RUMFORD, Maine – Aside from their “bro” talk and Colorado slang, Team HomeGrown knows how to get serious when it counts. It might not seem that way when its athletes, like U.S. Ski Team members Tad Elliott and Noah Hoffman, jokingly hold hands. Most of Team HomeGrown thinks every race is “awesome” and “pretty sweet,” even if it isn’t their strength. That’s just their attitude. In its third season as part of Ski and Snowboard...
RUMFORD, Maine — Eighteen athletes braved Wednesday’s brutal temperatures and wind to kick off the 2012 U.S. Adaptive Cross Country Championships with the 0.8 k sprints at Black Mountain. The number of competitors was likely a record, according to U.S. Paralympics High Performance Nordic Director John Farra. “Some of them are just developing some of them are racing World Cups and finishing in the top ten,” Farra said. “We’re really developing as a nation and...
RUMFORD, Maine – Standing opposite of six bodies storming toward the finish at the 2012 U.S. Cross Country Championships on Tuesday, a spectator a few hundred meters away might have struggled to pick out a specific racer in the Central Cross Country crew. There were three of them in the women’s 1.4 k freestyle sprint A-final at the Black Mountain on Tuesday — all in red, all blond and all at the front of...
RUMFORD, Maine — With the first day of U.S. Nationals racing over and done, here’s a look at what didn’t make it into the freestyle sprint recaps. Racers shed light on course conditions, changing strategies and the unavoidable bumps along the way. On preparations: “I planned my season to get good right now, and it looks like its coming together and that’s all you can hope for.” – Torin Koos (BSF), 1st in Tuesday’s freestyle...
Note: Due to a change in the results from the women’s sprint qualifier, this article has been updated. RUMFORD, Maine — Twenty-four hours after the 2012 U.S. Cross Country Nationals were originally scheduled to start, the women in the 1.4 k freestyle sprint qualifier found themselves racing on completely different conditions on Tuesday – and no one was complaining. The second to start, Jessie Diggins (Central Cross Country) posted the fastest qualifying time in 2:58.84,...
RUMFORD, Maine — A look at the freestyle sprint course on Black Mountain, about 1 1/2 hours before the start. The women’s 1.4 k qualifier kicks off at 9 a.m. and the men start the 1.6 k qualifier at 10 a.m. Video: Athletes were busy warming up on the sprint course and some coaches had been testing wax since before dark.
On the eve of U.S. Nationals in Rumford, Maine, FasterSkier’s Audrey Mangan talks about the conditions and the atmosphere in at Black Mountain on Sunday.
Once again, we’re shaking up the Pro Workout series by giving busy skiers a chance to add some simple weight training (simple in principle, harder in practice) to their fitness regimens. This is the second “quick” workout in a series about gym exercises. We started with Canadian Senior World Cup team member
Four days after Jennifer Caldwell passed away at home, the former U.S. Ski Team member and University of Vermont graduate will be remembered at a memorial service on Saturday, Dec. 31, at St. Katharine Drexel Church (11 a.m.) in Wolfeboro, N.H. Caldwell died at home on Tuesday at age 53. She is survived by her daughter Anya, husband Howie Bean, parents John and Hep Caldwell and three older brothers: Tim, Sverre and Peter Caldwell. Among...
Looking for photos from U.S. Nationals? Be sure to check out click here.
The American Birkebeiner Ski Foundation (ABSF) is one step closer to having its wish in developing a new trailhead about three miles south of Cable, Wis., after its Board of Directors voted in favor of the proposal. The foundation posted a click here.
Note: This article has been updated. Peering up at a sign inside a pizza joint in Colville, Wash., Sam Tarling saw an opportunity. Like so many other spontaneous offers 21-year-old Dartmouth College racer seized to get out West, Tarling jumped at the chance to eat for money. With an evening to kill and a stomach of steel, Tarling reasoned he couldn’t lose. The defending NCAA 10-k champion trumped similar challenges in the past. Three quarters...
Photos from Haywood NorAm freestyle mass starts (women 10 k, men 15 k). Check out Dan Roycroft’s gallery for more photos from Sunday’s mass start.
Photos from the NorAm Teck freestyle sprints in Rossland, British Columbia, on Dec. 17, 2011. Special thanks to Dan Roycroft (AWCA).
ROSSLAND, British Columbia — There had been a few slips and trips and a couple of wrong turns along the way, but as competition drew to a close on Sunday, race organizers were pretty content. Crashes like the one that nearly took out every man in the fourth quarterfinal heat, and course confusion, which happened to at least two racers in the mass start, were not all that uncommon, said Rossland NorAm Chief of Competition...
After completing the second weekend of NorAm Cup series in Canada, some of Sunday’s top racers talked about their start to the season and what they’re looking forward to in the new year. From Rossland, British Columbia, where the Black Jack Ski Club hosted two days of freestyle events with sprints on Saturday and a 10/15 k mass start on Sunday.
ROSSLAND, British Columbia — It’s not that Kevin Sandau’s not a team player. He just puts the pedal down when he feels like it. One of four Alberta World Cup Academy skiers seeded in the top eight of Sunday’s NorAm 15 k freestyle mass start, Sandau pushed the pace early as he tried to break free of the 73-man field. It didn’t exactly work at first, but the man in the green leader’s jersey kept...
ROSSLAND, British Columbia — Emerging from a curved and wooded downhill into the open-aired Black Jack stadium, Jessie Diggins suddenly felt an unfamiliar pang of dread. Looking around her, the Central Cross Country and U.S. Ski Team member realized she was alone and not where she wanted to be. She hadn’t lost the race, but could have been out of it entirely. The leader of Sunday’s NorAm 9.9 k freestyle mass start, Diggins immediately pulled...
ROSSLAND, British Columbia — Some 2,500 kilometers or 1,550 miles away from Wisconsin, the Central Cross Country (CXC) ski team was feeling a little travel-weary as it rolled into Rossland on Monday. After almost five weeks on the road, some of its members decided to remedy their bodies and minds with a distance ski on the Rossland-Paulson classic-only trail. A little confusion led Jessie Diggins and Jennie Bender to the wrong trail, Seven Summits, where...
ROSSLAND, British Columbia — Anyone who caught a glimpse of Jesse Cockney on Saturday probably saw him smiling — except for when he was racing, in which case he was concentrating. The first day of NorAm freestyle competition at Black Jack Ski Club started out well enough for the 22-year-old Alberta World Cup Academy skier, as Cockney won a sprint qualifier for the first time in his life. The fifth to start on a 1.6...