Three Spills in St. Lawrence Meet Tumble Skiers to Last Place Finish

The Crimson ski team stumbled to a dismal last place finish in the St. Lawrence Winter Carnival last weekend, behind squads from Dartmouth, St. Lawrence, and Norwich.

Some brilliant individual performances were wasted for the Crimson as three giant slalom specialists crashed on the course at Big Tupper, in Jay, N.Y. The snowmen were never able to recover from this initial handicap.

As anticipated, St. Lawrence's C.B. Vaughn swept the slalom, giant slalom, and alpine combined. Vaughn, one of the foremost non-Olymipic skiers in the East, currently holds the world's skiing speed record at 106 miles per hour.

Vaughn negotiated the short, steep, slalom course only .8 seconds faster than Harvard's Kim Chaffee, the runner-up. Mark Jensen was tenth, Fred Noyes was 13th, and Riccardo Peccei was 15th for the Crimson.

In the giant slalom, Chaffee tied for fourth with John Ciman of Dartmouth, while Jensen finished eighth. Coach Charlie Gibson was somewhat peeved that only two of his skiers were able to finish the course, though he blamed at least one of the tumbles on a defective binding.

Nordic Skiers Excel

The team was much more successful in the Nordic events, finishing first in cross country, third in jumping, and first in the Nordic combined. Sophomore Jon Chaffee, Kim's cousin, chugged along the seven-mile cross country course in 63 minutes, for a first place finish. Other Crimson skiers also finished well; Bill Gray was fourth, Eli Noyes was fifth, and his brother Fred was seventh.

A strong showing by the freshman team augurs great things for the future. The frosh whipped St. Lawrence and Norwich, dominating all events but the jump. Steve Blodgett, racing on the varsity giant slalom course, came within .3 seconds of Vaughn's mark.

Gibson plans to cloister his squad this weekend at a training camp in Jackson, New Hampshire. He feels that with a little more practice his team can finish among the top five at the Williams Carnival Feb. 28 and 29, and thus qualify for the NCAA championships at Dartmouth in March.