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Northwest Suburban Conference Meet
The Chisago Lakes alpine ski teams both showed their strong resolve and impressive depth again in their Northwest Suburban Conference race on Thursday, January 11.

On the girls side, top skier Hannah Stec stumbled in her second run and didn’t score varsity points, but the girls still won comfortably over Centennial.

Stec finished the red course in 28.76 seconds in first place, but then came in 73rd on the blue course when the fall caused her to finish in 1:01.05.

In her absence, Sophie Janzig, Hannah Janzig, Megan Cartier, Alicia Sandberg and Bailey LeTourneau really stepped up their game.

Sophie Janzig finished in third place overall with a combined time of 58.65 seconds, including a third place finish on the red course and a sixth place finish on the blue course.

Hannah Janzig, her older sister, came in fifth place, just two-tenths of a second behind with a combined time of 58.88 seconds.

Megan Cartier had her best showing of the year, finished in seventh place with a time of 1:00.39. She was very consistent, finishing seventh on the red course and eighth on the blue course.

Alicia Sandberg and Bailey LeTourneau finished just four-tenths of a second apart to really push each other as the fourth score. Sandberg ended up with a time of 1:02.82 and LeTourneau had a time of 1:03.19.

The girls ended up scoring 469 points, which put them over 50 points ahead of second place Centennial, who scored 417 points.

Boys
The boys had an even bigger margin of victory, and that also included a stumble and fall from top skier Ryan Mower. He shared the same fate with Stec, but on opposite courses. He was the top overall skier on the blue course before falling on the red course and finishing 85th. That left him in a non-scoring position for Chisago Lakes.

But, his brother Jamie ended up taking the top spot in his absence, finishing in second on the blue course and first on the red course for a combined time of 52.17 seconds.

Augie Brown came in fourth place with a time of 53.92 seconds. He had a great run on the red course, finishing in third place.

Zach Hennen finished fifth place on both courses, and that got him a fifth place overall finish with a time of 54.43 seconds.

Jack LeTourneau and Sam Witucki battled it out for the fourth scoring spot, but it went to LeTourneau by a hair. He finished in 12th place with a time of 57.44 seconds while Witucki made a strong bid, finishing in 13th place with a time of 59.79 seconds.

Their top finishes accumulated the Wildcats 634 points, 55 points ahead of Centennial in second with 579 points.

Both the girls and boys junior varsity teams won their meets in a landslide, also.

“A few younger team members stepped it up a notch and Chisago won both boys and girls races. It was a good night at Trollhaugen even though is was a bit brisk,” Assistant Coach Su Leslie said.

MLK Day Races
Girls
The girls finished in third place at the Martin Luther King Jr. Sunrise Race at Giants Ridge on Saturday, January 13.

The ‘Cats used a similar formula to their NWSC race when Stec went down with a fall on the second run. The Janzig sisters, Cartier and Sandberg each improved from their red course time to their blue course time, and they got Chisago Lakes to third place. Hannah Janzig finished in fourth place, Sophie Janzig in seventh, Cartier in 12th and Sandberg in 25th.

The girls scored 393 points, just eight points behind Stillwater in second place and 9.5 points behind Edina, who won the Sunrise meet.
In the Sunset meet – the MLK event has two events over the course of one day – the girls improved to second, just barely losing to Stillwater.

The results were the same, with Hannah Janzig taking the top spot for CL with a third place finish and Sophie Janzig coming in eighth place. Cartier finished in 11th and Sandberg came in 22nd place.

Stec skied to a sixth place finish on the red course before an unfortunate tumble brought an end to her day on the red course.
Chisago Lakes still scored 396 points, just 10 behind Stillwater, who won the Sunset event.

The finishes give the Wildcat girls the confidence that with clean runs, they can compete with anyone in the state and are more than capable of defending their state title.

Boys
The boys finished in seventh place in the Sunrise run, with Jamie and Ryan Mower leading the way. Jamie, the younger brother, finished in fourth place with a time of 1:19.80 and Ryan finished in fifth place with a time of 1:20.12.

Jack LeTourneau was the third scorer for the Wildcats, coming in 30th place. Zach Hennen had a little bit of a hiccup on the blue course, and in a competitive meet like this one, that affected him big time. He ended up finishing in 45th place overall after an 18th place finish on the red course.

In the Sunset race, outside of a Jamie Mower slip, the boys looked much better. Ryan had to great runs, finishing in fourth place with a time of 1:19.58.

Augie Brown rebounded nicely after a tough morning race to come in eighth place overall. He finished 18th on the red course and 12th on the blue course.

Hennen also refocused after his small hitch in the first races and finished in 10th place overall for Chisago Lakes with a time of 1:26.10.
Jack LeTourneau rounded out their scoring with a 1:32.21, which put him in 30th place.

St. Cloud won the Sunset race with 414 points, and the ‘Cats scored 388 to finished in fourth. Stillwater and Brainerd both finished in front of CL, with Brainerd having to go to a tiebreak winner after they also scored 388 points.

“The girls have a solid team with four skiers in the top 25 both races,” Leslie said. “The boys team is continuing to work on their finishes and getting better all the time.”

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