SKIING

Coach Al Merrill was nervous at the beginning of February. Snow had come late, and his skiers had had to make do with a small amount of pre-Christmas workouts in Colorado. January skiing had been good, but the competitive season still lay ahead.

February 4 and 5 was the St. Lawrence Carnival, followed on consecutive weekends by the 57th annual Dartmouth Winter Carnival, the Williams Carnival, and the Middlebury Carnival - the "Big Four" in Eastern ski competition.

Dartmouth appeared on the road to a clean sweep, after taking the Eastern Intercollegiate Ski Association Championship at Williams for the second year in a row, the Dartmouth Carnival Cup for the 32nd time since 1915, and the St. Lawrence event.

The Dartmouth team this year is unusually well balanced, with strong performers in both nordic and alpine events. They came through consistently when points were needed.

The Dartmouth Carnival provided the squeaker of the season. While the Green ended the meet with 394 points to Middlebury's 380.7, the margin was only 1.9 points at the end of the first day's activities.

Dartmouth won both the slalom and cross-country on Friday, with Middlebury a close second in each. Dartmouth Captain Ned Gillette '67 of Barre, Vt., won the cross-country, and Dartmouth placers in the slalom were Hans Mehren '68 of Oslo, Norway, in second, John Meek '67 of Hanover fifth, and Rick Lounsbury '69 of Sherrill, N. Y., sixth.

On Saturday Dartmouth split events with Middlebury, losing the downhill by a close 98.3 to 97.9 margin and sweeping the jump with Per Coucheron '68 of Oslo, Jim Speck '67 of Bethesda, Md., and Larry Gillis '69 of Rumford, Me., winning respectively the top three spots. Speck also took fifth in Friday's cross-country.

The following week at the Williams Carnival the Dartmouth skiers enjoyed such Williamstown luxuries as a portable tow for the Alpine events and a mechanical rut-disperser for the cross-country race.

Again Dartmouth took the measure of the nine-college field, again the Big Green ran off with the first two events, lost the third to Middlebury, and then piled up points in the final jumping event to win easily.

With that background, observers in mid-February gave a hefty knock-on-wood and awaited a smashing finish to the ski season.

Ski team captain Ned Gillette '67 of Barre, Vt. (left), who won the DartmouthCarnival cross-country event, shown at the jump with Coach Al Merrill.