Zamansky, Jess Kelley win World Cup trials

Jake Zamansky and Jessica Kelley won time trials Friday at Keystone's North Peak to earn World Cup starting berths in Beaver Creek and Aspen, respectively. Zamansky won a time trial Friday at North Peak at Keystone, Colorado, to earn a berth in the Dec. 3 World Cup slalom at Beaver Creek. Zamansky skied fastest in both runs to nab the spot ahead of Tim Kelley and Warner Nickerson.

JAKE ZAMANSKY AND JESSICA KELLEY won time trials Friday at Keystone's North Peak to earn World Cup starting berths in Beaver Creek and Aspen, respectively.
    Zamansky won a time trial Friday at North Peak at Keystone, Colorado, to earn a berth in the Dec. 3 World Cup slalom at Beaver Creek. Zamansky skied fastest in both runs to nab the spot ahead of Tim Kelley and Warner Nickerson.
   "It went well. Keystone's done such a great job with preparing the conditions — really, outstanding snowmaking for us," men's head coach Phil McNichol said, "and it was pretty cool. We ran the time trials simultaneously, guys up top with a little overlap on courses, and the women at the bottom of the course … definitely pretty cool."
    “All three guys skied real well,” U.S. men’s technical coach Mike Morin said. “It was a good time trial on very good snow and it was exciting to see Jake skiing quite well.”
    The men will be looking to fill seven slalom places in the Dec. 3 race at Beaver Creek. Bode Miller will be joined by Olympic combined champion Ted Ligety, Jimmy Cochran, Tom Rothrock, NorAm slalom runner-up Roger Brown, T.J. Lanning, plus one skier determined in the time trial — Zamansky — and another selected from results at the NorAms Nov. 27-30 at Keystone.
    Kevin Francis, one of the Europa Cup speed skiers, won the GS spot for Beaver Creek a week ago in a time trial. Zamansky and Nickerson are among a group of racers already set to compete in the Beaver Creek GS.
    McNichol said the final slalom start was awarded to Lanning. Originally, U.S. coaches planned to fill the seventh slalom start based on results from the Chevrolet Super Series slaloms Nov. 30 and Dec. 1 at Keystone. However, since Lanning already had skied so well in training to earn a super combined berth, and that would give him familiarity with the World Cup slalom hill, coaches decided to have Lanning be the final U.S. skier in the Beaver Creek race.
    World Cup spots are allocated by the number of individuals from each nation that are ranked in the top 60 based off World Cup Start Lists. From those allocated spots for each nation, each skier that uses them must be ranked in the top 100 based off of FIS points in that event. The U.S. men have two “top 100” spots open due to Daron Rahlves’ retirement and Dane Spencer’s injury.
    Kelley won the women’s giant slalom time trial Friday, with Katie Hitchcock and Caitlin Ciccone also earning starting berths. Keely Kelleher and Kirsten Clark competed in the trial but did not ski fast enough to earn a berth. Kelley won the trial by more than a second, followed by Hitchcock and Ciccone. The trial filled the last three places in the 10-skier quota for the GS Nov. 25 at the Sirius Satellite Radio Aspen Winternational. The race will be the first giant slalom of the season after rains and warm temperatures forced cancellation of the original season opener Oct. 28 in Sölden, Austria.
    “Jess’ first run was classic, is how I would put it,” women’s tech coach Chris Knight said. “She did a good job. It’s good when they can produce that sort of run in their first run of the morning.”
    In a similar time trial in Sölden, Hitchcock won with Ciccone and Kelley also securing starts, which subsequently were wiped out by a night of rain that washed out the race course on the Rettenbach Glacier. Already assured of giant slalom start spots are Olympic GS gold medalist Julia Mancuso, Lindsey Kildow, Resi Stiegler, Libby Ludlow, Stacey Cook, NorAm GS champion Megan McJames and Kristen Mielke, the NorAm GS runner-up the last two seasons.
    “If we can transfer that skiing into the race, we’ll be looking good,” Knight said. “Snow-wise, the conditions at Aspen should be pretty close [to Keystone]. The glaciers in Europe had pretty soft snow, melting a lot, springlike, but over here it’s injected rock-hard snow, and you really know if your skis are working well in those conditions. It really brings out the best and the worst in athletes.
    “Of course, the terrain in Aspen is a lot different. It’s a challenging hill with all those rolls, not a lot of consistent fall line, it’s all rolls and turns. It’s not terrain you find elsewhere, quite a unique hill.”
    Knight said the team will train through the weekend and early next week, maximizing training time at Keystone before heading to Aspen Wednesday for the World Cup. Mancuso will resume training next week, and Stiegler returns to the training hill Saturday after a five-day break following her 10th-place effort in the Levi, Finland, slalom.
    While the women were battling it out in their own qualifier, Kildow was working overtime at Copper on her speed technique with coach Alex Hoedlmoser. “It was really good. She’s getting her feeling back on the speed side again,” he said. “She had a break from it by going over to Finland for that single slalom, so she missed out on some speed training, which the others had. So she’s staying a little longer and will do some extra speed training.”