Melbye, Lavén Pick Up Wins in Utah Invitational Opener

Saturday, January 24

Midway, Utah / Soldier Hollow Nordic Center

9 a.m.

University of Utah

7.5K Freestyle (I)

Mons Melbye won Saturday's freestyle interval start in Melbye's home snow racing debut.

Photo by: Jackson Bilawa/Utah Athletics

Melbye, Lavén Pick Up Wins in Utah Invitational Opener

1/24/2026 3:24 PM | Skiing

Results Photo Gallery

Utah tallies three podiums and four top-nine results in freestyle races at Soldier Hollow

MIDWAY, Utah – The Utah Ski Team opened the Utes' home meet on Saturday with 7.5K freestyle interval start races at Soldier Hollow Nordic Center. Erica Lavén and Mons Melbye each recorded individual victories on the opening day of the Utah Invitational, while Sofia Pedersen added a silver medal in the women's competition.

The Utes were a little shorthanded on both the men's and women's sides today but nevertheless won the women's race with 99 points. For the overall meet, Utah is in second place in the team standings after day one with 174 points, just behind Colorado (188).

Zachary Jayne was among a group from Utah that did not race today; the senior has competed in Europe the last two weekends after being invited for his first career World Cup starts. Jayne raced in classic sprints on Saturday in Goms, Switzerland, and recorded his first career top-30 World Cup performance in a 27^th-place result. He took 17^th in the qualifying stage to punch his ticket to the classic sprint quarterfinals.

Women's Race
Erica Lavén and Sofia Pedersen pulled out the top two spots, respectively, as Lavén earned her third win in as many starts this season while Pedersen skied to her second straight podium. Lavén finished the three-lap event with a time of 20:08.2 and Pedersen was about five seconds behind (20:13.4).

Ally Wheeler added a top-nine performance as well (21:35.9) to pull in key points for the Utes. Witta Walcher was 16^th to round out the Utah women's lineup for the day.

"The course was really nice," said Lavén. "It was a hard race from the start. But I'm happy that (Sofia and I) both finished strong. We were able to build up into the race and got better throughout. I'm happy with the day."

All three of Pedersen's races with Utah have netted a top-five finish. As part of the larger field, Wheeler was also called to the U-20 race podium to be honored for her second-place performance in that group.

Men's Race
The men's competition followed at about 9:50 a.m. as Mons Melbye drove the bus with a 17:17.8 total time. Max Kluck was 11^th in the field (18:31.0) while Carl Rune placed in the top-20 (18:59.9).

It was Melbye's third podium of his debut season at Utah and second individual victory.

"I started at my normal pace and felt like I had a good one going," said Melbye. "I felt like I could maintain it, and that was the winning formula today. It was great to defend the home snow. It's a bit of thin air for me up here, but it works and the conditions were super good. I couldn't ask for better conditions today."

Lucas Wilmot added a 25^th-place finish for Utah.

Next Up
Utah and the rest of the RMISA teams will return to Soldier Hollow on Sunday for 15K classic mass start races. The men will go off at 9 a.m. with the women's event scheduled to begin at 10:40 a.m. Awards on Sunday will take place separately for each gender; the men's awards will take place in between races and the women's awards will take place shortly after that competition.

Admission is free for Sunday's races as is parking in the large lot. Due to conditions around Soldier Hollow, please note that spectator viewing access will be limited to the balcony of the timing building and the inner parking lot. Access to the course will be limited to the athletes, coaches and race staff.

Follow the Utah Ski Team on social media @utahskiteam. Download the Utah 360 app here.