Friday, March 12
Francona, N.H.
All Day
Colorado
vs
Slalom
Forejtek, Fleckenstein Shine As Buffs Close Gap At NCAAs
March 12, 2021 | Skiing
FRANCONIA, N.H. – Junior Filip Forejtek and Stef Fleckenstein both earned first-team All-America honors as the Colorado Buffaloes Ski Team remained in second and closed the gap on Utah in the slalom competition here Friday at the NCAA Ski Championships at Mittersill-Cannon Mountain.
Forejtek took second in the men's race, just seven-hundredths of a second from a National Championship, and Fleckenstein finished fourth in the women's race to give her two first-team All-America honors here at the Championships after her second place GS finish on Wednesday.
Freshman Louis Fausa finished 11th in the men's race, missing out on All-America honors by just two-hundredths of a second, and on the women's side freshman Cassidy Gray, Wednesday's gold medalist, took 13th with sophomore Emma Hammergaard had the second-fastest second run in the field to move up into 16th place. Senior Joey Young was disqualified on the first run.
The women's scored 64 points, third most in the field behind Denver and Vermont, and 16 points ahead of Utah's total of 48 points. Despite Young not finishing, the men scored 57 points, fourth best in the field behind Montana State, Denver and Vermont, and 26 points ahead of Utah's total of 31 points. The Utes Wilhelm Normannseth was disqualified in the first run while Gustav Vollo self-reported a DQ in the second run.
As it stands, the Buffs picked up 121 points and cut the Utes lead from 66.5 points down to 24.5 points with one day of competition left, having a 398-373.5 advantage over the Buffs. Behind CU is Denver, who had the most slalom points on the day, with 346 while Montana State (314.5) gives the RMISA the top four spots and Vermont (299) rounds out the top five.
Forejtek won the first run by 78-hundredths of a second over Vermont's Mathias Tefre, and course conditions deteriorated throughout the day, making the second run very difficult. Tefre started second-to-last on the second run with Forejtek racing last and was able to beat him by 85-hundredths for the .07 of a second victory. This is the second time in two seasons Forejtek has finished second by a sliver, also taking second last season in the GS race by just .02 of a second.
Fleckenstein started 15th and moved up to seventh after her first run, and then a second solid run moved her up three more spots into fourth. All three women's racers finished significantly better than their starting positions, with Fleckenstein moving up 11 spots, Gray moving up 13 spots from a starting position of 26 and Hammergaard moving up four spots from her starting position of 20th to take 16th.
WHAT IT MEANS: The slalom is called the "great equalizer" for a reason, and that proved to be true on Friday. After the second day, the Utes held a 66.5 point advantage over Colorado and that lead shrunk by 42 points down to 24.5. Colorado then had a 39 points advantage over third place on Thursday, and the always dangerous Pioneers are just 27 points behind CU entering the final day. The top four after the second day were separated by 119 points and after Friday, the top four are all within 83.5 points of each other.
The Buffs pulled off the largest final-day comeback in NCAA Ski Championship history in 2013 at Middlebury, where these championships were supposed to be held, overcoming a 54 point deficit to Vermont to win by 43 points. And while 24.5 points seems small, and certainly is significantly smaller than the Buffs 54-point comeback, final day comebacks are still rare as only four times in the last 26 seasons the third day leader has not gone on to win the championship. But the Buffs could be primed to do just that with a strong freestyle team on both the men's and women's side.
UP NEXT: The final day of the 2021 season has arrived, and the NCAA Championship will come down to the final two races, the 15K women's and 20K men's freestyle races. The women's team will start first on Saturday at 8 a.m. MT, followed by the men's race at 10 a.m. MT.
QUOTABLE: Richard Rokos: "Anything can happen and obviously everything happened. It is a scary moment. For me it hasn't changed in 30 years. I live with them and ski with them so my heart rate for one minute or whatever the length of the race is goes up to 180-200. And I do it 12 times today, six skiers times two rounds. I don't think it's healthy, but I survive it so it's okay. It was a good race obviously. Filip was under great pressure, poor kid. In the giant slalom he was starting in second to last and two of our guys in front of him went down. It was fairly obvious he had to finish. He did not have a choice. To finish it you have to slow down a little bit because you cannot take the risk. In slalom it is the same thing. He was starting last leading up to the first run. The UVM kid didn't have anything to lose so he went after it in a major way. Filip was behind but his level of discipline is exactly what NCAA Championship races need. To be able to take it seriously but not to risk the chances. That is what happened to him. Everybody skied great. I cannot say one bad word. In the end, I think we collected the most points out of slalom. For sure the ladies did. For us it was a good race. Being some 30 points behind Utah is a tough proposition this year because Utah is invincible, but anything is possible. Freestyle is our better race so we see how we will do."
"I am going to my last intercollegiate meeting. I will certainly enjoy at least the moment of it."
"We have the people to do it. The question is if it will happen. I know our freestyle is better. We have Magnus (Boee) who was a steady winner the whole season. I am hoping for him to be there. The rest of the guys can get top-10. It is all about the girls and how well they do. I hope Anna-Maria (Dietze) won't lose a ski pole like she did in the start in the Classic. It took courage to continue and lots of juice before she got the second pole. She was single poling for a long time before she got the second poles. There are a lot of heroes coming out of this race."
"I got phone calls from people I haven't seen for decades. I got a phone call from Chip (LaCasse). He is out of the region and has been the head coach for UVM for so many years and graduated from CU. We've known each other our whole athletic life. To have an opportunity to talk to gentlemen of that caliber and we are good friends who hope to see each other again after this whole thing. I am happy to have it the way it happened. It was 33 years of a great life and 32 national champions, not winning but attending. It is a fantastic atmosphere and will stay that way. It makes me happy."
"We were a little luckier than the east was because Ivy league schools cut it all out. We did a lot of things right in the beginning. We were trying to stick to our schedule even though we had to modify many races and make sure we fit each protocol in every county. We had to really pay attention to everything. Luckily no one got sick and if they did it was early enough to be out of it by competition season. It is almost over. We need one more day. So far so good. (NCAA President) Mark Emmert kept a very close eye on it and protected everybody. Being in the first NCAA Championship in the COVID-era means something. It sets the tone for the rest of the championships. Everyone can see that it is doable as long as rules are followed. That was our goal as well."
Filip Forejtek: "I took the opportunity to race fast. In the second run I wanted to finish, but at the same time I wanted to push and wanted to win. I guess second place is also nice."
"I focused on finishing which makes me ski a little more defensive I would say and more cautious of gates. That is what we all need to do here at NCAAs so we can compete for a title. We need all the points so that was my approach."
"I am satisfied. I am glad we could race. That was the main thing. It was really nice. Sitting on Zoom all day is quite boring. The fact that we raced and had a season was amazing. I am satisfied with my results as well."
"My freshman year I DNF'd twice so I didn't want to do it anymore. It doesn't feel good. It is a great event."
Stef Fleckenstein: "The first run I was skiing more conservative because I wanted to ski without mistakes. We kind of talked about that in the meeting the night before. It was going to be the clean runs that were fast. That was kind of my approach to it. The second run I knew both girls in front of me made it down with clean runs so I was like, 'There is nothing to lose at this point. I might as well go for it." It worked out, but the course was really bumpy so it was kind of just a fight for the second run."
"They did a really good job trying to maintain it. It has been super warm the last few days. There was just no chance. The snow was melting every day more and more. They worked really hard last night to try to give us a surface. It worked for the most part, but the top part of the course didn't hold up as well because the salt did not stick as well. I actually don't know why. The top part was worse than the bottom."
"My season started a little later than everyone because of injuries and stuff. It was really nice to race. I think I just enjoyed every race."
"I think it is really important that we closed the gap a little bit going into the Nordic. It gave them hopefully a little more inspiration going into the races knowing we are that much closer. Especially salmon because it is such a hard discipline to get all of your racers down. I think we did a really good job today. Hopefully the Nordics are excited by where we stand."
"My first year I felt a lot of pressure because we had been doing pretty well all year. Last year I didn't finish. You feel a lot more pressure at these races than you expect because it is a team event instead of just individual. It is really fun. I think it is a really cool event."
ALL-AMERICAN NOTES:
WOMEN'S INDIVIDUAL NOTES:
MEN'S INDIVIDUAL NOTES:
NCAA CHAMPIONSHIP TEAM STANDINGS (Through 6 of 8 Races): 1. Utah 398; 2. Colorado 373.5; 3. Denver 346; 4. Montana State 314.5; 5. Vermont 299; 6. Alaska Anchorage 265; 7. Westminster 212; 8. New Hampshire 174; 9. Plymouth State 134; 10. Boston College 121; 11. Northern Michigan 100; 12. St. Lawrence 93; 13. Alaska Fairbanks 75; 14. Michigan Tech 39; 15. St. Scholastica 25; 16. Colby 21; 17. Clarkson 0.
MEN'S SLALOM (29 collegiate finishers)—1. Mathias Tefre, UVM, 1:29.09; 2. Filip Forejtek, CU, 1:29.15; 3. Simon Fournier, DU, 1:29.90; 4. Joachim Lein, UU, 1:29.99; 5. Louis Muhlen-Schulte, MSU, 1:30.07; 6. Tommy Kenosh, SLU, 1:30.36; 7. Aage Solheim, MSU, 1:30.57; 8. Will Bruneau-Bouchard, UNH, 1:30.61; 9. Hunter Watson, PSU, 1:30.69; 10. David Frisk, UVM, 1:31.01. Other CU Finisher: 11. Louis Fausa, 1:31.03. Disqualified First Run: Joey Young.
WOMEN'S SLALOM (30 collegiate finishers)—1. Amelia Smart, DU, 1:38.90; 2. Justin Clement, UVM, 1:40.91; 3. Julia Toiviainen, WMC, 1:41.16; 4. Stef Fleckenstein, CU, 1:41.40; 5. Reece Bell, DU, 1:41.65; 6. Rebecca Fiegl, UAA, 1:41.87; 7. Josefine Selvaag, UVM, 1:42.01; 8. Francesca English, UVM, 1:42.08; 9. Kristinae Bekkestad, MSU, 1:42.10; 10. Katie Vesterstein, UU, 1:42.59. Other CU Finishers: 13. Cassidy Gray, 1:43.17; 16. Emma Hammergaard, 1:44.70.
Forejtek took second in the men's race, just seven-hundredths of a second from a National Championship, and Fleckenstein finished fourth in the women's race to give her two first-team All-America honors here at the Championships after her second place GS finish on Wednesday.
Freshman Louis Fausa finished 11th in the men's race, missing out on All-America honors by just two-hundredths of a second, and on the women's side freshman Cassidy Gray, Wednesday's gold medalist, took 13th with sophomore Emma Hammergaard had the second-fastest second run in the field to move up into 16th place. Senior Joey Young was disqualified on the first run.
The women's scored 64 points, third most in the field behind Denver and Vermont, and 16 points ahead of Utah's total of 48 points. Despite Young not finishing, the men scored 57 points, fourth best in the field behind Montana State, Denver and Vermont, and 26 points ahead of Utah's total of 31 points. The Utes Wilhelm Normannseth was disqualified in the first run while Gustav Vollo self-reported a DQ in the second run.
As it stands, the Buffs picked up 121 points and cut the Utes lead from 66.5 points down to 24.5 points with one day of competition left, having a 398-373.5 advantage over the Buffs. Behind CU is Denver, who had the most slalom points on the day, with 346 while Montana State (314.5) gives the RMISA the top four spots and Vermont (299) rounds out the top five.
Forejtek won the first run by 78-hundredths of a second over Vermont's Mathias Tefre, and course conditions deteriorated throughout the day, making the second run very difficult. Tefre started second-to-last on the second run with Forejtek racing last and was able to beat him by 85-hundredths for the .07 of a second victory. This is the second time in two seasons Forejtek has finished second by a sliver, also taking second last season in the GS race by just .02 of a second.
Fleckenstein started 15th and moved up to seventh after her first run, and then a second solid run moved her up three more spots into fourth. All three women's racers finished significantly better than their starting positions, with Fleckenstein moving up 11 spots, Gray moving up 13 spots from a starting position of 26 and Hammergaard moving up four spots from her starting position of 20th to take 16th.
WHAT IT MEANS: The slalom is called the "great equalizer" for a reason, and that proved to be true on Friday. After the second day, the Utes held a 66.5 point advantage over Colorado and that lead shrunk by 42 points down to 24.5. Colorado then had a 39 points advantage over third place on Thursday, and the always dangerous Pioneers are just 27 points behind CU entering the final day. The top four after the second day were separated by 119 points and after Friday, the top four are all within 83.5 points of each other.
The Buffs pulled off the largest final-day comeback in NCAA Ski Championship history in 2013 at Middlebury, where these championships were supposed to be held, overcoming a 54 point deficit to Vermont to win by 43 points. And while 24.5 points seems small, and certainly is significantly smaller than the Buffs 54-point comeback, final day comebacks are still rare as only four times in the last 26 seasons the third day leader has not gone on to win the championship. But the Buffs could be primed to do just that with a strong freestyle team on both the men's and women's side.
UP NEXT: The final day of the 2021 season has arrived, and the NCAA Championship will come down to the final two races, the 15K women's and 20K men's freestyle races. The women's team will start first on Saturday at 8 a.m. MT, followed by the men's race at 10 a.m. MT.
QUOTABLE: Richard Rokos: "Anything can happen and obviously everything happened. It is a scary moment. For me it hasn't changed in 30 years. I live with them and ski with them so my heart rate for one minute or whatever the length of the race is goes up to 180-200. And I do it 12 times today, six skiers times two rounds. I don't think it's healthy, but I survive it so it's okay. It was a good race obviously. Filip was under great pressure, poor kid. In the giant slalom he was starting in second to last and two of our guys in front of him went down. It was fairly obvious he had to finish. He did not have a choice. To finish it you have to slow down a little bit because you cannot take the risk. In slalom it is the same thing. He was starting last leading up to the first run. The UVM kid didn't have anything to lose so he went after it in a major way. Filip was behind but his level of discipline is exactly what NCAA Championship races need. To be able to take it seriously but not to risk the chances. That is what happened to him. Everybody skied great. I cannot say one bad word. In the end, I think we collected the most points out of slalom. For sure the ladies did. For us it was a good race. Being some 30 points behind Utah is a tough proposition this year because Utah is invincible, but anything is possible. Freestyle is our better race so we see how we will do."
"I am going to my last intercollegiate meeting. I will certainly enjoy at least the moment of it."
"We have the people to do it. The question is if it will happen. I know our freestyle is better. We have Magnus (Boee) who was a steady winner the whole season. I am hoping for him to be there. The rest of the guys can get top-10. It is all about the girls and how well they do. I hope Anna-Maria (Dietze) won't lose a ski pole like she did in the start in the Classic. It took courage to continue and lots of juice before she got the second pole. She was single poling for a long time before she got the second poles. There are a lot of heroes coming out of this race."
"I got phone calls from people I haven't seen for decades. I got a phone call from Chip (LaCasse). He is out of the region and has been the head coach for UVM for so many years and graduated from CU. We've known each other our whole athletic life. To have an opportunity to talk to gentlemen of that caliber and we are good friends who hope to see each other again after this whole thing. I am happy to have it the way it happened. It was 33 years of a great life and 32 national champions, not winning but attending. It is a fantastic atmosphere and will stay that way. It makes me happy."
"We were a little luckier than the east was because Ivy league schools cut it all out. We did a lot of things right in the beginning. We were trying to stick to our schedule even though we had to modify many races and make sure we fit each protocol in every county. We had to really pay attention to everything. Luckily no one got sick and if they did it was early enough to be out of it by competition season. It is almost over. We need one more day. So far so good. (NCAA President) Mark Emmert kept a very close eye on it and protected everybody. Being in the first NCAA Championship in the COVID-era means something. It sets the tone for the rest of the championships. Everyone can see that it is doable as long as rules are followed. That was our goal as well."
Filip Forejtek: "I took the opportunity to race fast. In the second run I wanted to finish, but at the same time I wanted to push and wanted to win. I guess second place is also nice."
"I focused on finishing which makes me ski a little more defensive I would say and more cautious of gates. That is what we all need to do here at NCAAs so we can compete for a title. We need all the points so that was my approach."
"I am satisfied. I am glad we could race. That was the main thing. It was really nice. Sitting on Zoom all day is quite boring. The fact that we raced and had a season was amazing. I am satisfied with my results as well."
"My freshman year I DNF'd twice so I didn't want to do it anymore. It doesn't feel good. It is a great event."
Stef Fleckenstein: "The first run I was skiing more conservative because I wanted to ski without mistakes. We kind of talked about that in the meeting the night before. It was going to be the clean runs that were fast. That was kind of my approach to it. The second run I knew both girls in front of me made it down with clean runs so I was like, 'There is nothing to lose at this point. I might as well go for it." It worked out, but the course was really bumpy so it was kind of just a fight for the second run."
"They did a really good job trying to maintain it. It has been super warm the last few days. There was just no chance. The snow was melting every day more and more. They worked really hard last night to try to give us a surface. It worked for the most part, but the top part of the course didn't hold up as well because the salt did not stick as well. I actually don't know why. The top part was worse than the bottom."
"My season started a little later than everyone because of injuries and stuff. It was really nice to race. I think I just enjoyed every race."
"I think it is really important that we closed the gap a little bit going into the Nordic. It gave them hopefully a little more inspiration going into the races knowing we are that much closer. Especially salmon because it is such a hard discipline to get all of your racers down. I think we did a really good job today. Hopefully the Nordics are excited by where we stand."
"My first year I felt a lot of pressure because we had been doing pretty well all year. Last year I didn't finish. You feel a lot more pressure at these races than you expect because it is a team event instead of just individual. It is really fun. I think it is a really cool event."
ALL-AMERICAN NOTES:
- The Buffs picked up two more All-America honors, the 520th and 521st in CU history. It's also the seventh and eighth honor of this Championship.
- Forejtek's honor is the 296th by a men's skier. Fleckenstein's is the 225th by a women's skier.
- Forejtek has now been named a first-team All-American in both disciplines, earning first-team GS honors in 2020. He now has three overall All-America honors.
- Fleckenstein also had three overall All-America honors and she pulled off the double first-team effort at these championships, taking second in the GS and fourth in the slalom.
- The Buffs now have 94 total All-America honors in slalom action, 50 in women's and 46 in men's.
- The Buffs now have 172 men's first-team honors all-time and 131 women's first-team honors in its history, and 303 overall first-team honors.
- The Buffs scored 121 points on the day, third most in the field behind Denver (153) and Vermont (148), and 42 head of Utah to cut its lead from 66.5 to 24.5 points entering the final day.
- The RMISA holds the top four and six of the top seven spots in the team standings through three days.
- The women's alpine team scored the most points of any team at the NCAA Championships with 158, topping Vermont (144), Westminster (130) and Denver (124).
- The Buffs finished fourth in the men's race with 57 points, but just 12 points behind race winner Montana State (69), and the CU women scored 64 points, third behind Denver (88) and Vermont (85), who both placed three in the top 12.
- Scoring for the Buffs were Forejtek (37) and Fausa (20) for the men and Fleckenstein (31), Gray (18) and Hammergaard (15) for the women.
WOMEN'S INDIVIDUAL NOTES:
- Stef Fleckenstein finished fourth and picked up first-team All-America honors, her second of the championship and her third overall All-America honor. She started in 15th, moved up to seventh after the first run and then up three more spots after her second run. She ends her junior season competing in eight races, finishing seven, all in the top seven with six top five finishes and two podium appearances. In 35 career races, she has finished 29 with 25 top 10 and 16 top five performances with eight podiums and one race win.
- Cassidy Gray finished 13th, moving up 13 spots to miss out on her second All-America performance by three spots (less than six-tenths). She concludes her freshman season with six races competed in collegiately with five finishes all in the top 13. Her three slalom finishes were 10th, 12th and 13th and her two GS finishes were wins.
- Emma Hammergaard finished 16th, after starting 20th and slipping two spots to 22nd after the first run, she had the second-fastest second run to move up six spots and finish 16th. She finishes her sophomore season finishing eight of 12 races, all in the top 16 with five top 10 performances.
MEN'S INDIVIDUAL NOTES:
- Filip Forejtek capped a spectacular junior season finishing 11 of 12 races, all in the top seven with nine top five performances that included seven podium appearances and one win. In his last 19 races, he has finished 17, all in the top seven with 12 podium appearances. In his career, he's finished 25 of 35 races, 20 in the top 10 and 18 in the top five with 13 podium appearances.
- Louis Fausa finished 11th and just missed out on All-America honors (by just .02 of a second). He ended his freshman season finishing nine of 12 races with eight top 20 performances with five top 10 and one top five finish.
- Joey Young did end his career how he would've wanted, not finishing either race at the championships, but that doesn't put a damper on a great career that saw him race 49 times, finishing 41 of them with 33 top 20, 19 top 10 and seven top five finishes including three podium appearances and two race victories.
NCAA CHAMPIONSHIP TEAM STANDINGS (Through 6 of 8 Races): 1. Utah 398; 2. Colorado 373.5; 3. Denver 346; 4. Montana State 314.5; 5. Vermont 299; 6. Alaska Anchorage 265; 7. Westminster 212; 8. New Hampshire 174; 9. Plymouth State 134; 10. Boston College 121; 11. Northern Michigan 100; 12. St. Lawrence 93; 13. Alaska Fairbanks 75; 14. Michigan Tech 39; 15. St. Scholastica 25; 16. Colby 21; 17. Clarkson 0.
MEN'S SLALOM (29 collegiate finishers)—1. Mathias Tefre, UVM, 1:29.09; 2. Filip Forejtek, CU, 1:29.15; 3. Simon Fournier, DU, 1:29.90; 4. Joachim Lein, UU, 1:29.99; 5. Louis Muhlen-Schulte, MSU, 1:30.07; 6. Tommy Kenosh, SLU, 1:30.36; 7. Aage Solheim, MSU, 1:30.57; 8. Will Bruneau-Bouchard, UNH, 1:30.61; 9. Hunter Watson, PSU, 1:30.69; 10. David Frisk, UVM, 1:31.01. Other CU Finisher: 11. Louis Fausa, 1:31.03. Disqualified First Run: Joey Young.
WOMEN'S SLALOM (30 collegiate finishers)—1. Amelia Smart, DU, 1:38.90; 2. Justin Clement, UVM, 1:40.91; 3. Julia Toiviainen, WMC, 1:41.16; 4. Stef Fleckenstein, CU, 1:41.40; 5. Reece Bell, DU, 1:41.65; 6. Rebecca Fiegl, UAA, 1:41.87; 7. Josefine Selvaag, UVM, 1:42.01; 8. Francesca English, UVM, 1:42.08; 9. Kristinae Bekkestad, MSU, 1:42.10; 10. Katie Vesterstein, UU, 1:42.59. Other CU Finishers: 13. Cassidy Gray, 1:43.17; 16. Emma Hammergaard, 1:44.70.
Players Mentioned
ALPINE
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ALPINE
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