Skiers Wrap Up Tech Challenge With Classic Races on Sunday
HOUGHTON, Mich. – The Michigan Tech Challenge wrapped on Sunday (Dec. 15) with the classic races at the Tech Trails. Team scores weren't recorded.
Five Huskies finished in the top 10 in the women's 5-kilometer classic led by Deedra Irwin in fourth place. She finished the snowy course in 17:35. Sarah Daniels was 21 seconds back in sixth. Alice Flanders (18:00) and Lisa Koenig (18:24) placed eighth and ninth.
"The women were pretty darn competitive today," Tech coach Joe Haggenmiller said. "We're still losing a little bit of time in the last K, and we need to continue to work on hammering it into the finish.
"It's exciting to see Deedra lead the team and see her in the form from her freshman year. Sarah was also really good today and Alice competed hard."
Rachel Mason (14th/18:51), Erin Mathews (21st/20:25) and Ruth Oppliger (25th/21:37) rounded out Tech skiers in the women's race.
Matt Wong led the Huskies with an eighth place finish in the men's 10K classic. He crossed the line in 31:17. Kyle Hanson was seven seconds behind Wong in ninth place.
"Matt Wong is moving himself closer to Fredrik from NMU and that's good to see," Haggenmiller added. "Kyle Hanson also had a pretty respectable effort."
Matt Dugan (32:08) and Jay Woodbeck (32:14) finished six seconds apart in spots 14 and 15. Thomas Kendrick (20th/33:20), David Joda (23rd/33:37) and Sam Holmes (30th/35:03) also raced for the Huskies.
"The conditions for the amount of snow we had were actually pretty good," said Haggenmiller. "There were some reasonable firm tracks even as the snow came down during the races."
Northern Michigan's Fredrik Schwencke (29:20) won the men's race and Rosie Frankowski (16:43) of NMU won the women's race.
The skiers wrap up the 2013 portion of the schedule next weekend (Dec. 21-22) at the Wausau Ski Festival.
"We have our first sprint of the year down in Wausau and the athletes will have some fun with that," Haggenmiller said. "Hopefully the conditions down there are similar to here, but they have an extensive man-made snow loop, so it'll be a good competition."