Hometown favorite Billy Demong (Vermontville, NY)
celebrated a weekend homecoming with his ninth national
title at the U.S. Nordic Combined Championships
in Lake Placid. Third after the morning jump, Demong
posted the third fastest 10k cross-country roller
ski time to hold off the hard charging Fletcher
brothers, Taylor and Bryan (Steamboat Springs, CO),
who took silver and bronze. Jump leader Todd Lodwick
(Steamboat Springs, CO) finished fifth in a very
tight field.
Lodwick led the jump and started 16 seconds ahead
of Demong in cross country. Both Fletcher brothers
had deficits around a minute after the jump, but
set a torrid pace in the roller ski segment. Taylor
Fletcher (Steamboat Springs, CO) had the fastest
roller ski cross country time to finish second with
brother Bryan (Steamboat Springs, CO) third.
"The biggest threat today was either Todd (Lodwick),
sprinting to the finish, or Taylor (Fletcher), who
if he catches you, the chances are he’s just going
to ski away from you on the bigger hills, especially
lately, because he’s been training so well. So I
just wanted to ski an even split and stay just 10
to 15 seconds in front of him so he didn’t have
the opportunity to break away from me. It seemed
like that worked out. He pulled within 10 seconds
of the last lap, but I had enough energy to hold
that gap to the finish line", the new champion
who won his ninth national title with this victory,
explained.
"This was a really good goal to accomplish,
winning today, especially at home, but overall it
shows that the entire team is on course. I had my
best day of the summer. But overall there were four
to five guys who could have won so I think that
our team is exceptionally strong, even stronger
than four years ago, so that’s the most important
thing to me."
RESULTS
U.S. Nordic Combined Championships
Lake Placid, NY
Oct. 13, 2013
(Jumping rank, cross country rank)
1. Billy Demong, Vermontville, NY (3, 3) 25:47.8
2. Taylor Fletcher, Steamboat Springs, CO (8, 1)
+0:11.1
3. Bryan Fletcher, Steamboat Springs, CO (7, 2)
+0:11.4
4. Brett Denney, Steamboat Springs, CO (6, 4) +0:31.1
5. Todd Lodwick, Steamboat Springs, CO (1, 5) +1:14.5