Completed Event: Skiing versus 20K Freestyle (M) on March 8, 2025 , , 1st
Final Score
Skiing
1st
vs 20K Freestyle (M)
Wednesday, March 11
Lake Placid, N.Y. (Olympic Sports Complex)
All Day
University of Utah
at
Freestyle (5K/10K)
Mayerhofer Wins NCAA Championship in Women's Freestyle
3/11/2015 12:00 AM | Skiing
March 11, 2015
LAKE PLACID, N.Y. - Freshman Veronika Mayerhofer won the NCAA title in the women's 5-km freestyle as four Utah skiers earned All-America honors on the first day of the NCAA Championships in Lake Placid, N.Y. The Utes rank second in the standings after one day of competition.
Mayerhofer led a strong Ute contingent in the women's race, with junior Sloan Storey finishing fifth and sophomore Anna-Lena finishing ninth. Mayerhofer has four wins this season and hasn't finished lower than fourth this year. It was the fourth career All-America honor for Storey, who recorded her seventh top-five finish of the year. Heynen earned her first career All-America honor with her eighth top-10 run of the year. The Utes were the top-scoring women's Nordic team of the race.
The last Utah women's Nordic skier to win a national title was Maria Graefnings, who won the 5-km free in both 2011 and 2012. The Utes have had five women combine for eight Nordic national titles in their history.
The men were led by Niklas Persson in the 10-km free race, who finished 10th to earn the third All-America citation of his career. It was his eighth top-10 run of the year. Noe Bellet finished 17th while Kevin Bolger crossed the line 26th. Both are making their second career NCAA appearances.
"What a day!" Utah head Nordic coach Abi Holt said. "Any race that adds another University of Utah skier to the list of Ute national champions is a good one, so I am pretty fired up right now! My only lament is that I wasn't able to see the second half of Veronika's race, because she really lit it up! I was giving splits around 2.5-km, and at me, the splits indicated that Veronika was in a three-way tie for first place. For her to win that race by 13 seconds is really something. Also, I do not want to ignore the efforts of Sloan, Anna-Lena, and Niklas. Top-ten finishes at the NCAA Championships are highly contested, and demonstrate excellent skiing. Veronika, Sloan, Anna-Lena, and Niklas all earned All-American status today with their top-ten finishes. I'm very proud of their skiing today. It's nice to have these championships underway, and I look forward to seeing what these next few days have in store for us."
Utah is second in the team scoring after day one with 131 points, behind Colorado's 155 points. New Mexico and Vermont are tied for third (106) with Denver in fifth.
"It was incredible today to see the women ski so impressively!" Utah Director of Skiing Kevin Sweeney said. "I have to give them a huge amount of praise for absolutely throwing down and skiing very smart yet extremely tactical races . I was ecstatic to see them coming thru the S-turns on the final decent into the stadium just flying! The men were solid, but I don't think they were super happy with their overall results. It is tough to open the Championships, and perhaps this got to their nerves a bit. I'm confident however they can respond for the classic. It was a stunning team atmosphere today as [alpine coaches] Jaka [Korencan] and Luke [Patterson] brought the alpine team over to cheer the Nordic athletes on. It was awesome. Both squads are in really good shape right now. Good momentum and vibe amongst the squad and a good event for us tomorrow. Huge kudos to Utah's latest NCAA national champion, Veronika Mayerhofer! She was tied for the lead at the 2.5km mark, got the split from Abi and just put the hammer down. That's a good indicator that our fitness is there. Really looking forward to the giant slalom tomorrow!"
The NCAA Championships continue on Thursday, March 12, with the men's and women's giant slalom races. The women's race begins at 9:00 a.m. ET/7:00 a.m. MT and running to completion, with the men going off at 12:00 p.m. ET/10:00 a.m. MT.
Live Video:
Women's Giant Slalom
Men's Giant Slalom
Players Mentioned
Nordic
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