January 18, 2021 at 8:17 a.m.
Hodag skiers do an about-face, go to Hinderbinder race
Hodag skiers do an about-face, go to Hinderbinder race
Rhinelander ended up faring well in the race, placing five in the top 10 of boys the high school boys' and girls' divisions.
At issue early in the week was that, according to Reis, race organizers were planning a mass start for the event. Also, due to a lack of snow, the race would be several laps around a small course. Organizers made a late call to move to interval wave starts and, thanks to some late-week snow, the course was changed to a two-lap race along an approximately four-kilometer loop.
With those more socially-distant changes in place, the Hodags decided to attend the race.
"I'm ecstatic that we made the choice to come to the race," Reis said on Saturday.
Rhinelander had the two individual winners on the day in the high school division, with Kyle Morien taking the boys' race and Liana Teter winning the girls' race. Morien finished the eight-plus kilometer race in 27 minutes, 39 seconds to beat Chippewa Valley Nordic's Connor Jol by more than a minute for the top spot. Teter (32:08) led a 1-2-3 overall finish for the Hodags girls with Anna Wood second (32:40) and Callie Threlkeld, recently promoted to Rhinelander's competition squad, finishing third (32:50).
"Callie Threlkeld just moved up to comp following her performance at Lakeland. Callie's now a varsity skier," Reis noted. "I'm getting better cohesiveness on the team because they're realizing that they're paying their dues and everyone's united by that. It's showing in their races. All that skiing that they're putting in is going to pay off in spades later on."
Sam Rutkowski finished fourth overall in the boys' division (29:47), with Daniel Goldsworthy eighth (30:07), Travis White ninth (30:22) and Mason Shinners 10th (30:25). Megan Lester added a fifth-place finish for the Hodags girls' (33:54) while Abbey Henrichs finished 10th (34:50).
In particular, Reis said she was proud of how the Hodags attacked a steep climb toward the end of each lap that incorporated part of Camp Forest Springs' ski hill.
"They responded well to the little tips and tricks that (assistant coach) Jim (Wood) and I were giving them to get up that hill fast," she said. "I saw some really good determination, some good racing. Hodags were passing other skiers on that hill and really racing it hard and gutting it out, because that hill was completely unforgiving."
Hodag Nordic Challenge nixed due to COVID concerns
The Northwoods Nordic Ski Club, organizers of the Hodag Nordic Challenge ski race, have canceled the event that was to have taken place this coming weekend at the Cedric A. Vig Outdoor Classroom due to concerns over the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
"We do not believe we can hold a High School or Middle School event that provides the necessary safeguards to the participants, parents, coaches, and especially our volunteers," the club stated in a press release issued last Wednesday evening.
The club stated that its race committee, based on input from the Oneida County Health Department, had established a threshold of an 8% or lower positivity rate in order to move forward with the race. The positivity rate was listed at 11.4% for Oneida County, according to data on the Wisconsin Department of Health Service website accessed last Thursday morning.
The event typically attracts hundreds of high school and middle school racers from Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Had it gone forward, race organizers had previously declared they were separating the event into a one-day high school race on Saturday and a one-day middle school race on Sunday to limit the number of people gathering on-site.
"People in the state look to the Hodag Challenge as one of the more elite scholastic events, so it stands to reason that they should take the high road and make a tough choice for everyone involved," Reis said. "It's tough to hold people back from that race. They really love to come here, so we can't dangle the carrot."
The Northwoods Nordic statement said, "We will be back next year under better circumstances."
Rhinelander is not scheduled to compete again formally until Jan. 28 in the Northern Conference meet in Cable.
Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].
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