WILLIAMS CARNIVAL WEEK

We had a great week of skiing leading up to our home carnival. Even the golf course was groomed this week, which was very handy for those with afternoon classes!

Golf course grooming. Thank you Facilities Crew!

On Thursday night Tom and Liz Costley had the whole team up for a pre-race team dinner. It was excellent and the team had a great time. Thank you Tom and Liz!!

Enjoying the cozy fireplace

Will and Kalle discussing race strategy

Enjoying each other's company after dinner

THE RACES:

The last carnival race that was held at Prospect was in 2010. This past weekend the 4 year drought ended with a BANG as mother nature dropped about 2 feet of snow on us Thursday, Friday and Saturday with the majority falling Thursday into Friday. This made for some really tough race organizing and grooming, but the races went off as planned thanks to a ton of work by many folks and the weekend was a success. On Friday the snow was so deep that the relay course had to be shortened to 3.25k in order to keep up with the grooming. Here is a shot from the waxing truck of the snowy landscape:

VERY SNOWY

The women's race went off first. Our team of Hannah Benson, Elena and Hannah Cole had the strongest women's result of the year and finished the day in 4th place! Eliza, Laura and Tsaina were the second Eph team to finish on the day. Results can be found here:

http://www.barttiming.com/eisa/Results14/woc2014-3.pdf

Eli, Jordan and Will also had a strong day and finished 4th in the team standings as well! Our second team to finish on the day was the team of Kalle, Isaac and Will. Results can be found here:

http://www.barttiming.com/eisa/Results14/woc2014-4.pdf

That evening we joined the outing club crew and Williams College President Adam Falk in an opening ceremonies parade down to Poker from Paresky.
There was a nice ice sculpture:

Silhouettes of the alpine and nordic ski teams
in front of the ice sculpture

 At the end of the parade there was a nice bonfire to help keep warm:

And a great fireworks display!

DAY 2 OF RACING:

We arrived to Prospect cloudy skies, but no falling snow on Saturday morning. That break in the weather gave the tracks a chance to set up a bit and things held up relatively well even though the snow started in again by about 8:30.

Our scoring women's team was lead by Hannah Cole in 15th, Hannah Benson in 22nd and Elena Luthi in 27th place. Eliza also was in the top 30 followed by Laura in 40th and Tsaina in 41st.

Women's Results: http://www.barttiming.com/eisa/Results14/woc2014-7.pdf

The men also skied well and found themselves on the podium again finishing in 3rd on the day. Eli led the way in 9th, followed by Vanya in 12th, Will in 20th, Isaac 21st, Jordan 25th and Kalle 31st.

Men's Results: http://www.barttiming.com/eisa/Results14/woc2014-8.pdf

It was a very successful weekend of racing with lots of individual and team personal bests!

Here is a little highlight video put together by Dylan Dethier:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbxKbcS9DlU#t=310

and the ephsports write-ups:

Day one: http://ephsports.williams.edu/sports/skiing/2013-14/releases/20140214ec3pwg
Day two: http://ephsports.williams.edu/sports/skiing/2013-14/releases/20140215keo0br


After all the racing was over Jayvin wanted to get a good look at the waxing truck:

STILL SNOWING!

Before the weekend the EISA coaches had brainstormed a way to honor Bud at his last home carnival after FOUR DECADES of leading the Ephs. After the awards ceremony I said a few words to acknowledge Bud and then handed over the mic:

BUD thanking the EISA crew

The EISA coaches then presented Bud with a t-shirt from their school. It was a great gathering to acknowledge the accomplishments of an incredible coach. WAY TO ROCK THE COW FOR 40 YEARS BUD!

And then the Dartmouth Men's team caught up on their Carnie Crush performance for the Williams Women:

All in all our home carnival was a big success and we'll look forward to hosting again in 2016!!!

Sunday's weather was absolutely beautiful and the team got in a nice classic ski at Prospect:

Jordan, Eli, Vanya, Elena, Laura and Jenna
on Chickadee

Thursday we head to Middlebury for the REGIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS!