The carnival also doubled as the Eastern Intercollegiate Ski Association Championships. The competition provided no added weight in the final standings, but were followed by an awards ceremony noting teams' achievements this season.
The season's final competition did not go off without a hitch, as weather conditions delayed some scheduled races, and slick trails provided for some extremely close finishes.
The conditions, however, did nothing to deter the women's cross-country team, which snatched first place in both of its races for a fifth consecutive week.
The women Nordic skiers, whose point contributions to the team's total were instrumental to the Big Green's success this season, were well-positioned to be the best in the East this year, women's Nordic coach Cami Thompson said.
"I don't think it's a huge surprise -- I think we have strong team, and we have been building up since before the season started," she said. "We did it a couple years ago, and we certainly knew it was possible. At the same time, it's nice to have gotten this."
In the women's five-kilometer classic, all six of Dartmouth's skiers finished in the top 10, led comfortably by Rosie Brennan '11 with a time of 19:11.8. Following Brennan was Hannah Dreissigacker '09 in fourth, Sophie Caldwell '12 in fifth, Ida Sargent '11 in sixth, Stephanie Crocker '12 in ninth and Erika Flowers '12 in 10th.
Saturday's 15-kilometer freestyle took shape a bit differently from Friday's five-kilometer race, as a passing storm quickly changed the weather conditions and resulted in icy trails for all the competitors.
Although groomed in time for racing, the trail's conditions impeded any chance to break away from the pack and thus created extremely tight races. Caldwell finished second in the race, clocking in at 48:11.5 -- only four-tenths of a second behind Middlebury College freshman Elise Moody-Roberts.
"I think it is closer when races are not really hard," Thompson said. "It was fairly fast conditions on Saturday, although Rosie won by a significant margin on Friday and had a good race there."
A similar story unfolded for the men's cross-country races, as the 20-kilometer freestyle saw Eric Packer '12 finish second with a time of 54:30.9, only five-tenths of a second behind Simeon Hamilton of Middlebury.
Four-tenths of a second later, Patrick O'Brien '10 claimed third, followed by Nils Koons '11 in fourth and Ben True '08 in sixth.
Packer's third-place finish in the freestyle race was his highest placing of the season.
Changing conditions before the race made it difficult to prepare for, he said.
"Minutes before the race [on Saturday] a warm wind hit, and the snow conditions changed really fast, and everyone was scrambling to get skis together," Packer said. "We ended up using skis that we hadn't really prepared for the race, but just had as a backup. Everyone was running like crazy, but it ended up being a pretty good race for Dartmouth."
In Friday's 10-kilometer classic race, five of Dartmouth's men finished in the top 10, beginning with Glenn Randall '09 in first, who clocked in with a time of 31:59.9.
Saturday's strange weather patterns hurt alpine skiers the most, as they were forced to cut the slalom races short and compete in the giant slalom race a day later than planned.
With only one heat, rather than the usual two, in Friday's slalom race, a lot of weight was riding on a single run.
Courtney Hammond '11 stepped up to the challenge, securing a first-place finish with a time of 43.30 seconds. Christine Roberts '10 followed in second with a time of 43.81.
The giant slalom race was then pushed to Sunday as officials decided the hill was too icy from the day's rain, and could not be groomed in time for the race to take place on Saturday.
Hammond returned to the two-heat race on Sunday, finishing first with a combined time of 1:52.83. Kelsey Roddick '11 followed in third with a total time of 1:53.35.
"It was interesting because we heard rumors about the race's [postponement], but you don't think about that before a race," Hammond said. "It was really confusing, but it ended up working out, and the Sunday conditions were great, and we all did really well."
Men's alpine took fourth and fifth place in the slalom and giant slalom races, respectively, helped by a seventh place finish by Rusty Heise '09 in the slalom race.
With the end of the carnival season, the team will look ahead to the NCAA Championships, which begin on March 11, and will be hosted by Bates College in Lewiston, Maine.
Each of Dartmouth's four teams can bring a maximum of three skiers to compete.
Caldwell, Dreissigacker and Brennan will compete for women's Nordic, and Hammond, Roberts and Roddick will represent women's alpine, while the men's selections have not yet been made official.
"We've all been looking forward to this all season, and I think we have a really strong team coming in, so it's really exciting," Hammond said.
