Congratulations to Lara Lathrop, the new J-IV State GS Champion! Lara beat Vermont's fastest skiers (all 77 of them), with a 2.5 second lead over 2nd place. Lara also won the second SL run and placed 2nd overall in the SL race. Lara will be representing Vermont and STC at the J-IV Future Stars Camp. Photo from the Manchester Journal:
Congratulations to these athletes for their top 20 finishes: Finn McNamara (6th SL), Leah Fowler (13th GS & 15th SL), Oliver Shih (14th SL), and Ali Davis (18th SL & 18th GS).
A special congratulations to Beatrice Edmonds for placing in the top half (SL) as a 1st year J-IV.
It's not easy to "beat your bib number" but these athletes performed better than their seed in SL and/or GS: Lara Lathrop, Ali Davis, Mary Clare Crochiere, Keagan Hanley, Oliver Shih, Gabriel Hjorth, Tyler Smith, Michael Symecko, Hunter Barrett, and Grayson Bubrosky. Congratulations for stepping up your performance against Vermont's finest J-IV's!
And kudos to all of our athletes that competed at this event. This is the first time ever that STC has had 21 athletes (including Wilson from SMS/STC) qualify for the J-IV State Championships!
Mary Clare Crochiere, Leah Fowler, Michael Symecko, and Scott Trudel arrived early on Friday to free ski at Killington. They worked on turn initiation on steep terrain. Everyone discovered that what seemed intuitive was not always the most effective on the steeps. We made some adjustments to help improve our balance and bend the ski early in the turn. After some practice all were able to maintain constant speed on the steeps while making round turns.
The Competitors
