Men’s Nordic Goes 1-2 as Lobos Finish Third
Montana State Invitational Final Results
BOZEMAN, Mont. — What’s that old song … anything you can do I can do better? One day after Kornelius Grøv finished first in the Nordic freestyle race and teammate Ricardo Izquierdo-Bernier finished second, the two switched places with Izquierdo-Bernier earning his first collegiate win, taking the flag at the 20K Classical race at Crosscut Mountain, with Grøv second to pace the Lobos to second place in the event.
Overall, the Lobo ski team earned their best finish as a non-home meet since 2014, with 569 points to finish third, behind Colorado at 587 and Utah at 583 in one of the closer three-way meet races in recent memory.
The pair took the title and runner-up trophy, giving the RMISA an interesting dilemma to figure out who the Nordic Skier of the Week will be, as each scored 77 points on the weekend. Lobo men’s Nordics have now won three of the four races this season, and the Lobos now have 10 top-10 finishes in four races, including four yesterday.
Izquierdo-Bernier had not finished on the podium in his collegiate career until this weekend, but his time of 1:00.06. was 13 seconds ahead of Grøv, and 30 seconds ahead of Utah’s Maximilian Bie who finished third.
Izquierdo-Bernier and Grøv earned 77 points between them, and Johan Eirik Meland finished 20th to continue his solid season, earning 15 points. That gave UNM 92 in the race, finishing second behind Utah’s 94 points. Ben Berend, who was fifth yesterday, finished 25th. Both Meland and Berend are new to Classical races.
The women’s race was contested first, and UNM picked up two top-20 results as Julie Spets was 18th, good for 16 points, and Savanna Fassio was 20th for 14 points. Brenna Egan, who was 13th yesterday, was 22nd overall and scored 13 points. Dariya Kuznetsova did not attempt the race. The women’s team is still recovering from an illness sweeping through the team. This weekend they recorded seven of eight possible starts after just three last week.
UNM will now have a week off before the UNM Invitational February 1 and 2. The alpine events will be contested at Red River and the Nordic in Red River at the Enchanted Forest.
NOTES: The finish was UNM’s highest in a non-home meet since 2014’s RMISA Championships, when UNM was third … the men’s Nordic squad scored 200 points on the weekend out of a possible 222.