Colorado University Athletics
Colorado
New Mexico Invitational
Skiers In Distant Second At New Mexico Invitational
February 09, 2007 | Skiing
SANTA FE / RED RIVER, N.M. ? Assorted maladies have caught up with the defending national champion University of Colorado ski team, as minus several of its top performers and others not at full strength Friday, the Buffaloes find themselves in a distant second in the New Mexico Invitational.
The CU women's alpine team again had a dominant day, winning the giant slalom competition as a unit, despite the fact that star performer, junior Lucie Zikova, was diagnosed with a respiratory illness and didn't ski anywhere near full strength. However, illness took its toll on the cross country teams, and the men's alpine squad struggled again for a second straight day.
Freshman Heidi Hillenbrand picked up the slack and finished second in the women's giant slalom with a 1:59.16 time, as
Zikova still managed a seventh place finish in 2:00.68 in the closely contested race, as just seven-tenths of a second separated the third through ninth place finishers. Sophomore Lisa Perricone was on the back side of that grouping, finishing ninth in 2:01.00. Junior Rachel Roosevelt was 12th in 2:01.73, while Kristin Taylor did not ski Friday as she nursed a mild leg injury.
In the men's GS,
“It looks like this weekend is not in the cards for us, we have some issues with sickness, so it's good that these things came now and not later,” CU head coach Richard Rokos said. “Lucie was on antibiotics and is fighting it, and she had a good first run and is giving it her all. But by the end of her second run, things had caught up with her. We still won the alpine on the ladies side, Heidi skied very well and it's just what we're looking for. She had skied well Thursday before skiing out of the course three gates before the finish line. So these two days have been a great boost for her confidence.
“Miles skied consistently well, and Stefan has showed some brilliance here and there, but the rest of the guys are fighting for a good place,” Rokos added. “The field is strong with a lot of good skiers, and this hill is sort of flat compared to others we ski and others performed better than we did.”
Junior Maria Grevsgaard won her fourth classic race in as many tries this winter, as she conquered the difficult 5-kilometer course in a 17:55.3 time, topping
Junior Mia Gaw posted CU's next best effort, as she finished 16th in 19:44.3, with freshman Maisha Goodpaster CU's third scorer on the day, as her 21:09.8 time was good for 28th overall.
In the men's 10k classical, freshman Matt Gelso recorded yet another third place finish, his fourth in a row and fifth on the year, as he completed the course in 29:54.5.
Sophomore Karl Nygren finished eighth in 31:02.4 and in doing so likely qualified for the NCAA Championships. It was his third top 10 effort of the winter, and put CU in position to qualify a full six-member Nordic team.
Colorado competed a bit short-handed Friday on the Nordic side, as top performers Kit Richmond, Lenka Palanova and Kristin Ronnestrand are back in Boulder, with a fourth skier, Joaquin Goodpaster here but unable to ski due to the flu. Other schools had to deal with similar issues, but none to the degree as the Buffaloes; each race had about 10 fewer participants than usual.
“They're back home, basically sick and trying to take it easy,” CU Nordic coordinator Bruce Cranmer said of the trio. “The only people here who seem to be totally healthy are Maria and Matt. Everyone else has been sick and are getting a little bit better. Some kind of sickness went through the crew pretty hard, and we really had been lucky in recent years not to experience it on such a level. If I could pick a weekend during the year for people to be sick, this would probably be the time. I get little more nervous if people haven't been sick at all, but we're two weeks out from regionals and a month from the championships. There's enough time to heal, get immune systems pumped up. We have a break next weekend, so I think that everyone will have time to recover.
“This is a tough race here, we're as high as we ever are (9,000-plus feet) and the course is made up of tight, narrow trails,” he added. “It was probably for the best that they're not here, especially Lenka.” Palanova has not skied up to the level she performed as a freshman; anything medical has been ruled out, but she's been fighting the same malady and possible could have over-trained a bit. Cranmer is hopeful she can return to form by the regionals.
“Matt was set to be second, but there's a really hard turn in the end with a lot of powder and he skied a bit off the course and lost a few seconds,” Cranmer said. “But he's continued to ski well, and he's on track to be right where he wants to be.”
And it's good to see Maria continue to do well, she feels great about the way she's been skiing. She's been in a league of her own in classic, and it's great for her. It's great to see it and hopefully it will continue.”
“I don't know if I expect anything better tomorrow in cross country since they're depleted, but I think with the slalom next up, it's been our stronger event and we should see some improvement,” Rokos said.
The slalom and freestyle cross country races will wrap up the
