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When Jessie Diggins (USA) first stepped onto the World Cup scene (as a fresh-faced Minnesota school kid straight out of Junior Nationals), her only real chances to excel were in Freestyle Sprints or 5 k Freestyle races. Memorably, she showed everyone her Sprint abilities by out-dueling World Cup Sprint champion, Stina Nilsson (SWE), for Olympic Gold (with Kikkan Randall). A season later, she was proving herself to be a threat at 5 k Freestyle events . . . until that event just plain went away. The 5 k distance once was a staple for women’s World Cup racing; but FIS’ efforts to apply distance equality between men’s and women’s fields meant that the 5 k was replaced with 10 k races. Suddenly, Diggins’ best shot at a distance medal became a race twice as long. Well, if the last few seasons are any indication—and if Diggins’ performance today in Les Rousses offer any additional proof—she has more than adjusted to this distance challenge.
Today in Les Rousses, Diggins started fast (a bit of a risk on this particular Distance course with its immediate and super-steep uphill), and just kept building her lead throughout the distance. She won going away with only Victoria Carl in her vicitity (19 seconds behind) followed by Astrid Oyre Slind in third (at 20 seconds).
“Originally, I had planned to pace the race a little bit slower,” said Diggins. ” But then we were watching the men’s race, and we were like ‘Holy moly, a 19 minute 10 k. This is going to be so fast! Talking with the coaches, I was like ‘I don’t think I can afford to give up any seconds anywhere.’ I gave Ben a big hug after his race, and asked if he had any tips. He said, ‘Yeah, I started really hard!” So I did end up being influenced by Ben Ogden, and it ended up being a great thing for my race.”
Among Americans, Diggins was followed in the standings by a resurgent Sophia Laukli in 8th, Lucinda Anderson 22nd, Rosie Brennan 28th, and Alayna Sonnesyn 34th (tie). Among Canadians Katherine Stewart-Jones and Lilliane Gagnon both skied strongly for 14th and 15th respectively, followed by Allison Mackie 33rd, and Olivia Bouffard-Nesbitt 38th.
Les Rousses 10 k Freestyle Interval Start
The 10 k Distance course at Les Rousses is one that demands both courage and fortitude: courage in addressing the need to attack the initial uphill (which, if raced too aggressively, results in racers being totally gassed at the top, struggling through a fog of lactic acid, and still with nine kilometers to go), and fortitude in dipping into physiological and psychological reserves to finish strongly on this unrelenting three lap course. It’s a level of discipline that only seasoned racers are likely to possess. Diggins is not the only seasoned competitor in the field, but she may just possess more fortitude than any skier in the world. Today in Les Rousses was an opportunity for her to put that fortitude on display.
Jessie Diggins in full flight is a sight to behold. Her fans got a look at “that Jessie” today. Starting fast and fearlessly, Diggins’ split times must have broken the hearts of her competitors. Frida Karlsson (SWE) started out even with Diggins, then consistenly lost time to her throughout the race. Karlsson would finish the day in seventh, 38 seconds off the lead.
Slind would remain close to Diggins at every time check, but could not overcome Diggins’ finishing surge. Slind would finish third, 20 seconds behind.
Carl was the only competitor to take a conservative approach to the early kilometers, and successfully accelerate through the finish. She chipped away at Diggins’ lead at every time check, ultimately powering into second place (19 seconds behind).
For such a short race (the shortest Distance race that World Cup fields contest), the Les Rousses course was extremely daunting. Laukli shed some light on the particular challenges of the Les Rousses course: “It was definitely a challenge to balance pacing and avoid blowing up, but also not going too slow,” Laukli said. “I’m typically not one to start very fast so for me I just had to go all out and hope I didn’t blow up, which mostly worked out.”
Laukli ended the recent Tour de Ski less than satisfied with her performance, and hampered by injuries sustained in a fall during one of the Tour’s mass start stages. Though 10 k is not her favorite distance, today’s strong result in Les Rousses felt like a bit of redemption for Laukli.
“Today’s race was a really really fast 10km and definitely a bit shorter than I would’ve liked,” said Laukli. “But because of that I’m happy with my result because it was really not a distance skiers course, so I probably did the best I could. I was unsure if I would be back racing this weekend after the tour just because of some injury and bad feelings over the tour, so I was just happy to be back and able to race, and closer to what I know I’m capable of.”
