State Meet Recap

As expected, the 2018 Minnesota high school Nordic Ski championships provided a thrilling day of racing.   The morning freestyle races once again set the tone for the day.  Mara McCollor, Wayzata, punched the top time on the Silver course, with Robbinsdale-Armstrong's Luci Anderson finishing second, just 13 seconds back.  Hannah Bettendorf, Proctor/Hermantown, and Sarah Olson, Blaine, also finished within striking distance of McCollor -- under 30 seconds back.  The afternoon classic pursuit provided some shakeups and exciting finishes, but as been the trend in recent years, the freestyle winner McCollor maintained her lead to become the overall State champion.  Bettendorf moved from third to second with the best classical time.  Olson and Forest Lake's Regan Duffy came to the finish line in a sprint, Olson just pulling ahead for third place.

The boys skate race saw Grand Rapid's star Garrett Beckrich post the only sub-14 minute time on the day, taking an 11 second lead over SPA's Peter Moore with Wayzata's Luc Golin third just another second back.  SIx other skiers were all within 30 seconds of the lead, setting up what appeared to be an exciting pursuit race.  The common theory passed around whenever biathletes participate in the State Meet is they will lose time in the classic race since biathlon races are all freestyle format.  While Beckrich did lose some time in the classical pursuit, posting the 7th best time, he managed to hold off a host of stars chasing him to be crown the boys State champion.   Wayzata's famed trio did not disappoint, as the top three (Golin, Anders Sonnesyn, and James Schneider) all finished in the top five -- Sonnesyn moving up from 4th to 2nd with the fastest classical leg, Golin holding 3rd, and Schneider, maintaing 5th.   It is a strong testament to the Wayzata program that these boys also had the top 3 classical times. 

When looking at the results, one thing stands out immediately:  Next year will be full of rematches!  For the top 20 girls, only five girls graduate this year.  And of those 15 returning girls, five of them will be racing for least two more years.  All this means if you want to break into the top 10 next year, you'd better be upping your game this summer!  The boys field graduates 10 of the top 20, providing a little more room for advancement next season.   But both of the champions, McCollor and Beckrich, have one more season in which to defend their title.

The team races were a very dramatic affair this year.   In the boys race, top ranked Wayzata captured the team time by a mere two points over a "no name" Stillwater team (not one of the Stillwater boys was ranked in the top 20).  In fact, Wayzata was on the ropes after the freestyle races as Forest Lake owned the lead.  It was Wayzata's strong classical performance that pulled them from third place to first.  The girls race also proved to be very close, with two Section 4 teams finishing 1-2.  Stillwater girls were clearly the best, notching the top freestyle and classic team scores.  But Forest Lake only finished 7 points behind, reinforcing the strong (but friendly) rivalry in that section.  The race for third place in the girls team standings are very close as only six points separated the third place finishing Robbinsdale-Armstrong and sixth place Ely.

Movers 

Every year we crunch the numbers to dig up some interesting stats from the races.   One of the most popular is the "Move" number -- the amount of change the skier makes during their classical race (pursuit start position to finish position).  This year's big mover was Andrew Wasnieski, Brainerd, who moved up 29 places in the classical pursuit to finish 64th.  There were six other skiers that passed 20 or more.  For the grils, there was a three way tie for biggest mover:  Etta Leugers, Minneapolis Washburn, Carolyn House, Wayzata, and Kayla Bovitz, Eden Prairie, all moved up 27 places while classic skiing.  And there were another six girls that weaved around 20 or more.

In the top 20 results, Gretchen Haggenmiller had the most impressive performance, going from 31st after skate all the way up to 14th by the time she crossed the pursuit finish line -- an incredible 17 places gained!  Ian Rusch, Stillwater, had the biggest move to break into the top 20 for the boys, striding up from 27th to finished 20th -- advancing himself 7 places.

Team Stats

We typically review the team performances across a wide spectrum:  freestyle, classical, full team, and top four.   The Stillwater girls made this one easy - the were the best in all four criteria.   On the boys side things get much more interesting.  Forest Lake boys had the best skating crew while Stillwater had the deepest team (best 7), but it was Wayzata with the top classic gang and fastest four skiers.

Predictions

So how did our State Meet Preview predictions turn out?  For the individual girls, we came so close... Sarah Olson upset our trifecta when she outsprinted our #3 pick Regan Duffy (we had correctly called McCollor first, Bettendorf second).  For the individual boys, we flip-flopped the 1-2, having Sonnseyn first and Beckrich second.  Peter Moore was a third place prediction, and he came close finishing 2nd after skate but slipping during the classic pursuit for finish 4th.   For the teams, we correctly picked Stillwater girls and Wayzata boys as victors.  With rest of the girls we came close as Forest Lake girls were our third place team (they were second), and our second place prediction Duluth East missed out on that position by eight points (finished 4th).  The boys team predictions for the rest of the podium was not so pretty, as the Minneapolis Southwest and Grand Rapids were 4th and 8th respectively.

And since we highlighted them in the preview, how about the calculations of the St. Paul Highland Park computerized scoring system?   Individually, their system had Garrett Beckrich ranked 24th but did have Wayzata's Anders Sonnesyn and Luc Golin ranked 1-2 -- very close as they went 2-3.  The system also had Mara McCollor ranked 1st, which she delivered on, but had second place Hannah Bettendorf ranked 6th, with Sarah Olson 2nd, who was 3rd.   For teams, it correctly picked the Wayzata boys as the best, but had Robbinsdale-Armstrong girls first, Stillwater second, Forest Lake third -- so not far off.

Commentary: Timing

While not directly impacting any of the key results, timing caught our attention this season.  There are a couple of issues that should be debated and formally addressed by the Minnesota High School Coaches Association.   The first is the issue of settling tie-breakers in high school races.   With the widespread adoption of chip timing, some meets and sections even, have begun to rely strictly on chip timing.  So depending on where the chip is placed (usually either the ankle or the bib), the skier may have to modify their body position when they attempt to cross the line in a close finish.  Nearly every skier has seen fantastic moments of the US women's team taking close finishes with boot lunges at the line -- and many high school skiers have practiced this move.  The boot toe as the tie-breaker is uniform across FIS and NCAA collegiate racing, and the Minnesota high school rules typically defer to the NCAA rules.  However, there has been some motion toward adopting chip timing as the tie-breaker in recent rules changes.  Hopefully the coaches will push back on this policy, requiring timers to have some type of visual record of the finish which can be reviewed to determine tie-breakers by boot toe, thus allowing the high school skiers to continue practicing a single, uniform method across all their races and through their skiing career.   

The second issue that has been raised is the demand for live timing.   At sections, and more importantly at the State Meet, many parents, fans, and participants, want to be able to see results in nearly real-time fashion.  Most major timing companies provide this feature, and chip timing should make this a relatively easy task.  However, it has not been implemented yet at the high school level in Minnesota.   At the State Meet a "bootleg" set of results were posted online shortly after the conclusion of the freestyle events, attempting to address the desire for quicker results.  However, there were some discrepancies in those results, which reinforces the need for the timers to provide a method of nearly real-time results.   

Hopefully both of these topics will be addressed in a future coaches association meeting.

While that concludes the high school racing season, you can still follow many of these stars as they come together to form the Midwest Junior National team, competing this March at Soldier Hollow in Utah.