Standing tall

Alannah MacLean wasn't too worried about winning on Saturday.

The Newfoundland-born, Sudbury-raised cross country skier had a simpler goal in mind, a day before leaving Thunder Bay for Whistler, B.C., the site of next weekend's Haywood NorAm under-23 and junior national team trials.

On the line are four spots on the Canadian team that will head to nationals later this winter, and the 18-year-old MacLean, a member of the National Development Centre Thunder Bay squad, wants to prove she belongs.

"For me, I have a lot of problems staying on my feet in sprint races. So I just wanted to prove to myself, as I did today, that I'm all prepared for next weekend to go to the races," said MacLean, who on Saturday won the senior women's 1.2-kilometre sprint on day 2 of the Ontario Cup being contested at Lappe.

MacLean edged Lakehead University ski team teammate Daphne Haggerty, who finished second after winning Friday's opening day race.

It's MacLean's third trip to the national trials, which last year were held at Lappe.

But it's the first time she's putting any pressure on herself, hoping for a positive result and a spot on the national team travelling to Erzurum, Turkey for the world championships, beginning on Feb. 19.

"This is my first time actually trying to make the world junior team. It's going to be obviously very difficult and I'd have a lot of really good races to make the junior worlds. But it's always there and in skiing, anything can happen," she said.

"It feels like it's a lot more pressure, but at the same time I know that it's a dream and that's what I want to do. If I treat it like it's something that I can reach, that's not impossible and don't get frustrated, then somehow it may be able to happen."

MacLean won't be alone in Whistler. The NDC Thunder Bay squad will be sending a full contingent of skiers to nationals, though senior-age skiers like Michael Somppi and Harry Seaton, who easily took the men's 1.6-kilometre sprint on Saturday, will be on the hunt for berths on the European and World Cup circuits, the prize at the end of a series of six races being staged in B.C. and Alberta.

Jack Carlyle, who turns 19 later this month, is a first-year member of the NDC squad, racing in the junior men's category next weekend.

Heading to the host venue from the 2010 Olympic Games has a magical feel to it, the Sault Ste. Marie resident said, an added air of excitement.

Carlyle, who finished fourth in Saturday's senior men's sprint, is confident, if only a little nervous.

"I've competed at that level before, so I'm not inexperienced, I know what it's like. But this is the first year I've really been eligible to qualify, so this is for real. This is what you've worked for," Carlyle said. "I'm a first year, so I still have next year, but my goal is really to qualify for this year."

The prospect of making national excites him.

"I would be fantastic. It would be a really, really exciting thing for me. I would learn so much from it and to have the experience to go overseas and race in Europe would be amazing."

Seaton, who won his race Saturday by almost 18 seconds over runner-up Leif Lennie, said the conditions were near perfect.
"It was pretty fast, so it was a fun race today," Seaton said, noting the huge difference between sprints and long-distance races – usually, that is. 

"But the nature of the course out there, the 1.6-K course is there a long section of climbing, so it's quite different from a regular sprint at that distance ... So it's almost like a 10- or 15-K distance race. It's kind of a tricky course out there."

Nakkertok's Duncan McTaggert took the junior boys race in 4:22.9, 6.7 seconds faster than Big Thunder's Benjamin Jones. In the junior boys category, Big Thunder's Julian Freitag outlasted Nakkertok's Benjamin Wilkinson-Zan, while in juvenile boys it was Aaron Birosh of North Bay outdueling Big Thunder's Fergus Foster by 0.3 seconds, crossing the finish line in 3:23.1.

Basia Gunka of Big Thunder won the junior girl sprint in 3:05.8 to edge Porcupine's Jessica Demers, while in juvenile girls it was Mia Serratore edging Lappe's Laura Inkila by just over a second, clocking in at 3:13.1.