The second meet of the year on Tuesday, Jan. 17, at Nashoba Valley was cause for celebration for the boys as they earned a clean first-place finish and added 14 points to their season score for a grand total of 26. The girls, however, had a rougher night with two skiers falling—one sustaining a serious injury—but they managed to pull themselves together, landing fifth place with 12 points. The two teams include skiers from the Bromfield and North Middlesex Regional High schools.
The girls were able to finish fifth despite falls by two varsity members. Seventh grader Norah Pride suffered a serious fall two gates from the finish. She got caught on the gate, breaking two bones in her wrist that will unfortunately make her unable to participate for the rest of the season. Coach David Bobruff reports that there is no long-term damage to her skiing career, and there is chance she can be a part of the USSA races this year. Still, this is a tremendous loss for the team, Coach Bobruff said. Pride had placed 10th overall and first for Bromfield in the first meet of the year. But he said he believes that the team’s response to this incident shows its commendable teamwork and hope for the future. The coach added, “Most importantly, I think everyone exhibited great teamwork in supporting Norah, making a point to see her in the patrol shack, and taking on additional responsibilities and looking for ways to help out while Coach Rowse and I were dealing with other matters.”
The second skier to encounter trouble was sophomore Sage McFarland, who according to Bobroff showed “effort and perseverance,” managing to recover from her fall during the first run and then going on to finish among the top 15 during her second. Her run helped the team to overtake both Chelmsford and Lowell. The achievements of junior and captain Brigid Griffin (North Middlesex Regional High School), finishing 11th, and eighth-grader Sadie Kerian, finishing 20th, also helped pull the girls up to fifth.
Another record-breaker
The boys beat last week’s record-breaker with a new best-in-five-years first-place win. Five of the boys placed among the top 11 skiers, with all six of the varsity skiers achieving better times in their second run. Coach Bobruff credited this improvement to “the ability to learn from [the] first run and make adjustments.” In an email to the Press, he said he believes that this ability will enable the boys to improve even more for the rest of the year.
Freshmen Callum Hammill (North Middlesex Regional High School), finishing fourth in his second high school race, is currently the league’s top-ranked ninth-grader. The captain, Bromfield senior Camden Maddalone, finished ninth, his first top-10 finish.
The girls’ record after the difficult meet stood at 6–8–0, and the boys’ was 13–1–0.
Bromfield results (times combined from two runs)
Boys giant slalom
- 4, Callum Hammill, 44.67 seconds
- 6, Benjamin Williams, 45.06
- 9, Camden Maddalone, 45.30
- 10, Conner Reitler, 45.46
- 11, Hayden Hammill, 45.54
- 21, Justin Patenaude, 47.12
- Team score: First with a score of 913.
Girls giant slalom
- 11, Brigid Griffin, 53.48 seconds
- 20, Sadie Keiran, 56.23
- 29, Grace Barton, 58.93
- 32, Isabel Barton, 59.34
- Team score: Fifth with a score 783.
Ivy Wang is a Bromfield junior.
