After a week of practicing on snow at home, the Boothbay Region High School Nordic team turned in this season’s best performance at the Maranacook Waves freestyle race on Saturday, Jan. 17 at Sugarloaf.

Fifteen high school Nordic teams and hundreds of skiers competed under cold clear skies and excellent conditions.

“While the weather forecast looked quite ominous, it didn't feel too bad at all,” Coach Nick Scott reports. “A lot of the course was in the woods and the open portions were pretty well blocked from the wind. The conditions were really nice; the open field spaces were a little slower, but the trails in the woods were really fast and fun to ski on.”

At Maranacook, the Seahawks were able to capitalize on the good conditions and their week of steady practice. The entire boys squad posted significantly faster times than they had in previous skate races this year.

Kyler Carty led the BRHS scorers, finishing 26th at 16:15, followed by Zach Vise (41st, 17:08), Joey Paolillo (54th,18:10) and Liam Conlin (60th, 18:19). Also skiing for the Seahawks were David Machon (69th, 18:57), Ray Perry (78th, 19:52), Trystan Mercier (94th, 21:07) and Sam Betts (100th, 22:55).

“It was a really good race for almost everyone. Kyler continues to ski very well as do Zach and Joey,” Coach Scott said, “Liam Conlin and David Machon had really big days. Liam made a huge jump between the last skate race we had and this one (two full minutes faster).”

Boothbay placed ninth overall, their best team finish to date at the annual Maranacook event. Scott reports that Carty’s finish time was the best for any Seahawk in this race ever and he tied Chase Brown’s record for the best finish place (better than 77 percent of his competitors) at this event.

Looking at their Mountain Valley Conference competitors, BRHS stacks up even better.

“We were also much closer to Telstar and Dirigo this week than last week,” Scott said. “When you rescore the meet with only MVC schools Dirigo won with 29, Telstar was next with 31 and we scored 32.”

Angela Machon, who finished 102nd at 27:43 was once again the solo Lady Seahawk to compete on Saturday.

Scott said the rest of the girls’ squad is still working on building their skill set.

“There are five girls on the roster, but only Angela has ever skied before. The other girls will ski in a race eventually, but right now it is a safety issue as their skills are not sufficient to participate in a crowded race on challenging courses,” Scott said.

The Seahawks are scheduled to race at Oxford Hills on Saturday.