The Marquette High School and Superiorland Nordic Ski Teams participated in the27th annual Mesabi East XC Invitational on January 7, 2012 at Giants Ridge in Biwabik, MN. This race is the nation’s largest high school cross country race with over 1000 skiers from 77 schools. This year’s 5 kilometer races were held as a lap event (2 x 2.5 kilometers) for the first time in its history due to low snow conditions. The race organizers created the course utilizing the man made snow base of the Giants Ridge downhill runs
In the team competition Marquette placed 13th in the Boys Varsity Division, 25th in the Girls Varsity Division, 29th in Boys JV and 39th in Girls JV. Top individual finishers for Marquette were Ellen Wiitala who took 3rd in the Girls Varsity 5K Classic Race with a time of 17:55.6. Blake Murray skied to a 7th place in the Boys Varsity 5K Classic with a time of 15:40.1. In the Boys 5K Varsity Freestyle, Eric Wagner skied to a 20th place finish with a time of 14:50.3. And in the Boys JV 5K Classic, Mike McFadden took 13th place skiing the course in 18:35.1.
Rounding out the team finishes in the 5K Girls Varsity Classic was Abby Potts in 92nd place with a time of 22:45.3. In the 5K Girls Varsity Freestyle, Beth Wright took 59th place in 18:45.9 and Sheila Flood took 117th in 20:45.6. In the Boys 5K Varsity Classic, Andy Twohey took 45th in 17:09 while Mike Wiitala skied to a 77th place in 18:12.3. In the Boys 5K Varsity Freestyle, Ben Wright took 74th in 16:09 while Marty Gray came in 155th with a 19:39.3 time.
In the JV Division, Paul Zyburt took 46th in the Boys 5K Freestyle while Michael Mlsna placed 66th (19:05.7) followed closely by Matt Sutton in 68th with a time of 19:16.4. Josh Collins was 78th in the classic (24:54.1). In the Girls Classic Race Ingrid Lindquist came in 74th with a time of 28.48.8 while Kendra Palomaki took 43rd in the 5K Freestyle with a time of 22:13.4.
Dan Wiitala, Marquette Assistant Coach, commented, “We are really happy with our team’s improvement over last year, going from 22nd to 13th in the boys division and from 62nd to 25th in the girls group, plus achieving two top 10 individual results in this competitive field. The success of the team can really be attributed to the growth in our athlete numbers as a recognized high school sport at MSHS, plus a very dedicated core of coaches and volunteers from Superiorland Ski Club supporting the team.”