BY KAREN BOSSICK

Sun Valley’s John Steel Hagenbuch was crowned NCAA XC ski champion Thursday, winning the 7.5-kilometer classic race on his home college course at Oak Hill just outside of Hanover, N.H.

It was the second national title in two years as he finished first in front of a huge crowd with a time of 20:52.08.  He won the 7.5K freestyle at the NCAA skiing championships last year.

The 23-year-old Dartmouth Ski Team racer, who grew up racing in the Sun Valley Ski Education Foundation program and now is part of the Stifel U.S. Ski Team, won a national title in the 20K freestyle  and was a bronze medalist in the U23 skate sprint during the 2023-24 winter season in Slovenia..

He has won the American Birkebeiner, Sun Valley’s Boulder Mountain Tour and two Junior World Championship Team Relay gold medals. And he had a 13th place finish in a World Cup race in Ostersund.

But Berit Campion reported that he told The Dartmouth newspaper last summer that he considered the NCAA Championship being hosted at Dartmouth the most important race of his career.

“I can’t wait to see all the smiling faces of friends and fraternity brothers out there in the crowd, and I’m literally going to try to have cardiac arrest,” said Hagenbuch, who was named the men’s Nordic National Skier of the Year by the U.S. Collegiate Ski Coaches Association.

Hagenbuch, a junior at Dartmouth, said that Thursday’s race was super fun, with family, friends and even teachers there supporting him on a warm day when he could shed his race suit.

“It’s really special to compete at home,” he told Dartmouth College Sports. “We’re out here every day training and there’s no place like home.”

But, he noted, he’s not finished.

Hagenbuch and his Big Green teammates will toe the starting line for the 20K freestyle race in the 2025 NCAA championships today—Saturday, March 8.

“I’m going to give it my all or die trying out there,” he said.