champion and 2018 Olympian, earned the sixth All-America honor of her career (three first-team, three second-team).

"I'm happy with the team, it was an awesome day," head Nordic coach Bruce Cranmer said. "It looks like we are in the lead and still have a lot of fighting left to do on both the alpine and Nordic side. We are only halfway there, but at least we don't have a big hole to dig ourselves out of it. It is tight and it will be interesting."

WOMEN'S 5K CLASSIC RACE: Lervik's second place finish came in a time of 15:34.1 and was the best collegiate result of her career. She becomes the 21st Buff in program history (sixth women's Nordic skier) to hit the podium in her very first NCAA race.

"I feel so good, it is the best result I've had in college and it came on a perfect day so I feel happy about that," Lervik said.

Hyncicova finished in sixth place for the Buffaloes to pick up 27 points and Christina Rolandsen was 11th. In a bit of bad luck for the Buffaloes, Rolandsen was one second out of 10th place and an unfortunate fall on the last downhill on the course cost her an All-America honor after she earned first-team accolades in both Nordic races at last winter's NCAA Championship.

It was still a very strong race on the women's side for CU, who was the only team to have all three racers finish in the top 11.

MEN'S 10K CLASSIC RACE: There was more bad luck in the men's race for Colorado, but also noteworthy highlights.

Those highlights came from Reistad and Bollum.

After finishing fourth in both Nordic races at last year's NCAA Championships, Reistad finally hit the podium with his second place finish. He had the third-fastest first lap in the field and closed in one more spot on the loop around the 5K course to earn 37 points for the Buffaloes.

Bollum was tied for seventh with teammate Alvar Alev after the first of two laps in the men's race and he finished seventh to collect 25 more points for CU.

The tough break came for Alev who battled through dehydration problems Thursday, but had a gutty second lap to fight through and finish the race. He had that great first lap, but down the stretch was not the same racer. He finished 31st and was just outside of the scoring.

NOTEWORTHY: Reistad and men's 10K race winner Martin Bergstrom of Utah both led the field while double-poling, an extremely impressive feat to power through the race using the upper body and poles to propel yourself instead of the kick-and-glide technique normally applied in classical racing.

At the 2016 NCAA Championships that CU also hosted in Steamboat Springs, Reistad attempted to double-pole the entire 20K classic race, double the length of Thursday's race. He was leading past the halfway point of that race and still hung on for a top 10 finish (ninth).

"I was double poling at the NCAA here two years ago and I was leading at the 10K of the 20K race, so I knew that this course could be double poled," Reistad said. "I was pretty uncertain and really not sure what to do this morning, so it wasn't until about 20 or 30 minutes before the race that I went and told Bruce (Cranmer) I'm double poling and to prepare the skis."

TIGHT RACE: The nine-point difference between first and second place marks just the sixth time in the last 28 NCAA Championships that the difference between first and second at the halfway point was in single digits.

WHAT IT MEANS: Colorado has won eight national championship under head coach Richard Rokos, most recently in 2015, and has been runner-up another seven times, but this is just the fifth occurance in 28 years the Buffs have been in the lead at the halfway point of the NCAA Championships. In 1991, 1998, 2000 and 2011, Colorado was in the lead after 4-of-8 events. Its nine-point lead at the midpoint of this national championship is the smallest margin in the lead.

CU won the NCAA title in three of the four previous occasions leading at the halfway point (1991, 1998 and 2011 with the 2011 team leading wire-to-wire).

UP NEXT: Friday will mark the final alpine day of the championship, and one of the most exciting with the night slalom races. They will be held at Howelsen Hill with fireworks kicking off the event at 6:45 p.m.

QUOTEABLE
Head Nordic Coach Bruce Cranmer
On the women's race
"The women' were awesome and without the fall, Christina could have been right in there. Especially in the women's, seconds are really tight, so I figure she lost 10 or 15 seconds and would have been up around seventh or sixth, which would have been awesome."

On Anne Siri
"Hats off to Anne Siri for second place, it was really good for her and that was exciting."

On Petra Hyncicova's race
"I think Petra had a good race. I'm sure she's not thrilled being the past national champion, but traveling from Korea and with all that she has been through there, it is hard to come back and be in top form with that much travel and her races there being at lower elevation. All of that stuff makes a difference."

On the men's race
"Awesome day with everything except with the bad luck, bad something with Alvar. It was great to see Petter, the third time I guess is the charm as far as double poling a race and having it work out. That is pretty cool and obviously with the winner double poling, it was the right call. Basically happy, without that one glitch they had a great day and that just kind of came out of nowhere (with Alvar). Bad luck or bad something because he seemed fine yesterday."

Petter Reistad
On finally getting on the podium in his fifth career NCAA race
"I'm very happy with being on the podium and getting points for the team. Of course my big goal all of these years has been to win, but it turns out there was one other double poller today that beat me by eight seconds, I didn't have eight seconds in me. I'm happy with the results, definitely."

On double poling this course at Howelsen Hill
"This course has two parts, one part where you are going up, up, up and you start feeling it, one part where you get rest coming back down. I think you can't really do that hilly part more than a couple of times so I was just on the border line today, but I managed to race well tactically and it was a perfect race."

On the team's standing
"I think this is a really cool position to be in after being behind midway the last two years. I have confidence in that the Buffs will just go crazy from here."

Petra Hyncicova
On how she feels after a busy month traveling to the Olympics in South Korea and coming back readjusting to the altitude
"I feel pretty bad today, but I feel happy for the team because overall we had a pretty good result. Some of us were reaching for better places, but some of us got really good race, especially Anne Siri and Petter. I'm glad that we still are in the lead now."

On how she wanted to approach the race and how it played out for her
"Coming here to Steamboat I was struggling since the beginning. After a month not being in the altitude, it's pretty hard to get used to it again in one week. I was trying to go a little bit easier in the beginning and then go harder, but just my body didn't work that well. I was trying and left everything out there."

How do you approach the day off?
"I will definitely rest because that is what I need. I'm still pretty tired from all the things going on in the last month. I will rest, watch the alpiners and try to do my best for Saturday and go get them."

Sondre Bollum
On how he approached the race and how it played out for him
"My plan was to start pretty easy. I'm known for starting too hard and tailing off at the end, so my goal was not to do that today. I felt I sticked to the plan, but still I was pretty gassed in the end. I'm pretty happy, but not super happy. It was descent."

On the men's team result
"Our goal was to have three guys in the top eight and it was really bad what happened to Alvar, I feel sorry for him. Petter and I, we did a good job and hopefully Alvar will be back on Saturday."

2018 NCAA CHAMPIONSHIPS
March 8, 2018 | Howelsen Hill

NCAA Skiing Championship Team Scores (4-of-8 events):
1. Colorado 276; 2. Denver 267; 3. Utah 235; 4. Dartmouth 217½; 5. Vermont 190; 6. Montana State 143; 6. Middlebury 143; 8. New Mexico 140; 9. Alaska-Anchorage 99; 10. Northern Michigan 86; 11. New Hampshire 47½; 12. St. Michael's 36; 13. Williams 33; 14. Alaska-Fairbanks 32; 15. Plymouth State 22; 16. Colby 19; 17. St. Lawrence 12; 18. Michigan Tech 10; 19. Bates 6; 20. St. Scholastica 4; 21. Bowdoin 3; 22. Boston College 2; 23. Harvard 0.

WOMEN'S 5K CLASSICAL TEAM SCORES (top 10):
1. Colorado 84; 2. Dartmouth 72; 3. Denver 65; 4. Utah 63; 5. Montana State 50; 6. Alaska Anchorage 49; T-7. Middlebury 33; T-7. Northern Michigan 33; 9. Alaska Fairbanks 22; 10. Vermont 16.

WOMEN'S 5K CLASSICAL (40 finishers): 1. Katharine Ogden, Dart., 14:47.2; 2. Anne Siri Lervik, CU, 15:34.1; 3. Hailey Swirlbul, UAA, 15:38.2; 4. Guro Jordheim, Utah, 15:40.4; 5. Jasmi Joensuu, DU, 15:41.6; 6. Petra Hyncicova, CU, 15:52.5; 7. Mariah Bredal, Utah, 15:54.6; 8. Anna Fake, MSU, 15:57.2; 9. Lydia Blanchet, Dart., 15:57.8; 10. Vivian Hett, NMU, 16:00.5. Other CU Finisher: 11. Christina Rolandsen,16:01.5.

MEN'S 10K CLASSICAL TEAM SCOREDS (top 10):
1. Denver 73; 2. Utah 69; 3. Colorado 62; 4. Northern Michigan 53; 5. Dartmouth 49; 6. New Mexico 47; 7. Middlebury 35; 8. New Hampshire 20; 9. Colby 17; T-10. Montana State 16.0; T-10. Williams College 16.0.

MEN'S 10K CLASSICAL (40 finishers):
1. Martin Bergstroem, Utah, 27:37.1; 2. Petter Reistad, CU, 27:45.6; 3 . Dag Frode Trolleboe, DU, 27:51.8; 4. Eivind Kvaale, DU, 28:16.0; 5. Ian Torchia, NMU, 28:23.3; 6. Callan DeLine, Dart., 28:33.6; 7. Sondre Bollum, CU, 28:35.2; 8. Sindre Tungesvik, UNM, 28:36.9; 9. Luke Brown, Dart., 28:38.6; 10. Kjetil Baanerud, NMU, 28:48.8. Other CU Finishers: 31. Alvar Alev, 29:59.5.

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Players Mentioned

Alvar Alev

Sondre Bollum

Petra Hyncicova

Anne Siri Lervik

Petter Reistad

Christina Rolandsen