Colorado Leads After First Day At New Mexico Invitational; Denver A Close Second

Friday, February 8, 2008 – by Curtis Snyder, RMISASkiing.com

Results Available On Schedule/Results Page

TAOS & RED RIVER, N.M. – Led again by strong performances on the women’s side, the Colorado Buffaloes lead the New Mexico Invitational here at the half way point of the meet. CU racked up 304.5 points on the first day. Denver is a close second to Colorado with 291 points while host New Mexico (248), Alaska Anchorage (226.5), Nevada (224) and Utah (201) all totaled over 200 points and Montana State (158), Whitman (83), Western State (80) and Wyoming (22) round out the standings. Nevada’s Shane Collins took the men’s giant slalom race by just six-one hundredths of a second over Denver’s John Buchar as Alaska Anchorage’s Jonathan Hverven, New Mexico’s Tor Fodnesbergene tied for third and the Wolfpack’s Cameron Barnes rounded out the Top 5. Collins and Barnes top 5 finishes helped Nevada rack up 74 points to win the race. Colorado placed four skiers in the top seven of the women’s giant slalom with Katie Hartman and Lucie Zikova finishing 1-2 just five-one hundredths of a second apart. Denver’s Jenny Tank was third while the Buffs Lisa Perricone and New Mexico’s Malin Hemmingsson finished tied for fourth. Colorado scored 85.5 points, just 1.5 points away from the maximum available. “It’s great to be able to have a new athlete be a top performer. Lucie (Zikova) is done after this year and we’ll need someone to replace her, and to have Katie already achieve this is great,” head coach Richard Rokos said. “All of our women are capable of that this year, and it showed today. Lisa (Perricone) and Rachel (Roosevelt) also finished high and dominated.” Denver’s John Stene won the men’s classical on the Nordic side of things, less than a second ahead of Colorado’s Kit Richmond. Four Denver skiers and three Colorado skiers all finished in the top seven in rotating order with the Pioneer’s finishing third (Havard Selseng), fifth (Mike Hinckley ) and seventh (Rene Reisshauer) and the Buffs fourth (Jesper Oestensen) and sixth (Karl Nygren) to go along with the top two. Denver finished with 84 points and the Buffs 81 in the race. “Overall today was our best performance of the year,” DU Nordic coach David Stewart said. “That's great, but what is really exciting is that everyone knows they can do better. Stene had his first win but was not satisfied because he knows he can reach another gear.” Colorado’s Maria Grevsgaard continued her Nordic dominance by winning her seventh race of the season in seven tries. She finished 37.5 seconds ahead of the pack as the Buffs had five of the top nine performers in the women’s classical race. New Mexico’s Polna Ermoshina finished second while Denver’s Antje Maempel was third followed by CU’s Kristin Roennstrand in fourth and Utah’s Sarah MacCarthy in fifth. “I don’t want Maria to feel like she has to perform every weekend and win every race,” CU Nordic Coach Bruce Cranmer said. “It’s not important for her to keep a streak alive forever. We’d rather see her lose a race if it means winning at NCAA’s. She’s handled all this well because she’s having fun. She just puts on her number (bib) and just goes.”