Hilltop Invite Day 1 Results
COLERAINE, Minn. - Junior
Tyler Kornfield climbed to the top of the podium for the second time in as many outings, after winning the men's 9.4 kilometer freestyle race on Saturday afternoon at the Hilltop Invite at Mount Itsaca.
The Alaska Nanooks men's and women's ski teams finished second on the day to their Central Colleigate Ski Association rivals, the Northern Michigan Wildcats, who swept the men's and women's titles with 74 and 76 points, respectively.
Alaska's men tallied 67 points and its women combined to score 69 points on the day. The Michigan Tech Huskies took third in both team events with 58 points on the men's side and 62 on the women's.
"They (NMU) have a lot of depth and they are a strong team. We have our sights on them and we'll have to have all of our men move up in the coming weeks to challenge and beat them and we're certainly capable of doing that."
Kornfield won the men's interval start event by almost 12 seconds, beating NMU's Kjell-Christian Markset, in 20 minutes and 32.9 seconds.
"He started as the race leader and never trailed but Kjell was chasing him the whole time," said head coach
Scott Jerome. "We were getting the splits after each lap and Tyler always seemed to be up on him from as little as five to as much as 12 seconds and he was able to stay up on him. It was a good race for Tyler."
Rookie
Logan Hanneman was the second Nanook to cross finishing 7th overall in 21:28.6. Hanneman got out to a fast start and was with the leaders for the first lap but faded after that.
"Last week (U.S. Championships) took its toll on him so he was a bit tuckered still especially from the 30k (last Friday in Maine)," said Jerome. "Seventh is still respectable and we expect him to bounce back in tomorrow's sprint."
Alaska rookie
Ludwig Schott followed in 10th (21:38.9) and senior
Ian Wilkinson posted his best career collegiate finish in 12th (21:42.3). According to Jerome, the Fairbanks native had the Nanooks race of the day.
"He has a tendency to start off too fast and fall apart after that but we told him to keep his speed down early and he did. He was 25
th after the first lap then moved up to 20
th on the second, then 17
th on the third and finished the race in 12
th. He did a great job and it was really exciting for Ian. We're really happy for and proud of him."
The Nanooks were also represented on the course by senior
Alex Morris (15th, 22:00.9), freshman Jonas Loeffler (22nd, 22:15.0) and senior Erik Soederstroem (23rd, 22:16.5).
Junior
Marit Rjabov raced her way to a silver finish in the women's 4.7 km event in 11 minutes and 52 seconds for the best finish of her career. Jerome said Rjabov was in 6th place with about a kilometer to go but dropped the hammer to finish just 2.5 seconds behind the race winner, MTU's Molly Burger.
"It was a really exciting day for Marit," Jerome said. "She's been more of a classic specialist but her skate was strong today and it was incredible for her to come in second just three seconds out of first. It was her best collegiate finish and a boost she needed and its nice it happened this early in the year."
A red-shirt freshman in her first true CCSA race, Aly McPhetres skated to a 6th place finish in 11:54.7 and junior
Crystal Pitney finished 9th (12:03.4) to round out the Nanooks scoring racers.
"Aly was only six seconds out of first in her first real colleigate event," said Jerome. "The future is really bright especially for her doing so well so early in the season and when she's still so young."
"Crystal did really well too and was only eight seconds out of 6th place. After U.S. Nationals she was pretty discouraged with some of her races so it was a good shot of confidence in the arm and it should really rev her up heading into next weekends distance races."
Junior
Heather Edic and sophomore Heidi Brook were 11th (12:05.4) and 12th (12:13.6), respectively and sophomore
Raphaela Sieber, who took a spill on a patch of ice in Maine last week and suffered some bruised ribs as a result, raced through her pain to finish 15th (12:22.1). Junior
Rebecca Konieczny also raced for Alaska, taking 21st (12:56.2) overall.
The Nanooks return to the Mt. Itasca course again tomorrow for a classic sprint, with the men's individual start qualification kicking off at 10 a.m., followed by the women's qualification at 10:30 a.m.
Sieber will miss tomorrow's sprint races to allow the injuries sustained in her fall more time to heal.
