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People are always asking Ben Ogden, “How does it feel to be on the start line with Klaebo, Jouve, Chanavat?” His response reveals much about both Ogden’s attitude as a competitor, and his character as a young man:
“For me, it’s not really a question of how it feels on the starting line,” he says. “It’s more a question of how it feels during the race. Klaebo goes by me, and I’m like, ‘That was bound to happen at some point.’ And it’s true, but if that’s what I’m thinking every time he goes by, then what am I even doing here? I would be a lot better skier if when Klaebo gets by me I was thinking, ‘Alright, how am I going to get back in front of him?’ Even if I spend the next ten years chasing him and never once beat him, I might as well stop now if I don’t believe I can ever beat him.”
“In terms of the consistency of Klaebo’s performances, it’s nuts. Nobody else makes a final more than 40% of the time (Klaebo always makes the final). AND what about some guy falling in front of you, or some guy stumbling in front of you, or getting boxed out, or someone stepping on your pole? For Klaebo, that NEVER happens. The rest of us, that happens all the time and we’re just like, ‘Oh, that’s sprinting.’ But that’s sprinting for 99% of us; for 1% of us (Klaebo) that’s not the sprint event he’s entered in. Sprinting is something very different for him than it is for us.”
Summer of the Double Pole
When asked about changes he intends to make in his training strategy this summer, Ogden’s ideas were more about refinement than wholesale change:
“Not anything too drastic,” he said. “But one of my big goals is about the first minute and the fourth minute of a sprint heat. Look at me in Drammen: my double poling in the first minute is pretty good, though in the fourth minute it’s atrocious. Double poling feels like NOT my strength because I get out-double poled at the line routinely. But the reality of it may be that others are better at maintaining good technique—getting up high, not getting frantic—when they’re tired. One of my big goals this summer is, when we do speeds, to change up the level of anaerobic stress.”
“Usually when we do double-pole speeds we’re fully rested (heart rate maybe 90 BPM). That’s great, but I’m like, ‘Maybe we should do L3 or even L4 before your speeds—watch your video THEN.’ I think the program (for me) should involve more stressed speeds. Concentrate on the fifth, sixth, seventh effort. It’s so easy to fall into the mistake of just going ‘tempo.’ When you’re fresh, you’d just commit to ‘strength.’”
“That’s mainly what I took away from this season. It was funny: at the beginning, I was like, ‘Oh, my double pole’s not good enough.’ But then I was watching some video this spring; actually my double-pole isn’t too bad. It really is my finish—my final 100—that’s not great. And that’s a different thing. I may be double-poling the final 100, but it’s not that my double-pole technique is problematic. It can certainly get better, but the most important training may be learning how to avoid getting frantic when I’m tired. That’s a big thing on my mind this summer.”
Therein lies the true challenge in sprinting: to practice being present, to focus on what I can do to optimize my own situation and not be distracted by what everybody else is doing.”
Ogden confessed to being affected by other racers in the most challenging moments of any sprint heat—the final 100 meters. He spoke to his own propensity to increase tempo too radically, to rely on speeding up rather than powering through, to fall into patterns of franticness rather than sticking with his strengths:
