After a two week break, the CCSA teams continued their official race season this past weekend at the Birkie Trailhead in Cable, WI, with the Gitchi Gami Games.

The women kicked off the race weekend with a five kilometer classic individual race. The collegiate field was led by Vivian Hett (3rd) from Northern Michigan, crossing the finish line at 15:04.9, followed by her teammates Kristen Bourne (4th), Anikken Alnaes (5th) and Sarah Bezdicek (6th). Another top ten finisher was Maria Hauer (7th) representing St. Cloud State University. The College of St. Scholastica was led by Kelsey Dickinson (12th), Michigan Tech by Sarah Goble (16th) and UWGB by Oda Bekkestad, coming in 43rd.

NMU’s Kjetil Banerud led the men’s field over a distance of 10 kilometers, clocking in at 27:27.2. Jacob Ajax (University of Wisconsin Green Bay) and Mathias Rolid (NMU) round out the podium. Michigan Tech’s Mitchell DeLong (5th) and Reid Goble (7th), as well as St. Scholastica’s Tamer Mische-Richter (6th) got a top ten finish. St. Olaf was led by Tyler Radke taking 36th place.

On Sunday, January 21, the women raced a 10 kilometer freestyle mass start race. NMU’s Vivian Hett striked again as the fastest collegiate skier, finishing with a time of 26:10.4. Hett’s teammates Anikken Alnaes, Julie Ensrud and MTU’s Sarah Goble also finished in the top 5. Kelsey Dickinson of Saint Scholastica (13th), Maria Hauer (25th) of St. Cloud, Stephanie Balas (39th) of St. Olaf and Oda Bekkestad (40th) of Green Bay took the top finishes for their teams.

In the men’s 15K, Tom Bye from Michigan Tech claimed victory with a time of 34:35.2. Kjetil Banerud and Gaspard Cuenot from Northern and Tech joined him on podium. The top finishers for each of the CCSA teams was Tamer Mische-Richter (6th) for St. Scholastica, Jacob Ajax (14th) for UWGB and Tyler Radke (30th) for St. Olaf.

Results can be found at: www.superiortiming.com

The teams of the CCSA traveled to Jackson, NH last week to compete in the 2017 NCAA Championships hosted by the University of New Hampshire. On Thursday, March 9th the men competed in the 10K classic individual start race while the women raced a 5K in difficult, constantly changing snow conditions. Two days later, on March 11th, was the 20K mass start skate race for men and 15K for women.

Martin Bergstrom of the University of Utah won the men’s race while Fredrik Schwencke of the Northern Michigan University Wildcats led the CCSA with a 6th place finish. Schwenckes’s teammate, Adam Martin, finished just behind in 7th place to take the top American spot in the competition. Both earned All-American honors for their performances. On the women’s side, Vivian Hett earned All-American honors with a 6th place finish, finishing behind race winner Petra Hyncicova of the University of Colorado.

Joe Haggenmiller commented on his team performance: “The NCAAs were a mixed bag for the Huskies. Our men being in the top 10 of men’s Nordic is a good mark for the team to build on for the future. Tomi Mikkonen had a pretty good classic race for a lower ranked classic skier and Tom Bye skied strong to move up to 14th in the freestyle mass start after breaking 2 poles and being left at the back of the field in last place. We were close with Gaspard’s skate race as he was skiing fairly comfortably with the lead pack for a lap and a half until his back began to bother him and eventually had him unable to ski with full power falling back through the field. Our women battled, but struggled with the challenging conditions thrown at them. I feel for them to be ending their Husky careers with some sour results, but that is the way ski racing goes. We wish them well in the future.”

Both Bergstrom and Hyncicova repeated as champions in Saturday’s mass start races. Martin led the CCSA with a second All-American performance in 6th place while MTU’s Tom Bye crossed line as the 14th collegiate skier in the field. Reitler Hodgert from Saint Scholastica finished 24th. NMU’s Kristen Bourne skied to a 13th place finish to earn the top CCSA spot of the day. Vivian Hett and Nicole Schneider, both of NMU, and Kelsey Dickinson of CSS took 22nd, 23rd and 26th respectively.

“CSS has a great time at NCAA’s with mostly results to match. Our skiers were gutsy and executed race plans really well. We are super proud of this team and motivated to start training for next year.” said Maria Stuber, Saint Scholastica’s head coach.

For results click: http://www.barttiming.com/eisa/Results17/ncaa17.htm

Ishpeming, MI – The two days of the CCSA/NCAA Regional Championships, held at Al Quaal Recreation and Outdoor Center by the Northern Michigan ski team, presented several challenges for the collegiate teams. First, the conjunction of the collegiate race with the USSA Super Tour brought a significant increase in competition and numbers. Professional athletes from across the nation attended the event vying for a top podium spot. The second challenge was the unusually high temperatures for mid-February.

On Saturday, the women faced three 5K laps during their mass start freestyle event. Northern Michigan women swept the collegiate podium, placing Nicole Schneider in first (44:59.8), Kristen Bourne in second and Vivian Hett in third. Kelsey Dickinson from Saint Scholastica came in fifth followed by Michigan Tech’s Sonja Hedblom (6th), Anna Kubek (7th) and Carolyn Lucca (8th). Sadie Peterson of Green Bay came in ninth. The top women from Saint Olaf and St. Cloud were Bri Paulsen (15th) and Maria Hauer (22nd) respectively.

“I was happy with how the Huskies performed this weekend. I think the five athletes we had who came in needing to perform to get to the NCAA Championships or to go into the Championships with confidence did well in this regard. I was also happy to see the upward trending skiing of Anna Kubek, who despite not being an NCAA Qualifier may have been our best female skier this weekend.” said MTU’s head coach Joe Haggenmiller

The men’s 20K was taken over by Adam Martin, skiing for the Wildcats, who crossed the line as the fastest collegiate skier (55:41.6). Martin shared the podium with his teammate Fredrik Schwencke (2nd) and Tom Bye (3rd) from Michigan Tech. NMU’s Zak Ketterson followed in fourth, MTU’s Gaspard Cuenot (5th), CSS’ Reitler Hodgert (6th) and Kyle Marshall (8th) from UWGB. Men from St. Olaf were led by Tyler Radke coming in 22nd.

Scholastica’s head coach Maria Stuber commented on her team’s performance: “We were really happy with our Regional performance, qualifying 2 athletes for NCAA’s and have 4 all-region races. CSS is ecstatic to have a solid group of 7 men and 5 women in the overall top 20 on the CCSA points list. This group of athletes will raise the bar for our program in 2018.”

Sunday morning kicked off with the men’s 10K classic interval start. Adam Martin clocked in 25:33.5 and claimed another victory. Gaspard Cuenot from Michigan Tech took second and Fredrik Schwencke from Northern finished third. Within the mix of Tech and Northern skiers, Scholastica’s Reitler Hogert placed seventh and Kyle Marhall rounded the top ten.

In the women’s 5K, Wildcats claimed all the podium spots with Nicole Schneider in first, Vivian Hett in second and Kristen Bourne in third. Just off the podium finished Scholastica’s Kelsey Dickinson. Tech women put the following three skiers in the top ten: Anna Kubek (7th), Carolyn Lucca (8th) and Lisa Koenig (9th).

The results in the team competitions, men’s, women’s and overall, remained unchanged for all categories with Northern in first, Tech in second and Scholastica placing third.

Rhinelander, WI – Teams of CCSA took part in 5 and 10 kilometer classic races held on COVAC ski trails. Originally, this weekend was supposed to be dedicated to relays but due to previous changes, the University of Wisconsin Green Bay had to accommodate changes as host of this race.

Adam Martin, representing Northern Michigan, clocked in at 26:33.28 and set the fastest time for the men’s 10K. Martin’s teammate Fredrik Schwencke, who similarly to Martin, decided to only double pole, took second and Lars Sonsterud rounded up the podium occupied by the Wildcats. Tom Bye and Tomi Mikkonen were the top men of Michigan Tech, taking fifth and sixth respectively. Breaking into the top 10 were also Kyle Marshall (8th) from UWGB and Ryan St. Clair skiing for Scholastica (9th).

Northern Michigan also managed to sweep the podium of the women’s 5K. Coming in first was Vivian Hett with a time of 15:36.21 followed by Kristen Bourne (2nd) and Nicole Schneider (3rd). By the difference of a split second put Tech’s Lisa Koenig (6th) outside of the top five. The top woman for St. Scholastica was Kelsey Dickinson (8th) and Green Bay’s women were led by Bree Mucha finishing 11th.

Joe Haggenmiller commented on his team performance: “I thought the Huskies competed hard and skied well. Kudos to Lisa Koenig and Anna Kubek for their top 10s. Same goes out to Tom Bye and Tomi Mikkonen.”

Northern won the team competition with a combined 138 points. Michigan Tech took second with 115 points followed by Scholastica with 100 points, Green Bay with 91 and Saint Cloud with 33.

“I just want to say thank you to all the CCSA teams who competed today at this new venue. Green Bay and the Northwoods Nordic Ski Club is excited to debut this new venue and work to perfect the course and accommodations in anticipation of future NCAA events. The course and venue was well received and provided a variety of challenges to the athletes.” said Steven Teclaw, head coach of University of Wisconsin Green Bay.

Houghton, MI – The first weekend of February brought Central Collegiate teams to Houghton, Michigan in order to find the CCSA distance champions. The hosting university, Michigan Tech, and its grooming crew, prepared outstanding trail conditions. Temperatures stayed around 20 degrees with mostly cloudy skies and small snow showers on both days. Men took on an individual start 10k classic on Saturday and mass start 20k skate Sunday while the distances for women were 5 and 15 kilometers respectively.

Saturday’s racing kicked off with the men’s 10k classic. Northern Michigan swept the podium placing Fredrik Schwencke in first with a time of 28:22.0 a 40 second lead on second place Zak Ketterson and third place Sam Elfstrom. Finishing just outside the podium was Tech’s Tom Bye with Scholastica’s Reitler Hodgert following in fifth, trailing only 1.1 second behind Bye. The top finishers from University of Wisconsin Green Bay and College of St. Olaf were Kyle Marshall (12th) and Mitchell Miller (24th) respectively.

The fastest time for the women’s 5k classic, 17:03.0, was set by Kristen Bourne from NMU, outskiing her teammate Nicole Schneider (2nd) by only 0.5 seconds and Vivian Hett (3rd) by 14.7. “It was great to see Kristen making the jump back to the top of the podium. Kristen came down with mono the very first week of the semester this fall so she had to take many weeks off and then we laid out a plan to come back slowly, this took some discipline and patients on her part and the road back from mono isn’t easy to do but she stuck with our plan and it worked.” Added Sten Fjeldheim. Also to squeeze into top 10 was MTU’s Carolyn Lucca (8th) and Sonja Hedblom (9th) as well as Bree Mucha (10th) skiing for Green Bay. Scholastica’s top woman was Alison Ternes (13th), Maria Hauer from St. Cloud finished 16th and leading woman for St. Olaf was Bri Paulsen placing 19th. “Our women skated well with a couple of top 20 performances from Bri Paulsen and Shelby Arendt. The men continue to improve.” Said St. Olaf’s head coach Kevin Brochman.

Sunday begun with the women’s 15k mass start with Kristen Bourne outsprinting Nicole Schneider in another tight finish with the time of 47:06.2 for first and 47:06.4 for second. Both of Tech’s athletes Carolyn Lucca (8th) and Sonja Hedblom (9th) placed the same as the previous day and Kelsey Dickinson representing CSS rounded off the top ten in 10th place. Sadie Peterson (12th) took the top spot for Green Bay’s women, Bri Paulsen (18th) for St. Olaf and Anna Lindell (27th) for St. Cloud. “Sadie Peterson continues to ski strong and improve week to week during her first year in the CCSA.” Noted Steven Teclaw, coach of UWGB.

Zak Ketterson representing the Wildcats took the first collegiate spot for the men’s 20k skate. Ketterson was closely followed by Tech’s Gaspard Cuenot (2nd) and his own teammate Fredrik Schwencke (3rd). Tom Bye, skiing for the Huskies, was just 4.2 seconds short of the podium finish. Kyle Marshall (6th) from Green Bay recorded another top 10 performance as well as Reitler Hodgert (7th) representing Scholastica. The St. Olaf men were led by Tyler Radtke crossing the finish line in 24th.

“We had a great time racing in Houghton. Trail conditions were outstanding and the race crew is the best. The CSS team had some performances that we are really proud of and we are feeling better each week and looking forward to a new course in Rhinelander next weekend,” said Maria Stuber, head coach of Saint Scholastica.

In the women’s team point standings, Northern Michigan captured 138 points, Michigan Tech 114, Saint Scholastica 97, Green Bay 91, St. Olaf 64 and St. Cloud 54.

On the men’s side, NMU finished with 135 points, MTU scored 119, CSS 100, UWGB 90 and St. Olaf captured 66 points.

Joe Haggenmiller commented on Michigan Tech’s performance: “Tom Bye was pretty strong this weekend. Overall, I thought we competed pretty well. NMU beat us pretty handily, you have to give them credit. We will take another shot at things next weekend.”

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View Race Results »

The weekend of January 28th and 29th brought the teams of the CCSA to Duluth, Minnesota for the Duluth Hilltop Invite hosted by the College of Saint Scholastica. Saturday’s race, 5k and 10k individual freestyle for women and men respectively, went as planned but the Sunday classic distance was changed to freestyle due to an insufficient amount of snow. This change left only the first day as a CCSA/NCAA qualifier point race causing some teams to leave after the first race.

Starting the day off with the women’s 5k, Nicole Schneider from Northern Michigan captured another freestyle victory with a time of 13:19 followed by her teammates Vivian Hett (2nd) and Sophie Schimpl (3rd). “I thought it was a good day of racing for our team. All of our athletes were out there giving it all they had on a fast icy course.” added NMU assistant coach Shane MacDowell.

Michigan Tech women were led by Carolyn Lucca finishing 11th, a few seconds ahead of her teammate Sonja Hedblom (14th). The fastest woman from the College of Saint Scholastica was Kelsey Dickinson (12th) followed by Green Bay’s Bree Mucha (13th) only three seconds behind. The top finisher from St. Olaf College was Bri Olsen (32nd).

Michigan Tech’s Gaspard Cuenot clocked in at 24:24 during the men’s 10k freestyle which secured him a first spot on the podium. His performance, along with his teammates Tom Bye (4th) and Tomi Mikkonen (9th), helped MTU to score the most points among the men’s teams.

Second place went to Reitler Hodgert representing Saint Scholastica and coming in third was Lars Sonsterud from NMU. University of Wisconsin Green Bay was represented by Kyle Marshal coming in 12th and Tyler Radke from St. Olaf finished 38th.

Even with the Northern Michigan and Michigan Tech men’s teams leaving the night before, there was not a lack of competition on Sunday. Kyle Marshall from UWGB placed 2nd with a time of 24:54 in the men’s race, and he was the top CCSA skier that day. Chasing down Marshal were Jack Christianson (4th), Samuel Boardman (10th) and Gerrit Garberich (14th), all skiing for the College of St. Scholastica. Tyler Radke from St. Olaf moved up to 21st from the previous day.

On the women’s side, the fastest CSSA skier was MTU’s Carolyn Lucca who took 3rd place with her time of 28 minutes flat. The closest collegiate skier to Lucca was Sadie Paterson (7th) skiing for UWGB. In the field of St. Scholastica’s women, Nicole Gilman was their top finisher coming in 17th.

Visit itiming.com to see complete results.

The weekend of racing at the Birkie Trailhead near Cable, WI brought yet another challenging competition upon the skiers as well as coaches from CCSA and Midwest high schools.

Day one started with the men’s classic 10k individual start. With temperatures around 36 degrees and raining, the course quickly deteriorated despite the best efforts of the organizers.

Adam Martin, representing Northern Michigan University, dominated the field with a winning time of 30:24.5 and a comfortable margin of 28 seconds on his teammate, Fredrik Schwencke, placing second. Another Wildcat placing within the top five was freshman, Zak Katterson (4th). The Saint Scholastica and Michigan Tech men were led by Ryan St. Clair (9th) and Gaspard Cuenot, rounding out the top ten respectively. “I have to give credit to Gaspard for battling hard after making a poor choice to double pole.” said Michigan Tech’s coach Joe Haggenmiller.

The women’s 5k was taken over by NMU placing eight skiers into the top ten. The fastest collegiate skier was NMU’s Vivian Hett (2nd) with the time 17:58.0 ahead of her teammates Nicole Schneider (3rd) and Sophie Schimpl (4th). The top MTU woman was Sonja Hedblom taking 12th place. With all the NMU women and majority of men placing in the top ten, Sten Fjeldheim said: “I am very happy with the performance of our team. We took our focus away from making the teams for Junior and U23 World Championships which certainly reflected on our results.”

Day two kicked off with the men’s 20k freestyle mass start. MTU’s Gaspard Cuenot topped the field in an exciting final sprint against NMU’s Adam Martin (2nd) and Fredrik Schwencke (3rd). His winning time was 58:39.4. Zak Ketterson (4th) and Leo Hipp (7th) were two other Wildcats finishing in the top along with Kyle Marshall (8th) from University of Wisconsin Green Bay and David Jaszczak (9th) from Michigan Tech.

The Wildcats were led by Nicole Schneider who completed the course in 49:26.1 followed by Sophie Schimpl (3rd) and Caroline Brisbois (4th). Just outside the top ten placed Elizabeth Evans (11th) from Saint Scholastica, Bree Mucha (13th) representing UWGB, and Carolyn Lucca (14th) from Michigan Tech.

“There were some highs and some lows and are hungry for improvement across the board. I was impressed by our teams tenacity in the physical & technical challenges of skiing in warm rainy weather. We are really excited to bring the CCSA to Duluth next weekend!” said Scholastica’s head coach Maria Stuber.

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Men’s 10km Classic Results
Women’s 5km Classic Results

Men’s 20km Freestyle Results
Women’s 15km Freestyle Results

Between January 7 and January 12, universities of the CCSA competed at the 2017 Cross Country Championships in Soldier Hollow, Utah. The same site which hosted the 2002 Winter Olympics will also provide courses for the Junior and U23 World Championships starting by the end of January.

The first day of racing kicked off with the women’s individual 10k freestyle on January 7. Nicole Schneider, NMU’s top finisher, took 34th place overall with a time of 29:27.4, followed by her teammate Sophie Schimpl just 0.5 seconds back and Vivian Hett placing 48th. Kelsey Dickinson from the College of St. Scholastica finished 61st and her teammate Nicole Gilman took the 226th spot. Michigan Tech’s women were led by Sonja Hedblom placing 120th followed by Carolyn Lucca 171st and Lisa Koenig 187th. Women who raced for University of Wisconsin Green Bay were Bree Mucha, Sadie Paterson and Madeline McKeefry finishing 181st, 206th and 236th respectively.

The following race was the men’s individual 15k freestyle. Adam Martin from NMU finished 13th clocking in at 36:02. Martin was the CCSA’s highest placing man that day followed by his teammates Fredrik Schwencke 62nd and Zak Ketterson 72nd. Michigan Tech’s men were led by Gaspard Cuenot placing 29th followed by Tom Bye 73rd and David Jaszczak 144th. St. Scholastica’s Reitler Hodgert, finished 116th.

The next race on the program was the classic sprint on January 8. With the temperature hovering around 36 degrees and constantly changing weather conditions, coaches and wax techs were constantly challenged to pick the best kick wax.

Tomi Mikkonen and Gaspard Cuenot from Michigan Tech both qualified for senior heats in 15th and 16th place respectively, both finishing their race in quarterfinals. NMU’s Frederik Schwencke qualified 28th for senior heats as well, advancing to the final round where he took 6th place. Zak Ketterson and Lars Soensterun from NMU qualified for the junior heats.
Nicole Schneider from Northern Michigan also qualified for the junior heats where she managed to win the final round.

The third day of racing, January 10, brought several classic distance races with mass starts throughout the day. First race was the senior men’s 30k followed by the senior women’s 20k, junior men’s 10k and junior women’s 7.5k.

NMU’s Adam Martin finished the 30k in 11th place and clocked in 1:24:35 securing a spot on U23 Worlds His teammates Fredrik Schwencke and Sam Elfstrom placed 23rd and 62nd respectively. Top MTU’s finishers were Tomi Mikkonen 54th and Daniel Wood 84th. Reitler Hodgert from St. Scholastica took 71st place.

The top CSSA’s finisher in the women’s 20k was Kelsey Dickinson from St. Scholastica in 40th place with time 1:12:46. Vivian Hett from Northern Michigan finished 43rd followed by her teammates Caroline Brisbois 46th and Kristen Bourne 50th. Sonja Hedblom from Michigan Tech placed 54th along with Carolyn Lucca taking 64th and Ruth Opplinger in 74th. Bree Mucha racing for UWGB finished 73rd followed by Madeline McKeefry, also representing University of Wisconsin Green Bay.

In the junior men’s 10k race, Zak Ketterson from NMU finished 34th and his teammate Lars Soensterud placed 121st. David Jaszczak from MTU took 95th spot.

Nicole Schneider from NMU placed 23rd in junior women’s 7,5k and St.Scholastica’s Nicole Gilman finished 101st.

Dartmouth College won the College Cup by earning 615 points scored by top three, male and female skiers from each university in the classic sprint and 10/15k skate race. Northern Michigan University tied with University of Denver for second place with 573 points, Michigan Tech placed 13th with 380 points Saint Scholastica 17th with 178 points and University of Wisconsin Green Bay took 18th place, scoring 89 points.

The final day of racing at the 2016 NCAA Championships started today with the men’s 20k classic mass start. At the start of the race the tracks were icy and fast, but it didn’t last long as the temperature began to rise causing the conditions to soften and deteriorate.

The men’s race was won by the University of Colorado’s Mads Stroem with a time of 49.41.9. The CCSA men had a strong showing today and were led once again by Northern Michigan’s Ian Torchia in fourth place with a time of 50:22. Torchia was followed by teammate Adam Martin in fifth 17 seconds later. The next CCSA skier was Michael Fehrenbach of the University of Alaska Fairbanks in 22nd. Reitler Hodgert just missed out on top 30 by 0.3 of a second, finishing 31st. In the same sprint finish was Michigan Tech’s Kyle Hanson in 32nd less than a second behind Hodgert. Northern Michigan placed their third skier in 33rd with the arrival of Jake Brown. Matthew Nichols of UW Green Bay rounded out the CCSA men coming in just behind Brown in 34th place.

In the team scores NMU led the way placing fourth for the men on the day with 60 points which also gave them 150 points over the championship and the title of the number one Men’s College cross country ski team in the country by three points over the University of Denver.

By the time the women’s race started at 11 am the sun had come out in full force, causing the course to soften making skiing very challenging over the three laps of the 5 kilometer course. The women’s race was won in a commanding fashion by Denver Universities Lin Eriksen with a time of 54:37.6. The CCSA women were led by UAF’s Nichole Bathe in seventh place with a time of 55:22, 44 seconds from the lead. Bathe was followed by teammate Anne-Tine Markset in 14th. The two UAF women were backed up by the NMU women Vivian Hett in 15th and Felicia Gesior in 18th. UAF placed their third skier in 23rd with Sarissa Lammers, to give UAF 50 points and fourth on the day. UAF led the CCSA women throughout the entire NCAA Championships besting the women of Northern Michigan by 21 points to finish sixth overall.

NMU’s third skier finished 25th with Sophie Schimpl. The CCSA women were rounded out by the College of Saint Scholastica’s Kelsey Dickinson in 36th and Michigan Tech’s Andrea Lee in 37th.

With the NCAA Championships concluded the CCSA athletes will head home and begin working hard for next year in hopes of returning to the NCAA championships to represent their schools and region.

For a full list of results and results and team scores visit summittiming.com

The first cross country ski races of the 2016 NCAA championships in Steamboat, Colorado kicked off today. The morning was led off with the women’s 5k individual start at 9am and followed by the men’s 10k individual start at 10:30. The weather for the women’s race was hard and fast, with the sun shining and temperatures right around 30 degrees.

Today’s CCSA women were led by UAF’s Anne-Tine Markset who placed 14th, 21 seconds off the pace. Markset led the UAF women to top the CCSA women’s teams today with a sixth place in the team scores. Markset was followed by her teammates Sarissa Lammers 18th and Nichole Bathe 23rd.

The women of NMU trailed by six points behind UAF to place seventh on the day in the team scores. NMU was led by Felicia Gesior in 16th 32.3 seconds off the pace. Gesior was followed by Vivian Hett 21st and Sophie Schimpl 24th.

Kelsey Dickinson of the College of Saint Scholastica placed 33rd today for the CCSA with Michigan Techs Andrea Lee placing 39th.

By the time the men were to start at 10:30, the weather had grown warmer with temperatures reaching into the mid 40’s. This made for some waxing changes for the teams to try and make the most out of the warming snow conditions.

The men of NMU not only led the CCSA field today but led the entire men’s field by taking the team lead with 90 points, 19 points over the next challenger, the University of Denver with 71 points. The Wildcats were led by Ian Torchia in second place, ten seconds from the win. Torchia was followed closely by his teammate Adam Martin 18 seconds later in fourth. Jake Brown placed ninth overall today solidifying NMU’s lead and giving each of the Wildcat racers All-American honors.

Michigan Tech was CCSA’s second team at the Championships in ninth overall. MTU was led by Gaspard Cuenot in 12th place. Cuenot was followed by Kyle Hanson who finished 31st after suffering a crash during his race costing him precious seconds in the overall. Didrik Elset placed third for MTU in 40th.

There were three CCSA men representing their schools with solo efforts today. Reitler Hodger of the College of Saint Scholastica finished 25th, Matthew Nichols of the University of Green Bay took 35th and Michael Fehrenbach of the University of Alaska Fairbanks finished in 37th.

The NCAA Nordic races continue Saturday with 15 and 20 kilometer classic mass starts. For full results and team scores please visit www.summittiming.com