The premier North American ski racing circuit, the NorAm
Cup, wrapped up with an Eastern sprint of seven races at Burke
and Waterville Valley. Super G wins went to Jan Hudec and Lau-
renne Ross; GS wins to Tommy Ford and Marie Michele Gagnon;
and slalom wins to Paul Stutz and Gagnon. The lone combined
win was captured by Will Brandenburg.
But there was importance to the final series beyond the victories.
With the top two finishers in each discipline getting a personal
quota spot in World Cup starts within that discipline next season,
and with the overall NorAm winners having automatic entry to all
World Cups, the consequences were huge.
Canadian Dustin Cook got the overall championship by two points
over Brandenberg with Nolan Kasper third, 35 points behind Cook.
Contrast that to the women’s side of the circuit, where Ross got the
crown by a massive margin (443 points) over Julia Ford with Me-
gan McJames third. As might be expected considering the margin,
Ross also claimed start positions through her discipline results,
winning the downhill and super G titles and placing second in su-
per combined.
The NorAm downhill title went to Steven Nyman by more than
100 points over Travis Ganong. Nyman won three of the four down-
hills on the 2010 NorAm schedule and placed third in the remaining
event. Ganong won the final event, at Aspen in late February, just
before claiming the national downhill crown on the same course.
As mentioned, Ross won the women’s NorAm downhill title; Ca-
nadian Georgia Simmerling was second, and it is the second straight
season Simmerling has finished in this spot. Julia Ford was third.
Ross’s results were identical to Nyman’s: three wins and a third in
four races. Simmerling was top-five in all four races, highlighted by
a second in Lake Louise back in December.
Nolan Kasper and Paul Stutz got the World Cup slalom start posi-
tions, Kasper taking the NorAm title by 25 points. Though he didn’t
fare well in the earliest races at Loveland — when the World Cup
boys were in town — Kasper was a whirlwind through the last five
slaloms of the season with four podiums (a win, two seconds and
a third) and one fifth-place finish. Stutz registered two wins — a
second and a fourth — but was a second-run DNF at Panorama on
Dec. 16; that spelled the difference for the title.
The men’s GS podium at
Waterville Valley.
