Blues skiers carve out impressive result
IN THE absence of any Cambridge involvement to spoil the party, writes Ben Hodgson, Oxford's skiers and snowboarders, along with some 3000 students from 40 universities, enjoyed a week of unmitigated success and outrageous après-ski at the annual British Universities Skiing and Snowboarding Council Alpine Championships in the French resort of Les Arcs.
Having mustered only three skiers to compete in the 1998 competitions, an aggressive press-gang recruitment policy ensured that Oxford teams were entered into all three of the main team events, Men's A, Women's and Men's B. However, no-one, least of all the established members of University skiing's upper echelons, namely Bristol, Edinburgh and Heriott-Watt, could have predicted the stream of remarkable results in both individual and team events with which Oxford swept the board at this, the first BUSA-recognised BUSC event. Certainly, the sight of an intoxicated Monica Shaw dressed in the colours of the English ski team and barely able to co-ordinate an effective snowplough after the team fondue, can have done little to instil fear into the hearts of their adversaries.
The core of the Men's A team that destroyed Cambridge at Christmas was available to Captain and Club President Dan Shute, with a freak ankle injury sustained by Nick Faure-Walker, in a bizarre cross-dressing platform shoes incident, healing sufficiently to enable his participation. A morning's training with the captain's personal coach, sacrificing the prospect of a foot of powder, paid off the following day in the Giant Slalom as the team's aggregate time was sufficient to place them fourth behind leaders Bristol, Edinburgh and Heriott-Watt. Not to be outdone, the B team stormed to a resounding victory, with Ed Booty, Lawrence Hene and Tony Dykes taking first, second and fourth places in a strong field.
The Womens' team, despite the early departure of top racer Monica Shaw from the course and the relative inexperience of the remaining racers, rallied to finish respectably high in mid-table.
Rumours soon surfaced that Oxford's surprise success had more to do with increasingly amorous encounters between former President Shaw and the head-honcho of the BUSC organising committee, Gregor McDonald. However, these soon evaporated as the A Team went one better the following day to finish third in the team slalom event. Skiing being a tactical race, the team's main priority was to ensure at least three finishes in order to guarantee a placing. This shrewd thinking paid off, as a tricky course and icy conditions claimed over half the field, leaving few universities with the results to achieve a placing. Solid performances by Hodgson and Brunner and a heroic run by Shute, skiing through the pain barrier to ignore the early destruction of a shinpad, were sufficient to displace Heriott Watt and give Oxford third place in the combined team event, only five seconds behind winners Bristol. The B Team unfortunately struggled with the highly technical course and failed to place, thus missing out on what would surely have been a convincing over all victory. Monica Shaw once again silenced the critics that have so frequently made an issue of her Mersonesque lifestyle to place second in the Women's team slalom and third in the individual, results ably supported by her teammates to give another high placing for Oxford.
The teams were now disbanded, with the vast majority of Oxford competitors qualifying for the individual races. Quite literally still drunk on their success, they reassembled at the Stade for a 9am course inspection and waited for the bright spring sunshine to soften the course sufficiently to bolster their confidence. Oddly, without the pride of skiing for Oxford rather than only themselves, men and women alike found it hard to rediscover their early form, with only Shute achieving a noteworthy finish, placing 6th in the Giant Slalom. His mother, however, was unimpressed and sent young Daniel back to the training course for the remainder of the day. Which matriarchal decree led to an improved 5th in the Slalom.
Whilst the skiers had been enjoying afternoons off for this first half of the week, Oxford's lone snowboarder Ben Hodgson ditched his skis and adopted a side-on stance for the hotly-contested snowboard disciplines. The first of these was the parallel slalom in which racers compete head-to-head down identical courses. Expectations were initially high, with Hodgson being seeded second after a time trial. Disaster struck in the semi-final, however, as an over-eager start led to a collision with the start gate and a sizeable head wound. Finishing only narrowly behind his opponent, Hodgson rallied to win the 3rd-4th place race. The timed Giant Slalom also brought misfortune as a fall in the first of two runs down the course left him six seconds off the pace, only half of which he was able to make up, finishing 5th. Boardercross was a new event to BUSC and to most of its competitors, but the thrill of racing alongside 3 opponents down a course comprising jumps, banked corners and rollers attracted a large field, with Oxford's representative succumbing to the lottery of unavoidable collisions at the semi-final stage.
There remained only three events, including the illustrious Big Air contest. A crowd of three thousand gathered to watch daredevils and drunken idiots alike. Hodgson did his best to join the growing casualty list in an abortive back-flip attempt, leaving Faure-Walker to represent the skiers in his own inimitable style. Suffice to say, neither progressed to the second round. The final day required Hodgson and Shute to rally themselves once more, shrug off hangovers and square up to the dangers of a Super-G course - only a Downhill is faster. Grateful for the compulsory helmets, neither was inclined to die heroically and finished well down the field. In the grand finale, the team parallel slalom, Oxford failed to live up to their fourth place seeding as a weary Hodgson turned villain and contrived to finish the course backwards in the first race, handing Loughborough an easy win.
BUSC '99 was the first Alpine Championships not to have a Scottish top three, Bristol and Oxford sandwiching Edinburgh. It was left to veteran Monica Shaw to put things in perspective, "Considering we didn't even have a team last year, this year's performance was astonishing. Finishing above so many of the Scottish universities is particulary impressive," she said. "It's a shame I'll be competing against Oxford next year."