Domestic Viewing Guide for March 7–9: NCAA Championships in Steamboat Springs

By Gavin Kentch

The 2024 National Collegiate Men’s and Women’s Skiing Championships, aka “NCAA Championships” or often just “NCAAs,” are being held in Steamboat Springs this week. A small amount of snark actual analysis is below, but to start with, here’s what’s going on when, and how to watch.

2024 NCAA Championships (local time at venue: Mountain Time)

Are the races streamed?

Yes! Here is the general link for livestreaming on the NCAA site. I suspect that this will take you to Thursday’s skate race specifically and this to Saturday’s classic race, but if those don’t work then just go to the first link in this paragraph and click around.

Results?

Here for Thursday skate, here for Saturday classic, and, for the true sickos, here for live team standings. Official FIS results will, eventually, be up here.

Who is racing?

34 alpine racers, per gender, whom I don’t know anything about and can’t speak to, but whose scores also determine half of each school’s overall team score, because NCAA Skiing in some ways still occurs in the Eisenhower Administration.

On the nordic side: 40 athletes per gender. Of this field, six are drawn from the central region (CCSA), 17 from the east (EISA), and 17 from the west (RMISA). “Bids are awarded to regions using a formula determined by the skiing committee” advises the relevant NCAA website, accurately if opaquely.

A school can send a maximum of three athletes per gender to NCAAs. Schools sending a full complement of six nordic skiers to this year’s NCAA Championships are Dartmouth, Denver, Michigan Tech, Northern Michigan, Alaska Fairbanks, Colorado, Utah, and Vermont. Plucky Harvard is among the schools sending just one nordic skier to NCAAs (though to be fair that one athlete, Rémi Drolet, could well win the classic race, so, scoreboard).

Here is the field for the nordic races, per screenshots drawn from here. It looks to me as if athletes are listed in the order selected by the committee, strongest skiers or lowest FIS points first, but don’t quote me on that.

Who’s going to win?

At the level of overall/team titles, probably Utah, until or unless proven otherwise; winning the last four titles in a row will have that effect. If not Utah, then likely either Colorado or Denver, both of which finished just ahead of Utah in the season-long RMISA standings. Colorado finished well up on Utah at RMISA Championships, so maybe give them the edge this year? But also Utah has a 17-point lead in this year’s NCAA Championships after Wednesday’s first day of alpine racing, so, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. But I do have the extremely lukewarm take that one of Utah, Colorado, or Denver will likely win this year.

You know how New England has claimed 15 of the last 19 Alaska Cups as the top region at Junior Nationals? RMISA’s dominance in 21st-century NCAA racing is of a piece: Of the 23 NCAA skiing team titles that have been awarded this century, Denver has won 10 of them, Utah six, Colorado four, and the now-shuttered New Mexico program one. Dartmouth, in 2007, and Vermont, in 2012, are the only Eastern or Midwestern schools to win an NCAA ski title this century (or ever, actually).

You may discuss amongst yourselves whether this trend represents an unfortunate oligopoly or a commendable example of the highest levels of performance. Extra points if you can refrain from implicit or explicit xenophobia about foreign nationals at RMISA schools while you do so.

That was a nice history lesson, but what I really want to know is, who’s going to win the individual nordic ski races?

Oh, that. John Steel Hagenbuch (Dartmouth) and Haley Brewster (Vermont) in the skate race, and Andreas Kirkeng (Denver) and Tilde Bångman (Montana State) in the classic race. Is my prediction.

How high are these races?

Pretty high! Low point on both the 2.5km course (used this year for the skate race) and the 5km course (used for the classic race) is the stadium at 2,045 meters, or roughly 6,700 feet. High point is 2,091 meters and 2,119 meters, respectively, which is up to 250 feet higher. All of my picks for individual race winners have experience racing and/or growing up at altitude, fwiw.

What does calf roping have to do with all of this?

“The stadium is situated within infrastructure designed for rodeo” advises the homologation certificate for the courses staged out of Howelsen Hill Nordic Center, a statement that you likely seldom see applied to Scandinavian race trails. ’Murika.

Enjoy the races, everyone.

You’re reading this on Nordic Insights, one man’s labor of love dedicated to publicizing American nordic skiing. Last season’s GoFundMe is literally the only reason why I turned a profit in year one of Nordic Insights, and in turn the only reason why there is a year two of Nordic Insights for you to be reading now: I was okay with working for very little money to get this love letter to American cross-country skiing off the ground, but I didn’t want to lose money for the privilege of doing so. If you would like to support what remains a brutally shoestring operation, this season’s GoFundMe may be found here. Thank you for your consideration, and, especially, for reading.