ELDORA, Colo. — It’s always fun to see newcomers excel, as is the case with Carl-Johan Öster, who finished ninth in the slalom in his first collegiate event. However, it’s just as fun to see a returner make that jump, and for Lobo fans, they can look no further than Sydney Staples.
The sophomore from Bountiful, Utah who entered the 2015 season with one top-10 finish in her career picked up her third top-10 of the season, and her first top-5 finish, coming in fifth place to help the women’s alpine team finish second in the slalom behind the University of Denver.
UNM’s solid 73 points in the slalom helped to push UNM into fifth place all alone and close the gap between them and fourth-place Alaska-Anchorage to just 13 points as UNM has 340 and UAA has 353. Colorado leads with 508, Utah is second with 475 and Denver is third at 429.
It was the women’s team that stole the show, with Courtney Altringer and Mateja Robnik both recording top-10 finishes with Altringer eighth and Robnik 10th. Overall UNM had five in the top 20, with Sara Ottesson finishing fourth and Taylor Grauer 19th. For Grauer it was her first top-20 finish of the season. Karoline Søvik Myklebust was in position for a top-20 finish but recorded a DNF in the second run.
Overall the course was extremely difficult as only 39 skiers finished the course and 36 recorded DNFs for crashes or missing a gate on the women’s side. Five of the top 15 skiers from the first round DNFed on their second runs.
Staples was in 10th place after her opening run, and then recorded the sixth-best second run at 56:07 to move up. Monica Hübner of Denver won both runs and won the slalom. Altringer had arguably the biggest comeback to get into the top-10, finishing 18th in the opening run and then recording the fifth-best time in the second to move up.
Overall, UNM had four of the top 11 runs in the second run.
The course was not only difficult on the women’s side, it was downright brutal on the men’s side, as exactly half the field couldn’t finish it, including a pair of Lobos. Juho-Pekka Penttinen and Mark Miller both couldn’t compelte their first runs, and Sean Horner struggled in both of his runs. While Horner recorded poor times in both runs, he did finish, giving the Lobos a second scorer, the second time in the meet UNM only scored two skiers in a discipline. UNM’s women’s Nordic squad scored just two in the 15K classical on Saturday.
However, saving the day on the men’s side was mid-year transfer Carl-Johan Öster, competing in his first collegiate race finished in the top-10 despite never finishing in the top-10 in either run. Öster was 12th after the first run, and he finished 11th in the second run. However, the rash of DNFs worked to his advantage giving him a top-10 finish in his first race.
The Spencer James Nelson Memorial University of Colorado Invitational continues tomorrow with the women’s giant slalom starting at 8:15 a.m. and the men’s at 10 a.m.
Remaining Schedule of Events
Monday, Jan. 26:
Women’s Giant Slalom (LaBelle/International; 8:15 a.m. first run, 12:45 p.m. second run)
Men’s Giant Slalom (LaBelle/International; 10 a.m. first run, 2 p.m. second run)
RMISA GS Qualifier
Tuesday, Jan. 27:
Men’s Giant Slalom (LaBelle/International; 8:15 a.m. first run, 12:30 p.m. second run)
Women’s Giant Slalom (LaBelle/International; 10 a.m. first run, 2:15 p.m. second run)
SCORING: For the second season, the RMISA has the same scoring system utilized by the NCAA. Each school can designate six potential scoring skiers with the top three counting toward the team score. Points are awarded as follows for a maximum of 30 skiers: 40-37-34-31-29-27-25-23-22-21-20-19-18-17-16-15-14-13-12-11-10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1. Any finisher from a school that has already scored three skiers do not receive team point credit, with the next placement assigned to the next finisher from a school who has not yet utilized all three scoring spots.
Notes: Had Penttinen or Miller finished, UNM would have picked up at least 13 points and would be no worse than tied for fourth … Staples picked up 29 points, her most in a scored race. Her only better performance was last year finishing fourth in a non-scored giant slalom qualifier … Robnik is the only alpiner on the women’s side who has scored in all three races this season.