It was a huge undertaking for the Mt.Washington Ski Club as we ran two simultaneous courses on two separate runs on the Friday and Saturday of competition. Setting up and running one course is a big job on its own, this required twice the manpower. The event was giant success with praise coming from the visiting clubs. Thanks to all the volunteers from visiting clubs that helped make it all come together.
This race was the main qualifier for the upcoming Whistler Cup so even though our coaches were trying to keep our racers focused on the event and not stressing out about placing high enough to qualify, it was still on everyones mind.
Maja has been focused on top ten at every event this year and has been pushing hard and taking risks. This has resulted in major improvements in her skiing but also means she is always on the edge and even the smallest error in this sport, where fractions of a second are critical, can drop you way down in the results.
Friday saw the girls skiing Giant Slalom(GS) and the boys on the Slalom course(SL).
There were 84 girls from around the province competing for Provincial standings. Top 30 is a great result.
GS&SL were both two single run events, meaning two runs with separate results.
Maja almost fell and winded herself on her first GS run but managed to stay on her feet and still finish 13th, only 00.7 of a second out of tenth place. Her team mate Keegan McCooey skiid well into 29th.
On her second run Maja placed 16th and Keegan 28th.
The boys as usual were at the top of their game on the Slalom course with Kole Harle winning the first run and coming 6th in the second run. Liam Gilchrist placed 7th and 9th, Logan Frame 10th and 11th, and Robbie Yelland 30th and 24th. There were 73 boys competing.Wow!
Day two had the girls on SL and the boys on GS.
Maja missed a gate and had to hike on her first run, placing 69th. You only have a few seconds to hike back to a missed gate before the judges call you off course for the next skier coming behind. You have to hustle and in the end you're only guaranteed a finish way down the list so it takes some will power to not just give in and not finish the run. Either way it's a disappointment for the racer and upsetting. So much work goes into training and it all comes down to one attempt, maybe a minute of your time to be perfect.
Keegan put in a great run and came 12th.
Maja's second run was much better at 12th place, Keegan also placed well at 23rd, only a second behind Maja and still enough to drop 11 positions!
The boys again cleaned up on the GS course with Harle 5th in the first run and 1st!! in the second. Gilchrist placed 3rd and 5th, Frame9th and 11th and Yelland 32nd and 36th.
Day three had the boys and girls both on the Kombi course for a single run only.
Maja gave it her all and came away with 6th place, less than a third of a second out of third place.
Keegan also skied very well, placing 14th.
The boys again all placed well with Gilchrist 6th, Harle 7th, Frame 10th and Yelland 32nd.
It was a great event that ended with bright sunshine on the Sunday.
We would have to wait until the slightly complicated Whistler Cup qualifications were calculated to see which of our racers would qualify.
There are two videos available, they are both identical but in different formats
that we are testing out to see which provides the best quality
for file size and consistent functionality.Both are linked from You Tube.
Both can selected for HD and full screen viewing. Enjoy.
