By David Miles,Standard Correspondent
Both the Woodstock boys and girls Alpine Ski teams claimed the District Championships at Bromley last week, but they took vastly different routes to get there.
“The girls were unbeatable today,” said coach Fred Dieffenbach, referring to the team’s sweep of both the slalom and the giant slalom. This allowed them to handily win the team title, 21 points ahead of second place Burr and Burton.
“The boys had to work harder,” said Dieffenbach. They won neither event. However, they were a close second behind B& B in the slalom and even closer to Rutland in the giant slalom. This allowed the boys to finish ahead of both teams overall, with Rutland coming home in second place, 10 points behind the Wasps.
“Patience pays off,” said the coach.
Depth again played a big part in the boys results. Rutland skiers took the first three places in the giant slalom and Woodstock the next four. Andrew Borden (56.06) led a quartet of Wasps who all finished within four-tenths of a second of one another. Kyle Weirether (56.31), Gordon MacMaster (56.35) and Joe Bianchi (56.46) were on his heels.
In the slalom, senior co-captain MacMaster led Woodstock by finishing in third place with a time of 1:16.89. It was the first time in his career that he led his team in scoring.
“I’ve had some good runs this year, but I’ve never been able to put two together,” said MacMaster. “I couldn’t have picked a better time to do it, in districts my senior year. I approached it as I’ve got nothing to lose now and that took the pressure off.”
Weirether was right behind MacMaster in fourth place with a time of 1:17.54. Also in the top ten for the Wasps were Michael Hirschbuhl (1:20.80) in seventh and Hartley Walker Money (1:24.98) in 10th.
The girls, meanwhile, were led by Emma Maiden who continues to ski better and better. The talented junior won both races, in both cases with a teammate in second place.
Maiden (1:18.32), Grace Vollers (1:20.88) and Lilly Noble (1:21.93) finished 1-2-3 in the slalom. Only B& B’s Lydia Morgantini prevented a clean sweep for Woodstock as she nosed out Anna Dieffenbach (1:23.18) by three-tenths of a second for fourth place.
In the giant slalom, Maiden did it again with a first place time of 58.20. Noble was close behind her at 58.68, while Dieffenbach (1:00.55) claimed seventh place and Vollers (1:00.73) finished ninth.
The races were originally scheduled for last Thursday but were pushed ahead two days because of the rain forecast for Wednesday and Thursday. It proved to be a wise decision, giving the skiers a warm and sunny day on which to race.
The District Championship title was both a repeat title and the fourth in six years for the Woodstock girls. The boys were also district title winners in 2015.
Both teams move on to the two-day state championships at the Middlebury Snow Bowl this week.
This article first appeared in the March 3, 2016 edition of the Vermont Standard.