February 7, 2009 (Stowe, VT) – The University of Vermont carnival heated up on Saturday with the addition of the Nordic Freestyle events, scheduled a day later than usual to coincide with the USSA Super Tour event featuring some of the premiere competition in New England, including multiple former Olympians. With the added boost, Dartmouth took the lead with 692 points while the University of New Hampshire followed with 611 points and the University of Vermont rounded out the top three with 570 points.

Even with the switch up in the normal competition days, Dartmouth’s Nordic squad came roaring into the Trapp Family lodge to sweep the Nordic events, helped by a second place finish in the EISA scoring of the 5k Women’s Freestyle by Rose Brennan and a victory, again in EISA rankings, by Nils Koons in the Men’s 10k Freestyle. On the alpine side Big Green skier Courtney Hammond blasted through a treacherous Slalom course to first place while teammate Ace Tarberry skied to third place in the Men’s Slalom.

Other schools put up a hard fight with many brilliant performances including wins in the Men’s Slalom by University of Vermont athlete David Donaldson and a win in the Women’s 5k Freestyle by another Catamount, Caitlin Patterson. Colby freshman standout Lucy Garrec proved she’s here to stay with a third place finish in the same event. Over on the men’s side of the Nordic Events Bates’ Sylvan Ellefson posted a second place finish while Dartmouth’s Glenn Randall took up third.

While both Nordic events were won by non-EISA skiers, with Kristina Strandberg taking the Women’s 5k Freestyle win and James Southam taking the win in the 10k men’s skate event, EISA skiers proved they can ski with the best. Watch tomorrow to see how the Nordic Skiers fare against the new competition. For more results, images, and videos please go to eisaskiing.org