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Summit High Alpine and Nordic teams eye state

Sebastian Foltz
sfoltz@summitdaily.com
Summit's Danielle Moulten charges past a gate in Friday's high school league GS race at Beaver Creek. Moulton finished fifth on the day.
Anthony Thorton / Vail Daily | Vail Daily

It’s already been a solid season for the Summit High School Nordic and Alpine teams, and they’re hoping to keep that winning tradition going headed into state championships next month.

“Our goal is the overall (Alpine and Nordic title),” Tiger Alpine coach Tommy Gogolen said. “That’s something we’ve had our eye on all season.”

The Tiger Alpine team is coming off a solid performance in giant slalom at Beaver Creek Friday. While Battle Mountain had a strong showing on their home turf — taking all three podium spots in boys GS and the top two for the girls competition — Summit contributed a number of top 10 finishers. Ellie Brown-Wolf led the way for the lady Tigers, claiming the only non-Battle Mountain podium spot with a third-place finish. She finished with combined run time of 2 minutes 14.24 seconds, just under 5 seconds behind GS winner Haley Frischholz (2:20.78) of Battle Mountain. Danielle Moulton and Anne Parker were the next highest finishers for the Tigers, ending the day in fifth and sixth.



“Battle Mountain did well, but our girls are really strong,” Gogolen said. Of his three top finishers he added, “Any one of them can get on the podium at any time.”

For the boys, Jack Farrell squeaked in to the top 10 finishing at No. 10 in 2:17.67. Teammate Brian Coleman finished less than a tenth of a second behind him in 11th in 2:17.71. Battle Mountain’s Sands Simonton owned the podium’s top spot running the course in 2:03.72. Teammates Quintin Cook and Keenan Zopf joined him for the all-Husky podium.



After graduating some of the state’s top boys skiers, Goglen said his Tiger team is on the rise with Ferrell, Coleman and Jack Billenduke leading the charge.

“It’s great to see our boys teams filling the holes. They went from being top 20 to top 10,” he said of the trio.

The team will close out the regular season close to home with a GS competition at Loveland Ski Area this Thursday and then head to Ski Cooper for the final slalom of the year Feb. 7.

Nordic: The Tiger Nordic team came away with big wins over the weekend in classic individual (interval) racing at Steamboat Springs Saturday. Both the boys and girls teams took top honors. The Summit boys finished first as a team with 175 points followed by Battle Mountain in second and Eagle Valley in third. A pair of Tigers took top honors for the boys with Henry Trowbridge finishing first in 15:16. Teammate Joel Sawyer took second and Luk Platil of Evergreen finished third.

For the girls, Ruthie Boyd finished second behind Vail Mountain School’s Hannah Hardenbergh. Summit’s Christa Gutzel took third. The lady Tigers finished first as a team with 168 points followed by Vail Mountain in second (167) and Steamboat third (158).

The Nordic team will close the season in Minturn this Saturday with a group skate race. States for both Alpine and Nordic skiing are scheduled for Eldora Feb. 13-14.

Both Tiger teams have already qualified a number of racers.


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