Matthew Clarner took his Nordic skiing skills from Hopkinton HIgh to Clarkson University. Now he’s taking them to the world stage across the globe in Changchun, China.
The junior dual athlete (cross country and Nordic skiing) has been selected among a competitive pool of skiers to represent Team USA at January’s World University Games. Clarner is one of eight male United States Collegiate Ski and Snowboard Association (USCSA) student-athletes to make the team that will head to China for the competition.
“I’m definitely looking forward to it,” he said. “It should be definitely a really cool experience. This could be interesting to race against a very new group of people in a very new area, too.”
Clarner’s already roller skiing in between his cross country training schedule so he can peak by the time he travels to China. It’s nothing new to him, though, as he would go through a similar process every year when he was in high school. The stakes are just higher this time around.
He set a personal best in cross country during his senior season at Hopkinton with a finish of 16 minutes, 29.5 seconds in the NHIAA Meet of Champions to place 37th. Just a few months later, he helped New Hampshire claim its first Eastern High School Championship in Nordic skiing since 1995 over Vermont after placing third overall.
The male Nordic team is made up of Wesley Sumner (Colorado Mesa University), Paavo Rova (Saint Olaf College), Gabriel Lloyd (Paul Smiths College), Sisu Lange (Paul Smiths College), Philip Matthews IV (Paul Smiths College), Graydon Walker (Western Colorado University) and Austin Quillian (University of Wyoming).
He knows his Paul Smiths College teammates well because of the proximity between the two upstate New York schools. Otherwise, he said, he doesn’t know much about the competition.
“I’ll want to try and focus my training to really get that to essentially have like that peaked more towards the beginning, but I think it should work out pretty well,” Clarner said.
Clarner’s sophomore year was a resounding success with the Golden Knights, as he finished sixth overall at the USCSA national championships last March, with a fourth in the 7.5K classic and 15K freestyle while also placing 21st in the freestyle sprint.
It won’t be an easy task to miss two weeks of school, where Clarner is studying aerospace and mechanical engineering. He’s looking forward to the challenge nonetheless and is trying to perform at his highest level in a brand new landscape.
