Minnesota Trials

Miscellaneous

Dec 20

Clare, Ethan, Mike and I just left Minnesota, where we were competing in a 4 day race series of IBU Cup Trials. The site of the trials was Mt. Itasca, a small ski club in Grand Rapids, Minnesota, which is WAY UP THERE in Minnesota, about a 3.5 hour drive from Minneapolis.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t much snow in Mt. Itasca to begin with, and the rain we got on the second day of racing didn’t help. But the organizers did a good job providing a 2.5k (ish) man-made loop that held up remarkably well throughout, and a little bit of snow and cold temperatures on our last few days made for great skiing just before we left! Turns out, you don’t really need a big loop to hold biathlon races, and the loop didn’t even get boring on training days when you had the anticipation of shooting every round.

These trials were my first real, on-snow, biathlon races so I wasn’t expecting much in terms of results, but it was great to see my teammates put together some solid races. They’ll announce the teams for IBU Cups (the level just below the World Cup) soon, so fingers crossed that the GRP will have a representative!!

We raced 3 sprints (7.5k for women, and 10k for men) and one mass start (12.5k for women, 15k for men). The weather and scenery didn’t inspire me much to take pictures, but luckily one of biathletes from Minnesota, Jakob Ellingson, is also a talented photographer so all of the race shots are from him. It was also the only day the sun came out during our entire 10 day stay, so we were happy to have sunshine and perfect skiing, along with the signature Mt. Itasca chilly weather… brrrr!

Enjoy the pics!