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From the FasterSkier archive — posts syndicated from athletes’ and coaches’ own blogs between 2004 and 2012, kept online as published. Current coverage is at fasterskier.com.

Tag: Green Acres

  • Bender Skis to Comfortable Tour Victory; Gregg Dominates in Final Pursuit

    Bender Skis to Comfortable Tour Victory; Gregg Dominates in Final Pursuit

    Jennie Bender (CXC) in earlier action this season. She won the Tour de Twin Cities on Sunday by 19 points.

    A top-five was all she needed to secure the overall win, but Jennie Bender (CXC) skied beyond that in Sunday’s 15 k freestyle pursuit at Green Acres, the final event of the five-race Tour de Twin Cities. The first athlete out of the gate, Bender finished third to teammate Caitlin Gregg (CXC), who won the pursuit by over a minute and a half and finished the Tour in second overall. Rosie Brennan (APU) was second on Sunday and third overall.

    “I neeed to get in the top five…so it was more of a survival race,” said Bender on Sunday evening. “I wasn’t really feeling it today, but I just had to put my head down.”

    Until the night before the race, Bender thought the pursuit start would be based off of the cumulative time difference from the previous four races, rather than only Saturday’s classic race.

    “I thought I’d be starting behind Caitlin,” Bender explained.

    Bender knew she’d be hunted down in either starting position, but with Gregg starting behind her, she knew she had her work cut out for her.

    “Caitlin’s a strong skater, and she caught up,” said Bender.

    Not only did Gregg catch up on the first lap, she ultimately gapped the field by over a minute and a half, and skied alone for much of the 15 k.

    Caitlin Gregg (CXC) took the pursuit victory on Sunday by well over a minute.

    After making up the ground between herself and Bender and Brennan in front of her, Gregg got to work on pulling away.

    “[I] just kept the hammer down so they didn’t want to try and stay with me I ended up skiing the entire race alone,” wrote Gregg in an email. “I was fortunate because I passed them on one of the steepest climbs of the course and that is where my strengths are in skating, so I took advantage of that.”

    Hunting down her competitors is another of Gregg’s strengths, and after she assessed how her body felt and how everyone else was skiing, she blew the race away.

    “I went hard at the start to avoid getting caught by the big group behind me (I was hoping) and soon realized that I was feeling great,” said Gregg. “So I just went with it and decided to charge hard the whole way.”

    Brennan, who started eight seconds behind Bender and 15 seconds ahead of Gregg, knew she wouldn’t be able to hang onto Gregg after getting caught in the first lap.

    “I didn’t stand a chance,” said Brennan. “I just tried to ski my own race, and I think that worked out well.”

    The course, which overlapped Saturday’s herring bone- and double pole-heavy terrain, featured steep hills and fast flats.

    “It’s hard, because you had to work the field or you’d lose a lot of seconds there if you didn’t just push all the way with your legs,” described Bender. “And the uphills were steep, so you had to keep the tempo up, and be really energetic up them.”

    A perennially strong skater, Gregg held nothing back up the three steep hills on each of the five laps. She knew Bender would take the overall win, but there was still a fight to be had for second.

    “The rest of us were still in contention for second through sixth, which keeps the energy high,” said Gregg.

    Bender, left, with men's Tour winner Matt Liebsch. Courtesy photo.

    Bender’s commanding lead in the points heading into Sunday was by design.

    “I wanted to put myself in a position on Wednesday and Saturday where I wouldn’t be stressed out for today,” she said. “I knew those racers would be my better chances, and I don’t like having it all on the line [the last day], so that’s why I was pumped I was third [on Sunday].”

    With three 30-point wins and 15 points from the bonus preem, Bender ended up winning the Tour by 19 points over Gregg.

    The sustained stress of the week behind her, Bender now looks forward to the rest of the season. Her first stop is the City of Lakes Loppet next weekend, in Wirth Park where the Tour begain.

    “Now that this week is over, I can get my thoughts together for what’s next,” she said. “I feel strong; I feel like I’m racing well.”

     

    Final Tour standings

    15 k pursuit results, elapsed time

    Overall pursuit results

     

  • McGuffin Climbs Back From Early Fall to Take 10 k Classic at Green Acres

     

    Dylan McGuffin (CGRP) during the mass start classic at U.S. Nationals. He collected his first win on Saturday at Green Acres. Photo: Flying Point Road.

    At the beginning of every mass start classic race, there are several points when the number of available lanes diminishes, and racers must scramble to find a new spot in the tracks. Starting lines 10-plus lanes wide must funnel down to two in a matter of a few hundred meters. Sometimes, a field of 100 athletes can make it through each transition with minimal collision. The men’s SuperTour 10 k classic in Lake Elmo, Minn. on Saturday was not one of those races.

    Between 20 and 30 athletes went down in a pile-up within the first 100 meters, including eventual winner Dylan McGuffin (Craftsbury Green Racing Project) and runner-up Matt Liebsch (Team Strong Heart/Team Birkie). Karl Nygren (Central Cross Country), who ended in third, managed to escape the carnage and led the race for the first few kilometers.

    “Luckily I didn’t break anything, it just took me 3 k to catch back up,” said McGuffin said on Saturday afternoon.

    Though it happened too fast for him to know exactly how the pile-up began, Liebsch recalled somehow getting tripped up when he and the skier next to him moved to take the same lane at the first point that tracks disappeared.

    McGuffin escaped with his equipment intact, but at its epicenter, Liebsch took the full force of the ensuing pile-up.

    “I got hit from behind by about 30 kids,” said Liebsch. “I used my body as a shield, so when I finally felt confident I was in the clear, I put my pole down and someone shot their ski into it.”

    Matt Liebsch at U.S. Nationals. Photo: Flying Point Road.

    After finding a replacement pole, Liebsch began working his way back from the back of the pack. He was so far behind, he “treated it as an interval start at that point.”

    The tangle put all skiers who went down at a disadvantage, but McGuffin said he remained fairly confident he could weave his way back to the front.

    “After I’d started skiing a little bit, I knew I’d catch back up. The race went out fairly slow, and I just made sure I didn’t panic; didn’t get too excited,” he said.

    The pace may have started slow, but the bonus sprint 4.5 k into the race ensured that it would soon pick up. With additional Tour points on the line (15, 10 and 5 for first, second and third), Nygren said the pace got going heading into the climb to the bonus checkpoint.

    “It spiced things up—going for the [sprint] made it no man’s land,” said Nygren.

    Pat O’Brien (CGRP) took the 15-point bonus and Nygren took the extra 10. After the second lap, the pace cooled down as the leaders recovered from the intermediate surge, which may have been just what McGuffin and Liebsch needed to reel the race back in.

    “I caught the main pack just as people broke off the front to go for [the sprint],” said McGuffin.

    With a big gap between the top three and the rest of the field after the bonus, McGuffin passed the checkpoint in fourth, in the lead of the chase group.

    “I just went with it—I pushed off the front, and then caught and passed the three guys that had initially broken off,” he said.

    Back in contention, McGuffin said he essentially led the race for the final two laps.

    “It was kind of an interesting course, I don’t think I’ve ever done one quite like it—pretty punchy, short hills, and then the rest was just double poling,” said McGuffin. “So it was basically herring bone or double poling the whole time.”

    With 500 m to go, Liebsch finally climbed his way back to the front of the race on the last uphill into the finish. As the group crested the top, Liebsch decided to go for it and took the lead.

    McGuffin, left, lunging for the win. Photo: PT Timing.

    McGuffin didn’t let him get too far in front, however, and closed back the gap on the following downhill into the stadium. In a lunge for the line, he edged Liebsch by a tenth of a second.

    “I’m pretty psyched,” said McGuffin of his first win of the season. “It was sort of unexpected, so it felt good.”

    Liebsch, who had hoped for a top-20 in the immediate aftermath of his crash, was upbeat in light of the photo-finish.

    “I hoped there was enough in the tank—they said it was a tenth of a second, but it was more like two inches,” he said. “I made the mistake of looking over—you’re supposed to race to ten feet beyond the finish line!”

    The mass start classic race was the fourth event of the five-race Tour. Racing resumes again on Sunday with a freestyle pursuit based on skiers’ times from Saturday. The overall points leader after five races—not the best time composite, as in the Tour de Ski—takes the Tour win and a $3,000 purse.

    Note: This article has been updated.

    Men’s 10 k results.

    McGuffin poses on the podium, though no official ceremony on day one of the two-day pursuit. Photo: CGRP.