Day 1 Results

Day 2 Results

Waterloo Nordic competed in the Haywood NorAm race in Duntroon, Ontario (near Collingwood) on January 26 and 27. The NorAm racing series is the top domestic racing circuit in Canada with a high level of competition.   A total of nearly 200 athletes were set to compete, and the Waterloo contingent had 6 men and 2 women ready to take on the best. The schedule for the weekend contained a classic technique sprint race on the Saturday and a 10 km skate race for the women and 15 km for the men on Sunday.

Sprint racing consists two portions, a qualifier in the morning and heats in the afternoon. The qualifier is used to determine the seeding for the athletes and to determine who makes it to the heats. The course for both the qualifier and the heats was a 1.5km loop with a wide array of terrain to challenge the racers. With a large number of OUA skiers in attendance for the sprints, the organizers created a separate set of heats for the OUA athletes to compete amongst each other and give strong competition heading towards OUA Championships.

Waterloo athletes were ready to go in the morning and put in solid qualifier results. Tim Rhodes (Deep River/) and Oliver Conway-White (Waterloo) led the men in qualifying in 10^th and 14^th place. The rest of the men also succeeded in qualifying, with Glenn Hartman (Stratford), Colin Elliott (Banff/), Ryan Fahey (Chelsea/) and Glenn Hartman (Stratford) all advancing to the heats in the afternoon. Alison Stephenson (Ottawa) in 17^th and Katie Madden (Parry Sound/Parry Sound) in 23^rd qualified for the women.

In the afternoon heats nearly all of the Waterloo athletes were able to match or beat their qualifying places from the morning. On the women's side,  Stephenson narrowly missed advancing to the semi-final and finished in 15^th place. Katie Madden (Parry Sound) finished 23^rd. For the men, Beanlands finished 23^rd and Fahey in 21^st were unable to advance from their quarterfinal. Elliott and Hartman were one place away from advancing in their quarterfinal and finished in 15^th and 17^th place respectively. Rhodes and Conway-White were both able to advance to the semi-finals. From there, Conway-White was unable to make it to the A-Final but advanced to the B-Final where he placed 3^rd, for 9^th place overall. Tim Rhodes (Deep River/) advanced to the A-Finals where he was able to take 5^th place for a 5^th overall finish, making a big improvement from his qualifying placement.

After the day of racing, the Waterloo men's team was sitting in 2^nd place overall amongst the universities, with a 6 point lead over 3^rd place, University of Guelph. The top four athletes' placement counts towards the team score.

On Sunday for the skate race, it was an interval start race and so athletes went out in 30 second intervals. Three Waterloo athletes started close together and so there was some internal competition and added motivation for the athletes. The course was very punishing by design; with 5 km laps that contained all of the largest hills at the facility needing to be climbed. The men completed this loop 3 times and the women 2 times.

The men went first and provided excellent results. Leading the way for Waterloo was OConway-White in 2^nd place, making the podium for Waterloo between two Carleton skiers. Conway-White kept pushing his way around the course, catching athletes who started in front of him as he powered his way to an excellent finish. Complimenting Conway-White's result were Hartman in 12^th, Rhodes in 15^th, Elliott in 16^th, Fahey in 17^th and Beanlands in 22^nd. The Waterloo athletes who started close together battled the entire race and placed close together at the end. With Conway-White's result leading the way, Waterloo again placed 2^nd as a team on the day and overall were the 2^nd fastest team for the weekend with a 15 point gap over 3^rd. The team is looking to carry this momentum forward to the next university race which is the OUA Championships in Thunder Bay.

For the women, Alison Stephenson (Ottawa/Ottawa) and Katie Madden (Parry Sound/Parry Sound) both improved their results from the previous day, finishing in 10^th and 16^th respectively.

In the open category (non-University), Warriors alumni Andrea Dupont won the women's sprint race and placed 3^rd in the 10km distance race.

Overall, it was a very successful racing weekend for Waterloo competing against some of the best skiers in the country.