Mountain Valley’s Kaylee Rumley is named the girls’ skimeister.
RUMFORD – It was the subplots that made the last day of the Class B State Skiing Championships at Black Mountain interesting.
The rest was pretty much a foregone conclusion.
Yarmouth High School won the girls Nordic title and had a strong enough grasp of the lead on the boys’ side to survive a third-place finish in the competition to take home both state championship trophies Saturday.
Maranacook was runner-up on both sides (184-215, boys and 151-222, girls). Greely, Mountain Valley and Fryeburg rounded out the top five for the boys. Mountain Valley and Fryeburg swapped places in the girls’ competition.
“For five years the guys have been chasing Maranacook and Greely,” said Yarmouth Nordic coach Bob Morse. “When we started the season off, that was our goal. For a double win, this is amazing.”
Subplot No. 1 played itself out in the 5K classical race Saturday. How would Greely’s Ben True respond to losing the freestyle event on Thursday to Caribou’s Russell Courier?
True was the first skier on the course Saturday and the first to finish in a blistering time of 13:41.8. Currier ended up third, over 40 seconds behind the leader.
“I was a little disappointed in the skate race,” said True. “I am a little bit better at classical and a little more confident in my classic skills. So I really wanted today to have a good race.”
Despite taking care of business, Russell wasn’t far from his thoughts.
“I was worried about Russell again because the word is he is a better classic skier so I was a little skeptical of him too.”
Greely and Maranacook each placed two skiers in the Top 10, which put the teams into a tie for first place in the event. Aside from True, Ben Knowles was fourth for the Rangers.
Ed Hunter led for the Black Bears with a second-place finish, about 17 seconds behind True. Forrest Tobie was seventh.
“Eddie Hunter didn’t beat Ben True today,” said Maranacook Nordic coach Steve DeAngelis. “But he was the fasted I have ever seen anybody ski classic. It was crazy. All the coaches out there were popping their eyes out.”
Mike Sweeney was eighth and Jeff Beal ninth for Mt. Abram. Regarding the Black Bears taking home the boys’ Nordic trophy, DeAngelis was pleased.
“They would not have been the favorite I don’t think coming into this race,” he said. “We hadn’t beaten Greely yet this year. The four guys at the top are all seniors and they wanted it.”
Mike Sweeney of Mt. Abram earned skimeister honors for the boys. It was the girls’ skimeister competition that provided the second subplot.
Mountain Valley’s Kaylee Rumley had the slimmest of leads entering the last event and the skier was not optimistic.
“This (5K classical) isn’t my best event at all,” said Rumley. “In fact, its my worst so I was pretty skeptical.”
On top of it all Rumley was fighting a cold and couldn’t breathe.
The Falcon finished 38th in her race and won the skimeister honors by one point over Stephanie Holton of Presque Isle.
Kalie Dunn of Yarmouth ended up sweeping both Nordic events with a win Saturday. Her time of 18:24.8 was slightly more than a half-second ahead of Elise Moody-Roberts of Cape Elizabeth.
“Its a challenging course,” said Dunn. “High School Hill is pretty tough with three different sections. It was a lot of fun though because for me personally it is easier to climb hills in classic.”
Yarmouth’s Taryn Hallweaver was fifth.
“We had some great performances from Kalie Dunn and Taryn Hallweaver, our two seniors,” said Morse.
Maranacook placed three in the top 10 as well with Jordanne Dunn, Lesley Stevens and Jane Tyler placing sixth, ninth, and 10th, respectively.
Rebecca Kurnick was 10th for Fryeburg.
“We knew that coming into the States that Maranacook was going to be our biggest challenge,” said Dunn. “We had a really good start on the first day and just kept it going.”
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