This winter has been a little different for the varsity ski team. Unlike past years, as a result of limited snow, the team’s first race fell all the way to late January. The team had a massive race on Friday, January 28, racing against 10 other teams.

First off for the girl’s slalom, freshman Chloe Cox leads the way placing 17th with a time of 54.68 seconds combined between her two runs. Not far behind, were senior captain Lucy Mclean and junior captain, Molly O’Meara. For the teams, the first race to have a freshman leading the way is a great sign. By the looks of it, Chloe has an excellent season ahead of her.

As a team, the Ranger girls placed 7th, which considering again it was the teams, as well as multiple team members’ first race, is pretty good. Captain Lucy Mclean spoke on how great the underclassmen did in their first race saying, “Our freshman did so well this week and we’re so excited to have them on the team. We have planned a couple of up-north practices to get them on better snow and have more runs before our next few home meets.”

The boy’s team had a little different situation. They were racing without one of their captains, Christian Bethea. Christian has been on the team for all four years of his high school career and the Rangers were unlucky he could not make it to the first meet.

Despite not having a key member, the boys placed 7th as a team. They were led this time by juniors Mickey Mehney and Matthew Taylor. Mickey placed 22nd and Matthew 27th respectively. Senior captain Thomas Carano and junior Nico Notarnicola also finished with strong performances.

Nico commented on the race’s difficulty saying, “What made this year a little different was how the race was actually set up on a different part of the mountain. Last year we were on one side but this year we were on a completely different one.” So with two things going against the Rangers, the placement and not having Christian, 7th place is not at all bad.

This season has been a weird one for the ski team, and extraordinarily long wait without snow especially at the local hill, this year was always looking like it was going to be tough. Head coach Sarah Yockey-Sutton commented on how hard the first race was and her outlook for the rest of the season. “Generally, we have three races prior to our race at Caberfae, however, this year’s poor snow conditions have canceled those first three races. Caberfae has a steep vertical and often provides a great challenge for our team, and this race was only the fourth time overall that our team has seen actual gates. A very challenging start to our season. Overall Friday’s race was just the beginning of our season, and we are excited to continue to compete now that the season has begun!”