Hendry, Jordheim Podium in Freestyle at NCAA Ski Championships

Thursday, March 12

Bozeman, MT

All Day

University of Utah

5/10K Freestyle (I)

Sam Hendry, Guro Jordheim, Mariah Bredal Ski NCAA 2020

Photo by: Brooke Frederickson

Hendry, Jordheim Podium in Freestyle at NCAA Ski Championships

3/12/2020 9:46 PM | Skiing

2020 NCAA Freestyle Results

BOZEMAN, Mont. – Samuel Hendry and Guro Jordheim finished on the podium for the Utah ski team to lead the Utes in the freestyle races on the second day of the NCAA Ski Championships.

Following the races the NCAA announced the immediate cancellation of all championship events due to nationwide concerns regarding COVID-19. At the time of cancellation, Utah led the team standings with 293 points, leading Denver (261) and Middlebury (216).

Hendry finished second, just 3.1 seconds behind the leader, in the men's 10-km race for his fourth podium finish in five races he competed this season, traveling back from NCAA's from U23 World Championships just days before the event. A freshman, he earns his first career All-America honor. Junior Maximilian Bie finished 14^th while junior Ola Jordheim placed 18^th. Both were making their second NCAA appearance.

"I was super psyched to be racing here at NCAAs," Hendry said. "I started off really conservative. It's a tough course and we are at high altitude so I had to take it out easy and I just continued to pick it up and ski faster throughout the race and got a split on the last time that I was just three seconds out of first place. I was fighting all the way to the line and it wasn't quite enough. Disappointed that I couldn't go all the way but I'm psyched to be on the podium."

In the women's 5-km race, Jordheim finished third for her career-best NCAA finish after previously finishing fourth three times at NCAA Championship races. She will finish her career with seven All-America honors, missing the opportunity to compete for the maximum eight honors, 17 career race wins and 29 career podium finishes. Junior Mariah Bredal finished eighth for her second career All-America honor, her first since 2018, and will finish every race this season in the top 10. Leah Lange finished 14^th for the Utes.

"Being injured for several months this summer made it incredibly great to get that podium, and end the streak of fourth and fifth places at NCAA Championships," Jordheim said. "This is my last ever race as a Ute and I have to say it's been a blast, all of it. The team and support is invaluable, and my time as a Ute was amazing."

Wax conditions were challenging with changing temperatures throughout the day.

"All-around great day," head Nordic coach Miles Havlick said. "We can't complain about leading the team scoring. We had some mixed results – some really good skiing by Sam and Guro. Both were super strong and skied some of their best races of the year. I think some of our skiers were a little disappointed in their results but they fought hard all the way to the finish line and that's all you can ask for, that they gave it everything."

"Very challenging with the weather changing throughout the day," Director of Skiing Fredrik Lanstedt said. "This morning we were confident coming in, we were well prepared, had done a lot of testing and were ready do to some more testing this morning and conditions were changing as we were preparing the skis, so we moved to a safer wax alternative, we wanted to make sure that we were in it and had things decided out on the trail. The women had really good skis, they were right there, and of course Guro had an incredible race and Mariah skied one of her better skate races. Leah was a little further back but fought all the way. It was a solid start. In the men's race, we changed wax a little bit and stayed with a safer wax just because it kept snowing and we didn't know what was going to happen, but they were right in it as well. Sam had an incredible race coming back from illness and finishing second and Max and Ola were struggling a little bit and fought like crazy and stayed in it and fought for every point. A solid day for sure."