Elm Creek Series Results

Conditions: Air temp. 15F-22F, windy and light flurries prior to the races. Very nicely groomed trails but covered by the an inch or so new snow, mostly blown onto the skate deck and tracks on the Vally Trails. Tough yet good racing conditions.

20+ skiers showed up at tonight's blizzard-like winter weather condition. Due to the windchill factor, the high teen/low 20s temp did not feel like a condition racing in shorts! The skate race was led by a pack of nine racers right out at the first turn down the tubing hill bridge. To pull against a strong head wind was not in everyone's racing strategy. But then, up on the "wall" seemed easier as the tail wind pushed one up the hill, which obviously made a move to pull away from the pack prior to getting into the woods a bit more challenge; hence the pack of nine was not separated enough before heading into Thicket and Northern Light trails. Luke Gesior charged ahead and crossed the line first, followed by an exciting photo finish between Chris Sachs and Anders Bowman (where the finish line was nearly unrecognizable due to the blizzard condition). Christi Nowak continued her dominance in the women's skate race. In the classic race, Luke Geisior lead all the way and claimed his second title of the night. Everyone in the classic race had their own battle not only due to the wind factor, but also due to a few long sections of tracks filled with new snow. The condition made skiing in the tracks much slower and made selection of wax a bit trickier. Ingrid Leask took home the women's title in the classic race.

Race course: 1 lap of 5K lit trails (Valley Trail loop, Thicket trails, Northern Light trails).

Race distance: 5K, both classic and freestyle, mass start.

Freestyle(F)/Classic(C)
Luke Gesior               13:33 (F)/16:00 (C)-- male skate and classic winner
Chris Sachs               13:35 (F)
Anders Bowman             13:35 (F)
Craig Stolen              14:11 (F)/16:27 (C)
Eric Lindquist            14:36 (F)/17:05 (C)
Laszlo Alberti            14:37 (F)/18:32 (C)
Clayton Keim              14:47 (F)
John Hopkins              14:50 (F)
Jake Schroeder            15:03 (F)
Christi Nowak             15:11 (F)--female skate winner
Kory Freeberg             15:15 (F)
Nick Ross                 15:34 (F)
Al Shuros                 15:43 (F)/20:00 (C)
Ingrid Leask              15:53 (F)/18:52 (C) --female classic winner
Mick McCalloch            16:24 (F)
Joel Benton               17:59 (F)
Megan Smaby               18:42 (F)
Andrea Potyondy-Smith     19:22 (F)/26:20 (C)
Zack Konetski             19:27 (F)
Saul LaCoursiere          19:59 (F)
Tom Nowak                          /20:04 (C)

-- Amy Xu (Timer for skate race and Results), Beth Maus (Timer for classic race), Melinda Silbernick (Race Director)