Wisconsin High School State Championships
By Maria Stuber
Yesterday, Bryan Cook and I went to Minocqua, WI to watch and help our respective high school programs at the Wisconsin State High School Championships. Both races took place on the same day, with a 5K classic in the morning and a 5K skate in the afternoon. The skate race in the afternoon was started according to the athlete’s percent back in the morning classic race. This enables skiers to fight for the overall victory and makes things more exciting to watch. The weather was warm and made kick waxing difficult in the morning. There were athletes on hard-wax, klister covered with hard-wax, and straight up klister all in the same race.
Ben Hugus of Wausau West and the CXC Junior team skiing to 1st place overall (photo credit: Dennis Loy)
Both of the pursuit individual champions were CXC junior team members. Ben Hugus from Wausau West took first place for the men, and Brooke Adams from Spooner was the women’s champion.
The Hayward High School girls were the overall champions, followed by Peak Nordic (my alma mater), and Wausau West respectively; however 2nd and 3rd were extremely close and needed to be determined by a tie breaker. The men’s race was equally exciting, with Peak Nordic edging out Wausau West for 1st place, and Hayward taking 3rd.
Bryan’s home team, The Rhinelander Hodag’s had a great day as well, with all of their girls taking between 3 and 6 minutes off of their times from the previous year. They also had a middle school athlete take 1st in the classic race which is inspiring for their future.
After the races, the awards were given out at Lakeland High School (Minocqua, WI) and were followed by a slide show and a social event. Bryan and I did a short presentation/question and answer session for parents and athletes who wanted to learn more about skiing opportunities in college and beyond.
