Complete Results

MINNEAPOLIS -- St. Scholastica freshman Sharmila Ahmed (Savage, Minn./Burnsville HS) led the women skiers' efforts for the second day in a row at the USSA SuperTour at Wirth Park in Minneapolis. 

Ahmed clocked 25:33.5 for the 9 km course to finish 17th in Central Collegiate Ski Association (CCSA) rankings and 33rd in the overall SuperTour. Northern Michigan University took the top two college spots on the day with Monica Markvardsen posting at time of 23:42.7 to win and teammate Molly Burger finishing in 24:19.9, taking fifth and 11th overall in the SuperTour races.  Alaska Fairbanks' Alyson McPhetres finished third in the college race and 12th overall in 24:26.0.

In what was another tight race on a fast course like Saturday's 6km classic, CSS senior Eleanor Magnuson (Champlin Park, Minn./Champlin Park HS) posted a time of 25:42.9, finishing 21st in the college race, but just 1.5 seconds out of 18th, while sophomore Brooke Adams (Spooner, Wis./Spooner HS ) finished 23rd in 26:22.4 to round out the Saints scoring.  The Saints finished fourth for the second day in a row and on the weekend behind Northern Michigan, Alaska Fairbanks, and Michigan Tech.

“It wasn't our best day today, but it definitely wasn't our worst either,” summed up Saints head coach Chad Salmela.  “Fourth as a team as is becoming a normal occurrence this season, and is really new territory for the program, but this is a very talented group of ladies, and I know they are looking for more than what we were able to do today.  We are quite simply going to have to be serious about dialing our race fitness in and fighting for more.  Sharmila is working through injury issues still on freestyle and I think today again was very solid freestyle race for her, Eleanor felt a little stronger and had fight in her which is positive, and Brooke felt flat after a hard week of training to try to find her top end race fitness, and I think Christina and Sarah both felt tired.  We have to react, adjust, and move forward.  You have days like this when you are trying to dial it in just right and maybe don't quite do it. While we're better as a program than we've ever been, our goal is to go to the next level and we have to spend the next few weeks with a serious focus as a group trying to get there.  It's that simple.”

The Saints women gear up for a 5km mass start classic and 15km freestyle pursuit at the Battle Creek SuperTour in St. Paul next weekend.