Women Lead Charge On First Day Of NCAA Championships

STEAMBOAT SPRINGS – Colorado went 1-2 in the women's giant slalom race with Magdalena Luczak winning a national championship and Denise Dingsleder taking second as the Buffaloes sit in second place as a team at the 2024 NCAA Ski Championships at Steamboat Ski Resort Wednesday.

Luczak essentially defended her GS title, which she won in 2022 in Park City after not skiing in college in 2023. She won both runs and took the race by an astounding margin of 1.18 seconds. Dingsleder tied for second place with Utah's Madison Hoffman. CU's third woman, Julia Toiviainen, also had a solid race, moving up six spots in each run from 23rd to 11th, missing out on an All-American honor by just three-hundredths of a second.

"The ladies saved the day," CU Alpine Coach Ian Lochhead said. "They were awesome. Magda and Denise skied like themselves. Julia started the first run with a high bib and battled through that, she had the fifth fastest second run which was really good for the team."

"We took matters into our own hands," Luczak said. "I'm happy for the whole team, we had some really good runs today. I felt good today, I had two solid runs. I've felt really good on skis the past few weeks. I'm super proud of DD (Dingsleder), being in the start with her (as the final two racers to start in the secon run) was the best I could've asked for."

"We did it together," Dingsleder said. "We did what we were hired to do, we got the job done … half way. It was a tough race at the beginning, the conditions were changing, it was cloudy then we had sun. The boys had a tough start, but we decided it's a team competition."

On the men's side, a bit of misfortune held the Buffs back from what could've been a truly special overall team day. Filip Wahlqvist had a little misstep on his first run and sat in 13th position, but moved up to eighth after the second run to pick up a second-team All-America honor. Etienne Mazellier had an outstanding first run and was second in the field fell to 12th after the second run, missing out on his own All-America honor by just 26 hundredths of a second. Ryder Sarchett had an unfortunate mishap on his first run and didn't finish the race.

"Ryder was charting really hard, he was skiing really fast," Lochhead said. "He just got in a weird position on the second pitch and it's just unfortunate. Filip got hosed with his starting position in both runs, first run the surface hardened after his run and on the second run, the sun came out and softened up the snow, but he skied well. Etienne sitting in second after the first run was great, but he just didn't have a great second run. Obviously the speed is there."

In the team standings, the Buffs won the women's race with 95.5 points and was sixth in the men's race with 42 points. Fortunately, no team had two outstanding runs and the Buffs' 137.5 points sit second, 17 behind Utah (154.5) and 4.5 head of third place Denver (133). Vermont is fourth with 101 points and alpine-only Westminster is fifth with 82, essentially making it a four-team race after the first day.

"On to the slalom for us," Lochhead concluded. "Happy to still be in it."

UP NEXT: The action turns to the Nordic side Thursday with the 7.5K freestyle interval start races. The men start at 10 a.m. followed by the women at Noon. Watch live action at ncaa.com/live and rmisaskiing.com.

WHAT IT MEANS: It's ski racing. It's up and down. You go 1-2 in one race, and get back luck in the other. At the end of the day, the three RMISA powers are within 21.5 points of each other with EISA power Vermont 30 back of those three. Any of those four teams have a legit chance to take home the national championship, and most importantly, so do the Buffs. The Nordic teams skied very well on these courses at the CU Invitational, so hopefully that trend continues Thursday as the Buffs fight for the program's 21st title, but first in nine years.

ALL-AMERICANS

CU had three All-Americans on the opening day, missing out on two more by less than a quarter second. Luczak and Dingsleder earn first-team honors and Wahlqvist second-team.
CU now has 550 All-America honors in program history, 310 men's honors and 240 women's.
With two first-team honors, CU now has 317 first-team All-America honors in program history, 139 for women.
CU now has 109 GS All-America honors, 55 women's and 54 men's.
Luczak picks up her second All-America honor but it's the first for Dingsleder (at CU) and Wahlqvist. CU has had 211 skiers become All-Americans, 122 men and 89 women. Dingsleder is the 152nd skier to win first-team honors and the 64th women's skier to do so.

LUCZAK'S WIN

Luczak's win is the 104th Individual National Championship in program history.
She becomes the 26th skier to win multiple individual national championships.
She's the first women's alpine skier in 24 years to win multiple individual national championships since Aimee-Noel Hartley in 2000.
Only Lucie Zikova has won more individual national championships in program history for women's alpine, winning three from 2005-08.
It's the 30th individual national champion from a women's skier in program history.
It's the 18th GS individual national champion in program history, and eighth women's GS title.
It's the 694th race in in CU history.
She is the ninth women's alpine skier to win three races in a season, doing so in just five starts thus far. She will become just the second women's alpine skier to win half of her races in a season, joining Lucie Zikova, who won seven of 12 in 2006.
With four career victories, she is now tied for 50th for most career wins, 17th in CU history for wins by a women's skier, and is tied for eighth for most wins by a women's alpine skier.

TEAM NOTES:

This is the ninth time the Buffs have won the women's GS race at NCAAs and just second in the past 12 seasons.
CU score 95.5 points in the women's race and 42 in the men's, and with 137.5 points sit in second place, 17 behind Utah (154.5) and 4.5 ahead of Denver (133) with Vermont the only other team to hit 100 with 101.

WOMEN'S ALPINE NOTES:

Luczak's win is her third of the season, second in GS and in five race starts, she has finished first three times and second twice.
Dingsleder hit the podium for the third straight time in GS, taking third at the GS Qualifier ahead of the RMISA Championships and then winning the RMISA individual championship. She has seven top 10 finishes this season with four in the top five with those three podiums. She now has 50 race starts in her career and this was her eighth podium, 14th top five and 26th top 10 finish.
Toiviainen finished 11th and has finished 12 of 13 races this season, all in the top 20and 11 of those 12 in the top 13.

MEN'S ALPINE NOTES:

Wahlqvist has finished 12 of 13 races this season, all in the top 12 and 11 of the 12 in the top eight. He closed out his GS season with six of seven in the top 10 with four top fives and two podiums.
Mazellier finished 12th and he has finished 11 of 13 races, all in the top 16.
Sarchett's DNF was just the second of his season, having finished six of his first seven with five in the top 14, two top fives and one race win.

TEAM STANDINGS (Thru 2 of 8 Races): 1. Utah, 154.5; 2. Colorado, 137.5; 3. Denver, 133; 4. Vermont, 101; 5. Westminster, 82; 6. Montana State, 78; 7. Alaska Anchorage, 70; 8. New Hampshire, 59; 9. Dartmouth, 47; 10. St. Michael's, 44.5; 11. Colby, 40.5; 12. Middlebury, 33; 13. Plymouth State, 9; 14. Harvard, 6; 15. Nevada, 3; 16. Bates and Boston College, 0.0.

MEN'S GIANT SLALOM (32 Collegiate Finishers): 1. Mikkel Solbakken, UU, 1:44.78; 2. Sindre Myklebust, UU, 1:44.85; 3. Christian Soevik, DU, 1:45.18; 4. Isac Hedstrom, UNH, 1:45.24; 5. Magnus Styren, UVM, 1:45.32; 6. Simen Strand, SMC, 1:45.38; 7. Gianluca Boehm, MSU, 1:45.43; 8. Filip Wahlqvist, CU, 1:45.61; 9. Leon Nikic, UAA, 1:45.62; 10. Oscar Zimmer, DAR, 1:45.63. Other CU Finisher: 12. Etienne Mazellier, 1:45.89. Did Not Finish First Run: Ryder Sarchett.

WOMEN'S GIANT SLALOM (33 Collegiate Finishers): 1. Magdalena Luczak, CU, 1:54.51; 2. Denise Dingsleder, CU, and Madison Hoffman, UU, 1:55.69; 4. Evelina Fredricsson, WMC, 1:55.86; 5. Liv Moritz, DU, 1:56.23; 6. Kaja Norbye, UU, 1:56.29; 7. Nora Brand, DU, 1:56.66; 8. Ainsley Proffit, UAA, 1:56.68; 9. Sara Rask, DU, 1:56.71; 10. Kristiane Bekkestad, MSU, 1:56.92. Other CU Finisher: 11. Julia Toiviainen, 1:56.95.

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Players Mentioned

Denise Dingsleder

Magdalena Luczak

Etienne Mazellier

Ryder Sarchett

Julia Toiviainen