February 9, 2009 (Sun Valley, Idaho) – Zack Simons (Rossignol) and Rebecca Dussault (Saab/Salomon) took the 34th Annual Wells Fargo Boulder Mountain Tour under perfect Sun Valley conditions on Saturday. In the men’s race, Simons narrowly out-sprinted Marshall Greene (Madshus/XC Oregon) with Bryan Fletcher (USST Nordic Combined) in 3rd. US Ski Team Nordic Combined star skier Bill Demong and Michael Sinnot (Saab/Salomon) watched from the back as their attack at 3km out was overwhelmed by the three leaders with only 300m to go.

The women’s race had a less dramatic finish with Dussault validating that her comeback from her third retirement is real by pulling away from a strong group of women and skiing alone to the win. Dussault’s time was only a little over six minutes behind the men’s winner. Saab/Salomon women took the top four spots with Kristina Trygstad-Saari out-sprinting Evelyn Dong for second and Laura McCabe, making her own comeback, right behind in 4th.

The race was run on a bluebird sunny day with hard, fast track, producing very fast times. The conditions were extremely fast, making breakaways very difficult. Despite the fast times, the men were actually skiing at low intensity for much of the race, waiting for the final kilometers to attack. A pack of approximately 25 skiers was together through the second preem at 15km, where the high pace shattered the group into a lead pack of eight, with a chase group of seven forming from the stragglers.

695 skiers completed the race, with finishers coming from 20 states and Canada

Complete results here

Results (brief)

Men

1. Zack Simons (Park City UT – Rossignol) 1:10:55.75
2. Marshall Greene (Bend, OR – Madshus) 1:10:55.8
3. Bryan Fletcher (Steamboat Springs CO US Nordic Combined – Madshus) 1:10:57.3

Women

1. Rebecca Dussault (CO – Saab / Salomon) 1:16:45.5
2. Kristina Trystad – Saari (Bozeman MT, Saab / Salomon) 1:17:23.6
3. Evelyn Dong (Bend, OR – Saab / Salomon) 1:17:24.8