The World Junior Championships got underway today in Solleftea Sweden. The top North American result was Lindsey Weier in 15th. Other than Weier, it was a dissappointing day for the US skiers. The temperature was in the low teens and Development Coach Chris Grover said the deep-freeze temperatures got the U.S. skiers, forcing a couple of drop out of the race while the others were visibly slowed. The 30/15K was expected to be our team's weakest event, since our juniors do not do a lot of long races.
Men's 30K Freestyle Mass Start
In the men's first race, Chris Jespersen posted an impressive 33 second victory . Second and third place were Alexei Petukhov and Eugeni Demntiev, both of Russia.
North American Finishers:
45 David Nighbor CAN
48 Bryan Cook USA
49 Cyrus Kangarloo CAN
57 Glenn Randall USA
Leif Zimmerman USA started very fast, but did not finish. Brent Lowen USA also did not finish.
<Full Mens Results – PDF
Womens 15K Freestyle Mass Start
The Russians and host Swedes dominated this race. Russian Ekaterina Vorontsova won by 36 seconds and teammates Irian Artemova (3rd) and Valentina Novikova (5th) were also top five. Second and fourth were Swedes: Maria Rydqvist and Hanna Forsberg respectively. Lindsey Weier USA posted a great race, taking home 15th place, less than a minute from second.
Other North Americans:
29 Daria Gaiazova CAN
42 Alison Crocker USA
45 Madeleine Williams CAN
46 Perianne Jones CAN
47 Carina Hamel USA
Kristina Trygstad-Saari struggled from the start and did not finish.
<Full Women's Results
Information from USSA press release
