Taylor Henrich and Tyler Smith win open Canadian nationals
Taylor Henrich wins Canadian nationals - NordicFocus
On the past weekend, the Canadian Nordic Combined athletes fought for the respective titles of Canadian Champion in the 2014 AVIVA Insurance CDN National Championships held at Whistler Park. Next to the men's and the junior race, five female Nordic Combined athletes also battled for the ladies' title. With this commendable effort, Canada is continuing to be one of the countries spearheading the development of Ladies Nordic Combined.
Like last year, Taylor Henrich claimed the ladies title with a whopping 2 minute lead on second-placed Jasmine Sepandj. Natasha Bodnarchuck claimed rank three, finishing 3:20 after Henrich. Abigail Strate and Nicole Maurer completed the result list.
After the jumping part, Henrich who is usually a regular on the ladies ski jumping World Cup had already been in the lead with a jump of 80.5 metres. Jasmine Sepandj also landed at 80.5 metres but due to her better style points, Henrich was able to go out on the 5 km cross-country track which also included a table top jump 18 seconds before Sepandj.
Nicole Maurer had been lying in third after the jumping part but lost her place to Bodnarchuck and Strate who skied about three minutes faster than Maurer. Taylor Henrich skied an undisputed fastest time with 17:45.0 for the five kilometres and Natasha Bodnarchuck claimed the third spot on the podium by skiing the second fastest time with 18:57.0
In the open men category, Tyler Smith beat out Wesley Sevill by one second in a finish line sprint. Nathaniel Mah claimed rank three by finishing 24 seconds after Smith. The other places went to JC Pretorius, Michael Ward, Colin Delaney and Sebastian Dandurand. Ward improved from a seventh rank to a final fifth by skiing the fastest time of 27:19.0 for the 4x 2.5 kilometres.
Nathaniel Mah had been in the lead after the ski jumping with 98.5 metres, beating out JC Pretorius who landed at 92.5 metres. Mah went out on the track with a 50 second advantage on Pretorius. Savill and Smith followed over two minutes behind Mah but the table top jump also did its part to jostle the result list with a lot of crashes.
In the junior category, Jack von Lierop won ahead of Ollie Munn.
