Denver Dominates UAF Invitational

Monday, February 17, 2025 • by Curtis Snyder, RMISA

FAIRBANKS, Alaska—The Denver Pioneers won the 2025 Alaska Fairbanks Invitational with an impressive performance by scoring 345 points in the Nordic-only meet.

Sunday saw the season's only sprint race, a classic race on the brand new competition trails on the UAF campus. The Pioneers placed three skiers in the finals heat where they finished 4-5-6 with Eve-Ondine Duchoufour, Lea Wenaas and Anna Stewart claiming those places. Denver scored 87 points out of the gate. But the Utes bettered the Pioneers by two points in that race with Erica Laven winning the finals head and Celine Mayer taking third. Montana State's Anna Pryce finished second to close out the finals heat.

The Denver men then dominated the men's race with Andreas Kirkeng winning and Florian Knopf taking second for the Pioneers as the team racked up 95 points and took the first day lead. UAA's Erling Bjoernstad was third with UAF's Cole Flowers taking fifth. Utah's Zachary Jayne rounded out the top five and Colorado's Eemil Juntunen was the final performer in the finals heat.

Monday moved to the 10K freestyle race and the Pioneers placed three in the top six of the men's race to take a commanding 49 point lead through three events. After UAF's Ben Dohlby, who won his first career race, the Pioneer's Kirkeng took second followed by Bushey for the Utes. After CU's Luka Riley took fourth, it was two more Pioneers, Knopf and Weenig, to tround out the top six.

UAF made it an individual race sweep for the 10K races with Kendall Kramer pulling off the win over Utah's Laven. The Nanook's Tabitha Williams was third followed by a pair of Bobcats with MSU's Katey Houser and Anna Pryce rounding out the top five. Denver was led by Wenaas in sixth and had four of the top 11 to close out the meet victory.

The teams now head south to Anchorage to take part in the RMISA Championships Friday and Saturday. Alpine teams pick up action on Wednesday with four days of racing to close out the UAA Invitational, which Nordic teams took part in way back in early January, and then also competing in the RMISA Championships.