February 25, 2024
Ski-O at Seeley Lake Nordic trails
This has been a rough winter for snow in Western Montana. Thanks to the hard work for the Seeley Lake Nordic grooming team, we were able to pull off our only Ski Orienteering event of this winter, despite challenging conditions and a thin snow cover. The nearly 30 brave souls who showed up to the event were rewarded with good skiing and, after an initial flurry of snow-rain, a very pleasant afternoon.
Among the notable performances were first-timers Shonna and Jason Drake, who just edged out Kaia Peterson and Caroline Chitty for the win on a challenging Medium course, Another shout-out goes to UM student Ben Conley, who was the fastest to complete the Shortish course, in what was only his second time on cross-country skis! Finally, great job to Svea Johnson, Nora Will, and Inara Granovskiy - all 8 years old or younger - who completed the Short course.
As always, we could not have hosted this event without a great team of volunteers. Thank you to Emily Johnson for directing the event! Kathleen and Larry Dent, Jeremy Ditto, and Jeff Johnson all helped with setup, takedown, and everything in between. Michael Kelly, the Dents, and Theresa Mooney helped with beginner instruction. Boris Granovskiy designed the courses, and set and collected the controls. Seeley Lake Nordic's Bruce Rieman provided support and excellent communication throughout the permitting process, and kept us updated on snow conditions up until the day of the event.
Up next is Blue Mountain on March 9!
You can see photos and courses at https://photos.app.goo.gl/NCtaVMXH1YxAS6h88
Split times have been posted at https://attackpoint.org/eventdetail.jsp/event_56563
