ROLE MODEL
L aws
of Motion
Though no longer racing the
clock, U.S. cross country alum
Justin Freeman is all about numbers
at New Hampton School BY BRYCE HUBNER
Justin Freeman (with daughters
Iris and Sage) finds something
else to do in the snow.
FOR MATHEMATICS AND physics teacher Justin Freeman, the
arts of teaching and ski racing are a lot alike — there’s no such thing
as mastery.
“I’m still learning how to be a ski racer,” says the 33-year-old Free-
man, a former U.S. nordic teamer and 2006 Olympian. “I wish I
knew eight years ago as much as I knew going into the Nationals
this year — I would’ve raced a lot faster. To have the context of, ‘Hey,
I’m an Olympian and I’m still figuring this out,’ makes it a lot easier
when I screw up with my calculus class, too: there’s always room to
keep getting better.”
Yes, Freeman — four years into working at New Hampshire’s New
Hampton prep school, father of two young girls, four years removed
from full-time competition — is still ski racing competitively at
events like U.S. nationals. This year, in his first classic race of the
season on January 6, he scored a remarkable sixth-place finish in
the 30K mass start at Anchorage. Not bad for a guy who has to eke
out training sessions between espousing the virtues of Newton and
Einstein; raising a family; serving as a dorm parent; and coaching
cycling and running.
Freeman grew up in Andover, N.H., and started skiing in the Bill
Koch League for the Andover Outing Club at age 7. Nordic coaching
legend Tim Norris trained Freeman and his younger brother, Kris,
a current U.S. Ski Team standout, for a spell in those early years.
Despite his auspicious introduction to the sport, Freeman struggled
with skiing for many years before he found success.
“I had been skiing and trying to go fast, but not getting very far with
it,” Freeman says. “At the level I was skiing in high school, I never
once made junior nationals, and no colleges were recruiting me. The
best I could hope for was to make the travel squad and compete for
whatever college team I raced for — I sure wasn’t thinking about win-
ning NCAAs or racing World Cup someday.”
Freeman attended the K- 12 Sant Bani School in Sanbornton, N.H.,
where, he says, coach Scott Clark gave him his first taste of athletic
success as a cross country runner. Eventually, he landed at Maine’s
Bates College as a top running recruit and a still-aspiring nordic ski-
er. As a junior at Bates, under the tutelage of Becky Woods, Freeman
had a breakthrough ski season, which he capped off with a third-
place finish in the 10K classic at the 1997 NCAA Championships.
It was a result that was quite literally a lifetime in the making, re-
quiring incredible patience and persistence over the course of nearly
