We next spotlight sophomore Killian Lathrop of Cape Elizabeth who won the Class B Slalom and helped his team win the Class B Alpine title. Killian was also the
WMC Slalom champion. We asked him about his success and his team's reaction to winning.
1) What were your preparations leading up to the state meet ? A few days before the race I got in a few good training runs at Sugarloaf with the CVA weekend program, then I went home and tuned and waxed my skis. I was trying to stay relaxed, eat healthy, and drink a ton of water. On the night of the race I played fortnite with the boys in the hotel room, then before bed I watched Ted Ligety, and Marcel Hirscher with Ian Geikie to get stoked.
2) How did you deal with the pressure and emotions that come along with competing in a state meet?
Everyone gets nervous before a race but I just try to not think about it and have fun and fool around with my friends.
3) What was going through your mind at the starting gate knowing about the conditions and knowing that you could win? I was just trying to clear my mind and relax, and think about my line through the course and where I could make up time and where to take it easy. On second run I was just thinking about staying on my feet trying not to kill it and fall.
4) You were the WMC slalom champ and the Class B Slalom State Champion, what do you contribute your great slalom success to? I train a lot with the CVA weekend program up at Sugarloaf, so all my coaches there help me get faster and better. Also my older brother Devon, who pushes me to keep up with him. on the mountain, but unfortunately he couldn’t race this year because he tore his ACL free skiing in early December.
5) What are your plans for next year? I’m going to try get faster in SL, and going to work on my GS skiing and try to get on the podium at states, try to win another state championship, and going to try beat my brother Devon.
6) What was your reaction when you found out that your team won the Class B Alpine? I was super stoked, because we have never won a state championship before. I knew that we had the potential to do it after we won WMC and after the first day of states, but I was surprised about the amount of points we won by. Everyone on the team had two solid days of racing which really helped us.