LUTSEN-Anna Krieger showed just how important each member of a team is Thursday.
The eighth-grader skied a 32nd-place time of 1:08.90 at the Cook County Invite at Lutsen Mountain. She was the fifth fastest Brainerd Warrior skier, but after the first four skiers tied with Cook County's first four skiers with 166 points, the tiebreaker went to the fifth skier. Enter Krieger for the win.
"We always try to make our kids understand how important to finish two clean runs is because you never know when that fifth skier will come into play," said Warriors head coach Jim Ruttger. "It's not a lot at stake at this point in the season, but in the sections, when it's the difference between going to state and going home, it could be huge. One of the things that we've started seeing on both teams is we're developing some depth. We won the other day on the boys with one of our to skiers going down. That's ski racing."
Alex Stone won for the fourth time in five races. She skied the fastest first run and held on for a first-place 53:17. Grace McGuire finished 10th with Payge Fitterer in 12th and Emma Hiebert 23rd.
The Brainerd boys struggled Thursday putting together two good runs and finished fifth. Nick Kratz led the Warriors with a 13th-place 57.1. Tristan Elsenpeter was 14th followed by Max Darkow in 21st and Brandon Niefert 22nd.
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"Ski racing is very unforgiving and the boys just had some bad luck with a few falls and then Cal (Madison) couldn't finish his second run," Ruttger said. "It's a fun course though and a fun race venue. It has a very good pitch to it from top to bottom and the kids love competing there. It was a good race."
Boys team scores: 1-Cook County 146, 2-Duluth East 120, 3-Hibbing 112, 4-Virginia Area 99, 5-Brainerd 98, 6-Cloquet-Esko-Carlton, Duluth Denfeld, Duluth Marshall, Hermantown inc
Individual winner: Will Lamb (CC) 51:25
Brainerd results: 13-Nick Krantz 57.61, 14-Tristan Elsenpeter 57.69, 21-Max Darkow 1:02.79, 22-Brandon Niefert 1:03.49, 24-Grant Kosobud 1:05.06, 25-Matthew Sherman 1:05.09, 26-Grant Anderson 1:05.40
Girls team scores: 1-Brainerd 166, 2-Duluth Marshall 166, 3-Hermantown 163, 4-Cook County 158, 5-Hibbing 146, 6-Duluth East 134, 7-Virginia Area 62, 8-Cloquet-Esko-Carlton 57, 9-Duluth Denfeld inc.
Individual winner: Alex Stone (Brd) 53.17
Brainerd results: 10-Grace McGuire 1:00.72, 12-Payge Fitterer 1:01.35, 23-Emma Hiebert 1:05.85, 32-Anna Krieger 1:08.90, 33-Madison Kalenberg 1;09.52, 34-Linsey Proctor 1:09.57, 37-Whitney Fink 1:15.17, 38-Hannah Taylor 1:15.35, 42-Allison Krantz 1:18.56
Next: Brainerd in Cloquet-Esko-Carlton Invitational at Spirit Mountain 10 a.m. Thursday.
