Seven Ford Sayre Junior Nordic Team (JNT) athletes competed in the Eastern U16 Championships, at Gore Nordic Center, in North Creek, NY this past weekend (March 8th-10th, 2024); 2 athletes from team Vermont: Maya Sluka (Woodstock, VT) and Tomas Masterson (West Fairlee, VT) and 5 for team New Hampshire: Lucille Dent (Hanover, NH), Mallory Eshbaugh (Lebanon, NH), Ollie Hanna(Lebanon,NH), Millie Larrick (Hanover, NH), and Leigh Eggleton (Hanover, NH). Ford Sayre Lead Coach Hilary MacNamee was also the NH Team Leader for the competition, sharing the role with Jenn Rowe.
A number of Ford Sayre BKL program graduates raced as well for team NH: Greta and Sophia Mancini, Lizzie Furstenburg, Annabelle Norris, Isaac Fellows, Donovan Van Citters, Rohan Novosad, and Nelson Barabas.
Friday racing began with a 5km freestyle race in full sun. The ribbon of snow saw a fierce competition for the girls, with Ford Sayre’s Ollie Hanna coming in second, a mere 0.7s behind the winner, Plymouth NH’s Elli Englund. Lucille Dent arrived in 5th followed by Millie Larrick in 9th, Greta Mancini in 15th, Mallory Eshbaugh in 25th, Sophia Mancini in 26th, Annabelle Norris in 30th, Maya Sluka in 44th and Leigh Eggleton in 54th out of 93 participants. For the boys race, Tomas finished on the podium in 3rd, Isaac Fellows finished 6th, followed by Donovan VanCitters in 11th, Rohan Novosad in 24th, and Nelson Barabas in 73rd out of 101. Keep in mind these are the best U16 skiers in New England and New York.
Despite a very challenging course, with a huge climb up the alpine mountain leading into a rutted and sketchy S-turn decent, everyone managed to have a great time skiing!
The Saturday morning’s classic 5km race saw a change of course, removing the dicey downhill, but still with plenty of climbing as the kids did 3 loops, again making their way up onto the alpine slope. The course change however did not shake up the girls podium with a repeat of: Elli(1st), Ollie(2nd) and Astrid(3rd). Lucille came in 7th, followed by Millie in 10th, Mallory in 20th, Greta in 21st, Sophia in 25th, Annabelle in 29th, Lizzie in 33rd, Maya in 34th and Leigh in 48th. The boys race had the same winner (Jed Bentley) with Tomas just off the podium in 4th and Donovan in 5th, followed by Isaac in 20th, Rohan in 44th, Nelson in 60th.
The kids all took a break for some much needed fuel, with plenty of lunch choices thanks to parents and instant pots!! Isaac’s birthday cake may have been the real reason for the crowd of hungry teenagers though. After a bit of rest, the kids headed into an afternoon free style sprint race.
The 1.3 km sprint races really drew some excitement from the crowd as the spectator friendly course looped around for perfect viewing of 2 large climbs. Ollie held strong on the hills to fend off two Vermonters winning the race, Lucille was 6th, Millie 10th, Maya in 22nd, Greta 29th, Mallory 32nd, Sophia 39th, Annabelle 50th, Lizzie 54th, Leigh 61th. Jed Bentley won the boys’ sprint, and Tomas was 5th, Donovan 14th, Isaac 17th, Rohan 59th, and Nelson 69th.
By awards time, winter had made a comeback and the snow continued on through the night!
Sunday morning started with almost 1 foot of fresh snow, just in time for the team relays! The 1st place podium position was taken by the NH quartet: Elli Englund, Ollie Hanna, Dean Ayotte and Jed Bentley where they dominated the race from the start. They were followed by a VT team in 2nd, and in 3rd by the NH 4s of: Lucille Dent, Donovan Van Citters, Millie Larrick and Matt Northcott. Tomas Masterson had a full out battle with Matt Northcott as the anchor legs vying for the final podium position. The course was crowded with skiers at this point and Tomas was in the unfortunate position of being boxed in twice on both of the big climbs, but he fought to the end and brought his relay team to a 4th place finish. There was a huge celebration at the finish line for both Matt and Tomas.
Ollie’s impressive performance through out the week led her to be the overall U16 girls champion!
In the team scoring VT had the edge over NH with Maine coming in 3rd place.
A big congrats to Lucille and Millie for having top 10 finishes in every race!
Q: What was the most memorable moment of your experience at the U16s?
Ollie: The most memorable for me was being at the finish line during the relay waiting for our teammates who raced the anchor legs to come in. It was so fun to cheer them on and a great way to end the weekend of races!
Leigh: My most memorable experience was the moment in the tent when everyone was putting on glitter and hairspray on Friday and I loved it because everyone was just super excited for the race and pumped!
Tomas (VT): Probably getting stuck behind the New Hampshire coach bus for two hours in the snow on the way home from the banquet.
Lucille: My most memorable experiences at U16s was probably watching movies with the other girls when we got to the hotel after the races, or cheering for my relay partners on Sunday. These times were some of my favorites. Also, thank you Hilary for putting me as the first leg of the relay!
Mallory: I think the most memorable thing from U16s was probably dying everyone’s hair before the races and putting on glitter. It was just so fun and I met a bunch of new people from that.
Maya (VT): I don’t think I have just one memorable moment, the U16 trip was amazing, from jamming out on the bus, to having pizza and one kid said they liked eating the crust first, to almost overflowing the hot tub trying to fit the whole team in, to joking with the people on the NH team. It was a really fun trip and I can’t wait for next years.
