Snow conditions, fog wreak havoc on Alpine opener

The Rhinelander/Northland Pines Alpine Ski team left the Northern Conference season opener Thursday, Jan. 8 without an official result, and with injuries that could put the team’s hopes of making it to state in girls’ skiing in jeopardy.

Dense fog canceled the Super G competition in the conference opener at Christie Mountain in Bruce. Coach Rod Olson said it was unclear if the Super G race would be made up during a meet later in the season. 

“We have to decide, we may add that super G into another race, and then go back and rescore, but we’re not sure yet. Some of the coaches are against it. Some of them are for it,” he said. 

Between the fog, soft snow due to a recent warm-up and difficult course set-ups, coach Olson said it led to a difficult day on the slopes for his team. 

“The snow was horrible, and then the course was set too tight,” he said. “We had to cancel Super G because of the fog. You couldn’t see 10 feet in front of you, and I think that played a big part too — tight courses and not being able to see … you could see the red and blue gates, but you really couldn’t tell if you were steep, flat, whatever. It was rough.”

That proved costly for the Hodag girls as Northland Pines sophomore Jessica Linn, the team’s top-returning skier, crashed in giant slalom and had to be helped off the hill with what the team feared could be a significant knee injury. Coach Olson said that bad news came on the heels of junior Lindsey Hoerchler suffering a non-skiing-related knee injury on the eve of the opening meet. 

The Hodags had only five skiers on the girls’ side to start the season and four are required to be eligible for a team score in WIARA competition. That means, with the Hodags down to three healthy skiers, the team’s chances of returning to state on the girls’ side could be over unless they find a replacement. 

“They can’t make state without four people. So, right away when the girls had a break, they were reaching out to a couple girls that they know that ski, see if we could recruit somebody,” coach Olson said. “Right now I’m planning on working those three girls as best we can for their individual stuff, but I’m not sure if we’re going to have a team now.

As it stood, the Hodag girls were credited with fourth place on the day while the Hodag boys finished third.

Senior Aila Bergman led the Hodag girls, sitting in seventh place through the two competed runs. She was sixth in giant slalom and 10th in slalom. Karlie Yunkers sat in ninth place, and Lucy Eddy was 14th.

By the eye test, coach Olson said Bergman had a solid day, senior Karlie Yunkers had an up-and-down performance, and junior Lucy Eddy was hindered after missing a gate in giant slalom and being forced to hike.

Coach Olson said the tight courses also caught out the top skier for the Hodag boys, senior Ben Olson, who had mishaps in both slalom and giant slalom on Thursday. He finished 29th overall on the day after being forced to hike to cross missed gates in both runs.

“Ben was faster than everybody by three seconds … but the last few turns at Christie are always set with a lot of what we call offset, too cranky. And he had to ski into the gate in slalom and in GS, but he was flying,” he said.

Ben Olson, Eli Repenshek and Holden Schmitz all were forced to hike in giant slalom. Wyler Koput finished second in giant slalom and fourth in slalom to sit tied for first though two runs. Repenshek bounced back to take second in slalom and state in 12th place. Holden Schmitz was 19th, Will Johnson was 23rd, Ryley Hull was 18th and Charlie Johnson was 30th.

“Wyler Koput had a good day. We throttled him back and just told him some key things to survive and he had a good GS,” he said. “In slalom, Eli and Wyler both did very well. It would have been nice to have Ben’s time in there. Holden had a decent time.”

Snowboard held an unofficial competition on Thursday, with coach Olson noting that the Ashland/Ashwabay squad was unable to field a full team after one of its coaches went into labor and was unable to attend. 

“It was my motion that we not scored as a conference race without all the teams there, and so we just had a JV meet,” he said. 

Sydney Sarkauskas swept the runs of giant slalom and slalom to take first overall on the girls’ side. Soren Dumar won giant slalom and finished second in slalom to take the overall title ahead of teammate Marshal Durkee, who recovered for a fifth-place run in giant slalom to take the slalom competition. Ayden Myers was fifth in his snowboarding debut for the Hodags.

The second WIARA Northern Conference meet of the season is slated for today at Mt. Zion in Ironwood, Mich.