RUMFORD — Welly Ramsey wasn’t even sure he was going to race Friday.

The New Sharon native and Mt. Blue High School graduate wasn’t feeling all that well. Going out and competing in a 30k cross country ski race didn’t seem like the best medicine.

So as the start of the grueling nine-lap men’s race at the U. S. Cross Country Championship at Black Mountain approached late Friday morning, Ramsey had to make a decision.

“I was on the fence about not racing about 2o minutes before the start of the race because I was feeling a little sick,” he said. “I figured if I’m going to be sick either way, I might as well race.”

With hardly any strategy in mind, Ramsey took to the course and produced one of his finest efforts. He finished 11th out of 76 racers with a time of 1:28:49.3. Colorado’s Noah Hoffman won the race in 1:26:49.3

“It’s pretty awesome,” said Ramsey, who now lives in Caribou and skis for the Maine Winter Sports Center. “It’s been my goal all year to get in the top 15 of one of these national races. It feels great to actually be able to achieve that goal.”

Ramsey admits he had doubts of his chances of doing so well, especially after feeling so lousy prior to the race.

“It was a reach,” he said. “I’ve never finished inside the top 30 in a distance race here.”

Ramsey was seeded 50th in the pack and he quickly dropped to  67th on the first lap.  He  made great progress and was in the top 20 on the second lap and was as high as seventh on the third. He fluctated between 24th and 12 over the final laps and moved into 11th on the final stretch.

“I didn’t really have a strategy to be honest,” he said. “(Being sick) it just removed a lot of the stress of the whole race. I just went out and had a good time.

 Hoffman  had a fine outing as well, winning the race convincingly. Hoffman finished in 1:26:49.3 well ahead of second-place finisher David Norris in 1:27:42.9. When Hoffman approached the finish,  he glanced behind him, only to see nobody close.

“With three laps to go, that’s when I decided to make my move,” said Hoffman. “I felt like it was time. My energy was great and my skis were incredible.”

Hoffman says he was surprised by how well he felt and that he was able to open such a sizable lead in the final laps.

“It allowed me to go out and ski a 10k time trial,” he said. “That’s what I was focusing on doing. That was my plan all along – to wait until six laps were gone and go out and ski a 10k as fast as I could.”

Eric Parker took third followed by Torin Koos. Matt Gelso rounded out the top five.

In the women’s 20k race, Minnesota’s Jessie Diggins continued her successful week with a third win in as many races.  Diggins pulled away late in the six-lap event. She had been skiing with a half dozen other skiers in the lead pack.

“On the last lap, I didn’t want it to come down to a five or six-way sprint,” said Diggins. “I wanted to just go and make it a pain-fest. I just went and looked back. No one was with me. I was like ‘Now I really need to go’ because I didn’t want them drafting me and catching up.”

Diggins finished in 1:05:49.9. Ida Sargent was second in 1:06:01.5 while Jennie Bender was third. Daria Gaiazove and Kate Fitzgerald completed the top five in fourth and fifth respectively.

Freeport’s Lucy Garrec finished 10th in 1:07:17.9 and Cape Elizabeth’s Laurel Clare Egan was 17th in 1:08:36.1

What made Diggins third win of the week remarkable was the fact that she’d never raced a 20k before. She had done a 30k in Sun Valley, Idaho last March and finished third.

“I’m still working on how you pace and how does it work,” said Diggins. “The start , the people were getting a little bit frantic. It’s just part of a learning curve.”

Despite her inexperience, she was  part of the lead pack early. She stayed ahead most of the race before pulling away in the final laps.

“I wasn’t as nervous because I knew a little bit more about what to expect in a distance race,” she said. “Being a 20k instead of a 30k, I thought it might be a little bit faster. So I just was thinking ‘Let’s do this and see what happens.'”

With the race on the line, she knew her conditioning might be a determining factor. With wins already in the shorter races, she used her sprinting ability to up the ante on the competition.

“I knew my fitness was pretty good,” she said. “So if it came to who can make it hurt the most, I’d have a pretty good shot.”

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