Despite relatively low snow, Anchorage is ready to host U.S. Cross Country Ski Championships

Matt Pauli took a breather from moving snow at Kincaid Park on Saturday to survey the situation.

While Anchorage’s 2 inches of December snow isn’t ideal for this week’s U.S. Cross Country Ski Championships, he is confident the Kincaid courses will be in fine shape when racing starts Thursday.

Pauli, the chief of competition for nationals, has four decades of experience working in major competitions in Anchorage and a long memory.

Anchorage has hosted the event more than a half-dozen times, including in 1983 when the city hosted both nationals and a World Cup stop. Pauli pointed to the last two times Anchorage has hosted — in 2010 and 2018 — as being similarly light with early winter snow.

“We’ve dealt with this a lot,” he said. “I’ve seen it worse, and we’ve had nationals. It’s kind of par for the course this early in the season.”

[One of the least-snowy Decembers on record makes for idle plows and happy skaters in Anchorage]

Pauli was joined at Kincaid by a host of volunteers Saturday who helped move outlying snow onto the trails for continued grooming. While snowmachines zipped back and forth with loads of snow, shovelers relocated snow to the middle of the trail from just off the outskirts.

“There’s some type of method to the chaos,” Pauli said. “We’ve got a lot of other equipment that’ll come through later that will spread it and tighten it up as it gets colder for us.”

The volunteer corps was composed of coaches, parents, fans and plenty of skiers of all ages.

Trond Flagstad is a UAA associate Nordic coach as well as a father to skiers in the Alaska Winter Stars program, and will have skiers from both groups competing this weekend.

“We have a really good base,” he said. “We’ve been racing on it. Skating is good, but we need more snow to set a track (for classic skiing).”

Pauli emphasized wanting to have more than the minimum requirements when it came to setting classic tracks.

Naomi Smith, 12, is a Winter Stars skier who was shoveling snow with a group of her teammates Saturday.

“We’ve been out skiing a good amount,” she said. “It’s not been horrible but it’s been better (in winters with more snow).”

Smith will be cheering on her brother Lance, who will compete over the weekend in the U16 category.

Cindi Hillemeyer lives in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, but grew up racing in Anchorage. She joined the shovel brigade on Saturday and recalled previous nationals in Anchorage from her youth.

“It’s an amazing show of support out here today,” she said. “They always pull it off even if it’s slim pickings for snow.”

Her nephew, former Service standout Alexander Maurer, is competing this weekend with the University of Colorado.

Outside of the trails, hosting nationals is a significant undertaking, with work and prep going back more than a year. The Nordic Skiing Association of Anchorage and Anchorage Parks & Recreation are co-hosts of the event, with scheduled competition days on Thursday, Saturday, Sunday and Tuesday.

Ida Gullett, who is co-chair of the event, said even outside of Saturday’s big snow-moving effort, there are more than 200 volunteers signed up to work the races. She also touted a livestream with former Olympian Nina Kemppel as part of the commentary team.

Each year there are changes to rules and specifications. This year, that includes new wax testing protocols. While the lack of snow won’t halt the races, it has changed the way organizers have set up the courses.

“We had to switch around a few courses,” Gullett said. “We wanted to do a one-lap 10K as our start race, kind of let athletes race strictly against the clock. We’ve had to switch gears and move to a two-lap 5K course.

“Everybody that helps do all the snowmaking, our grooming crew, they have all been rock stars. And so the snow that we have out there on the courses is fantastic with as little snow as we’ve had.”

NSAA executive director Kikkan Randall has competed in plenty of nationals as a skier but now has the boot on the other foot as an organizer. She said the institutional knowledge among veterans of previous championships and volunteer enthusiasm have been vital.

“I’m getting a whole new appreciation for this after racing several championships as a racer, now getting to see what it takes to put on this event,” she said. “I am blown away and super grateful for so many people that have put on all those championships that I got to participate in and incredibly grateful for the team we have here in Anchorage.”

Over 350 skiers are registered to compete, but multiple Alaskans could be in contention for national titles. There are nearly two dozen Alaska Winter Stars and 30 members of the UAA and UAF teams competing in various divisions with upwards of 40 representatives of the APU team.

“That’s a huge Alaska contingency,” Gullett said.

APU’s Luke Jager won last year’s classic sprint race in a time of 3 minutes, 45.60 seconds, and placed third in the 10K classic. APU teammate Michael Earnhart posted top-five finishes in both the classic sprint and the freestyle sprint.