By Gavin Kentch
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KINCAID PARK, Anchorage — Lauren Jortberg has now done eight laps of the Kincaid sprint course at race speed over the past seven days. She has done every single one of those faster than all of the athletes around her.
Friday was more of the same, as the Centre National d’Entraînement Pierre-Harvey skier won her second consecutive sprint, and third consecutive SuperTour race of the 2025/2026 season, by simply, well, skiing away from everyone all day long. Between the move to Québec, a healthy support system, and the million other small things that go into making an athlete feel comfortable and valued, Jortberg is clearly in a good place right now, and it shows.
Second yesterday was Sammy Smith of Sun Valley, who had been playing in the College Cup final in Kansas City on Monday, traveling back to Stanford on Tuesday, traveling to Alaska on Wednesday, and spending her first day on snow for the season on Thursday. She appears to have made the adjustment easily enough.
A close third was Hailey Swirbul of APU, who could not be more pleased to be back and racing again.
Fourth through sixth went to Nina Schamberger of Colorado, Ruby Serrouya of Denver, and Katey Houser of Montana State, in that order. The proud Alaskan in me (one of those words is redundant) is that this point required to note that Houser is a local; she is a 2022 graduate from Palmer High School.
“I’ve been stoked on today,” said a clearly pleased Jortberg, walking through the stadium from the finish line back to the athletes’ belonging area with a reporter on each side. (You can read the Anchorage Daily News’s take on the day here, or here if you hit a paywall.) “I love skating, I love sprinting, so it’s my favorite event, and it felt good and felt strong.”
“The hill here is hard to pass on, and it’s definitely my strength,” said Jortberg, explaining her strategy for the day. “And there can be a lot of drafting effect on the downhill, so I didn’t want to give anyone a free draft effect. I wanted to ski the hill how I wanted to and give myself space and not have any tangles or crashes, so I was aggressive. And it’s early season, so it’s good to keep going hard and not just play tactics, so that you’re fit through the whole season.”
Speaking of the whole season, what’s next for the CNEPH athlete, who is guaranteed at least a share of the Period 1 SuperTour lead even if she is DNS tomorrow, and who will be the leader outright so long as she starts tomorrow and finishes at least 20th in a field of 43?
“I’ll decline the Tour [de Ski start rights] probably and focus on Nationals,” Jortberg said. “I haven’t totally decided yet, but that’s probably my thought. Lake Placid is a sweet place to race. I’ve never done the Tour, and I don’t know if this is the year I want to do it.”
Sensational! Stanford sophomore Sammy Smith secures skate sprint silver in season’s second snow session
Sorry, couldn’t resist harnessing my inner New York Post there for a second, in headline style if not in political views. Something about “Cardinal Rules” would probably also work here. Or like “Tree by the Sea,” but that’s a little more of a stretch. I am hilarious.
Anyway. It’s been a big week for Sammy Smith. On Monday night, she was playing in a soccer game in Kansas City. Not just any game; it was the final of the College Cup, the championship for NCAA D-I soccer. Smith, who is in her second year at Stanford, wears number 13 and starts at defender/forward for the Cardinal. An older sister also plays on the team. A brother plays for the Duke men’s team. Her father played soccer for Duke and her mother rowed for Stanford. The family is rather accomplished athletically.
Stanford lost to Florida State in the final, 1–0, following a heartbreaker of a goal in the 87th minute for the Seminoles. Florida State goalkeeper Kate Ockene stood on her head all night to keep her team in the mix until they finally broke through, facing nine shots on goal and saving all of them.
That was Monday night, in Missouri. Smith spent much of Tuesday in Kansas City; she had a final to take, and Stanford flew out a proctor so that the student-athlete could do so. She had a few hours back on campus Tuesday night, before leaving the Bay Area early Wednesday morning. A connecting flight was canceled and she spent some unplanned time in Seattle, but she got into town Wednesday night. “Skied yesterday for the first time and then out here today,” Smith said on Friday.
It’s a small town; I had seen Smith at the venue on Thursday when I was there for my own practice with my masters group. She looked… better than I do for my first day back on snow. And I live in Alaska and can consistently check in with on-snow feelings throughout the dryland season with a bit of hiking.
What on earth is it like to do race prep in your first day back on snow in eight-plus months, I had to ask.
“Honestly, it felt pretty bad yesterday,” said Smith, shivering amidst what she identified as a 60-degree temperature change over the past 48 hours.
“Yesterday felt pretty rough. Just slipping around a bit, didn’t really feel like the balance was there or any of that coordination,” she said. “But today felt a little bit better, but I know it’s definitely going to take some time to get back on skis. And this was just a way to kind of get back to racing and not really have any expectations, just have fun with it.”
In her second day on snow, Smith logged the morning’s second-fastest time in the qual. She was 4.20 seconds behind Jortberg and 0.15 seconds ahead of Swirbul. In the final, she would outlunge Swirbul to take second by 0.05 seconds.
Did you feel like you knew how to ski today, I asked Smith, hopefully not insultingly given those results that I just presented.
*pause*
“I felt like I was skiing.”
Smith continued, “I’m definitely not at a place where I want to be later in the season. But it’s great to be back on skis. And I know there’s a lot of work to do, but I think this is a good starting point, and hopefully a really good place to build from.”
Final question for Smith, with an eye to Sunday’s distance race: When is the last time that you classic skied?
*pause*
*long pause*
Finally: “I have no idea.”
Smith continued, laughing, “Yesterday was the first day on snow, and, you know, skated for an hour, raced today, and tomorrow will be the first day classic skiing. So we’ll see how it goes.”
I’m going to spend most of this section telling you that Hailey Swirbul is happy as a person, first, and happy to be returning to racing, second. I’ve done that here before, I know, but I make no apology for repeatedly treating athletes as people too (also I really like Hailey and I am glad that she is happy!).
But first, what was the race itself like from her perspective, as Jortberg once again went hard off the front and the rest of the pack ultimately duked it out behind her for second?
“I was in there jostling around, so I can speak to that,” Swirbul said.
“I think that what was super fun about this final is like, We’re skiing next to each other, which — I don’t know, maybe that’s bad strategy — but it’s just so fun, you’re like stepping on each other’s skis. And up the first part of Gong Hill, it was two skiers wide with like someone trying to come up the middle, and everyone’s V2ing, but kind of almost a V1.
“And it’s a little too narrow to go two across on that steep part, so it has to shuffle out somehow, and that’s where I think gaps really open up. And it’s a drag race to try to get to the finishing corner where you can get an inside line, and that’s a tough one to have to go wide on, too.
“But it was fun to just, like, play cat and mouse and see where a little gap opens, and can you close it and dig deep over the top, and maybe an extra pole plant over the top is enough to close it on the downhill. It’s really cool to also pay attention to, you know, if you tuck a little lower, can you speed up a tiny bit? I’m all excited about those tactics for racing. I haven’t felt that in a long time.”
If you’re keeping score at home, that’s three funs, one really cool, and one excited. This is the quote of someone who is having fun out there.
Is it fair to say that you’ve missed this, I asked.
“That feeling is something you can’t get anywhere else,” Swirbul said. “And I love that. I’m so glad to be able to do that at this chapter of my life. And that’s a feeling that I don’t take for granted anymore.”
Junior podiums
There were no separate heats on Friday for the juniors who raced, but multiple junior skiers placed top-30 in the qual and raced in the open heats. Based on final overall placing, the junior women’s podium for the skate sprint (slide two above) was Ruby Serrouya (Denver) in first, Miya Kam-Magruder (Alaska Winter Stars) in second, and Neve Gerard (Utah) in third.
Racing continues tomorrow with an interval-start classic distance race, precise course format still TBD depending upon how conditions shake out in official training today. It is currently set to be two laps of the Junior Nationals 5km course, the main FIS course used for distance races at Kincaid over the last several years.
It will, somehow, be windier at Kincaid tomorrow than it was last weekend. Today’s high school race was canceled. Today’s Solstice Tree Tour event was postponed by a week. If I have no finish-line audio for you because of wind shear on the microphone, I apologize in advance. Skiing is fun.
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