Thirteen months of great imagery of Tomorrow’s and Today’s National Nordic Stars plus details on the most import National and International Events. Retail $20.00 (plus shipping) Wholesale $10.00 for Club Fundraisers or Nordic retailers, 10 units or more. Order online at https://www.nationalnordicfoundation.org/2013-calendars/
Boulder Nordic Sport is going international again this year, offering race service for the 2013 Masters World Cup in Asiago, Italy. Providing full race wax service, including ski consultations, the BNS Service Team will be arriving early to test wax at the race venue and will be on hand for every race February 16-22.
While the U.S. SuperTour season has already started, the Canadians are just about to get warmed up -- and without much time to do so -- when the NorAm opener doubles as Canadian World Cup trials this weekend.
SuperTour racing kicked off on the West Yellowstone plateau with point-to-point 9k's and sprint prologues; the FIS and IBU World Cups started in Scandinavia, where the U.S. women made history and the Canadian men had a strong relay. Recap, reporting, photos, and results.
GÄLLIVARE, Sweden – It’s always good to finish a race and be happy with the result. But the icing on the cake is when the entire sport seems to be behind your performance. And for the U.S. women after Sunday’s historic third-place relay finish, that was the case. As one team after another crossed the line behind them, they were hugged and congratulated – even by teams who surely wished the podium spot could be...
With so much happening in Gällivare, Sweden, this weekend, we didn’t have the chance to put quite everything into our main feature stories. Here are some leftovers from the races, as well as some small pieces about the U.S. men’s and Canadian women’s relays. Women’s Relay When asked about the U.S. women’s relay podium, Development Coach Bryan Fish initially didn’t get too specific… he was just impressed. “That was exciting to watch,” he told FasterSkier...
Images from Saturday’s 1.6 k freestyle prologue on the Whisky Trail. Though it wasn’t a full sprint, it sure didn’t look like anyone pushed themselves less.
FasterSkier had two cameras on location at the South Plateau to take in all the 9 k freestyle action.
GÄLLIVARE, Sweden – When Alex Harvey said yesterday that Canada could win today’s 4 x 7.5 k World Cup relay, he wasn’t kidding. It might seem surprising after the results the Canadians turned in on Saturday, with just one racer breaking the top 20 in the 15 k skate. But Sunday was a new day, and relays always generate a little extra something for the athletes. “I love racing the relay,” Devon Kershaw told FasterSkier....
Norway's relay anchor Petter Northug didn't have to use his signature finishing sprint to embarrass the Swedes on their home soil. With the extra time he had on Marcus Hellner near the finish, Northug picked up a Swedish flag and skied across the line.
While it's no surprise that Norway's women won the World Cup relay today, their margin of victory wasn't the largest it has ever been - for two legs, they were stalked by tenacious U.S. women. Jessie Diggins dug deep to retain a podium spot for the Americans.
WEST YELLOWSTONE, Mont. — Friday’s distance results in the first SuperTour of the season weren’t easy for everyone to swallow, especially not Ryan Scott of Ski & Snowboard Club Vail/Team HomeGrown. His coach Eric Pepper racked it up as a bad day. “He went out a little hard, blew up pretty hard [and] didn’t have great legs,” Pepper said on Saturday. Still, seeing he ranked 78th in the 9-kilometer skate individual start hurt. “That was...
Despite a degree of familiarity with the top of the podium, Sophie Caldwell (SMS T2) wasn't quite expecting to win the 1.6 k skate prologue so handily in West Yellowstone. She bested runner-up Anika Miller (Payette Lake Sports) by over four seconds; Caitlin Patterson (CGRP) finished third for her second bronze this weekend.
Despite two crashes that kept Liz Stephen and Jessie Diggins out of the top ten, today was easily one of the best days in the history of the U.S. women's program. The athletes reflect on how they got here.
GÄLLIVARE, Sweden – With all of the success by U.S. women at the opening World Cup race today, it is easy to forget that lots of other North American skiers competed, too. And several had strong results – headlined by Ivan Babikov of Canada, who placed 14th in the men’s 15 k skate. Babikov declined to comment to FasterSkier after the race, but appeared to have followed the same strategy he took to a podium...
GÄLLIVARE, Sweden – When fans were predicting who might win this opening World Cup at Hellner Stadion, a lot of names came up. Surely it might be a Swede – Marcus Hellner, who trains here and gave his name to the stadium, or perhaps one of his teammates, like Johan Olsson or Daniel Richardsson. Or what about “Super Dario” Cologna, the Swiss star who won last year’s World Cup overall title? Maybe Petter Northug...
GÄLLIVARE, Sweden – To here the top three women from today’s 10 k freestyle race tell it, none of them expected to win. Marit Bjørgen of Norway, the hands-down favorite coming into this first weekend of World Cup racing after winning the opening race last year as well as the overall World Cup, said that she would have been happy just to be on the podium. Despite the weight of expectations after trouncing Bjørgen...
Weeks of altitude training clearly paid off for Matt Liebsch (Borton Volvo XC United) in the first race of the year. The pride of the Midwest won the SuperTour 9 k freestyle on Friday morning on a fast but challenging point-to-point course looking like he had gas left in the tank.
WEST YELLOWSTONE, Mont. – The distance course on the South Plateau wasn’t too bad if you didn’t think about it too much. The 9-kilometer freestyle race – the first of the 2012/2013 U.S. SuperTour series – netted a slight elevation gain of about 300 feet from start to finish. A course profile indicated that the terrain was rolling. No problem. Try racing it. The individual start began around 7,260 feet above sea level, which is...
Any number of Swedish men seem capable of topping the podium on home turf. Here, Marcus Hellner leads teammates on some pickups. Otherwise, the heavy hitters come at the end: Dario Cologna and Marit Bjørgen hold the honors of being last season’s World Cup winners, and so will kick off this season wearing their yellow bibs and starting last (that puts the Norwegian as bib 78 and the Swiss star as bib 97). The last...