The Andover Nordic team competed in an untimed and unscored relay at Proctor Academy this past Wednesday. According to Christina Li ’21 and Amelia Vinton ’22, this meet was less about competition and more about getting the team out on the snow for the first time to get in the groove for future races.
Vinton said, “The goal for this race was just to find our areas of skill and other things we can work on. I don’t really think there was any specific technique that we were focusing on, it was more for getting back into the rhythm of skiing and continuing to build our strength and fitness.”
“It was our first meet of the season, but it was also non-scoring, so there was no pressure for us to do super well. Our goal was just to get our new skiers on the team out on the snow and have them see what it’s like to be in a race. We also just wanted everyone to be accustomed to the atmosphere of a nordic meet,” added Li.
According to Hannah Justicz ’22, because the race wasn’t timed, there wasn’t any pressure to perform at a certain standard.
Justicz said, “This was just a fun race… I think it was mainly for the newer skiers to just get comfortable racing and have some fun. It was more of a relay style race rather than a super competitive meet.”
The Proctor course is unique because it has several hills, giving the new skiers an opportunity to learn how to race with hills in their tracks, according to Co-Captain Posie Millett ’20.
Millett said, “As of right now, we ski on Siberia because there isn’t enough snow coverage on the sanctuary yet. Siberia doesn’t really have any hills that we can practice on, whereas Proctor has snow makers, so they can have coverage on the whole course, which has two pretty steep hills throughout the loop. We did get there a bit early, so the coaches were able to help some of the newer skiers learn how to get up the hills.”
According to Justicz, Co-Captains Eli Newell ’20 and Millett pushed and supported the skiers throughout the duration of the race.
Justicz said, “Our Co-Captains, Posie and Eli, are both really great. They’re super supportive, and they cheered us on from the top of the second hill of the two. They were just cheering us on and motivating us to get up the final big push, so that was really helpful.”
Andover Nordic will travel to Putney next Wednesday.
