Easterns Sprints

This new sprint course had the biggest hill we've encountered this year, and the top part of it was quite steep. It snowed a lot the day and the night before the race, but by morning it was clear and the wind had died down. The snow that fell was mostly ice pellets that don't stick together well, and despite the best efforts of the groomers, the course was very soft on the uphills. In qualifying, I picked my new soft NIS2 Rossi's, but it seemed the soft flex didn't help because I was sinking to the bottom on the uphills anyway. My legs were fried after the first uphill, and I couldn't really put the power down on the rest of the course. I was relieved when I heard I finished 24th in Open Men, but I ended up 13.2 seconds back in 2:53.8. After they separated the juniors out, my position for the heats was #19.

I knew I had my work cut out for me since I was up against #2 Fred Touchette, #9 Ian and #12 Poirier. The other 2 guys in my heat I didn't recognize, but I knew I had been ahead of them in qualifying. Not surprisingly, Ian and Fred got the best start and I settled into 4th behind Poirier. Up the first hill we went two in each lane, but I don't think anybody moved up. At the top of the hill, you have to accelerate from almost a stop and a small gap opened in front of me. I made sure to tuck low on the dropoff known as Dirk's Dive, and I got back on. In the next whiskers section I got up side by side with Poirier, but my 1-skate wasn't working in the soft, narrow corridor. I switched to offset but that didn't help and Poirier had half step on me and moved over. I stalled, but still accelerated as hard as I could over the top of the last hill. I tuck skated the whole way down, but I didn't seem to have the glide to get back on. The first three were in a photo finish and I was close fourth, but not challenging. In hindsight I probably needed some structure for the descent. In all, I skied much better than qualifying and I felt like I had done what I could given the conditions and the smaller, quicker competition. My final position was likely 19th, but I was listed as 15th on the results.