BEITOSTØLEN, Norway — Team USA led the participation numbers while Russia topped the medal table in the 2019 Masters World Cup, the annual competition for skiers aged 30 and over that wrapped up in this mountainside hamlet on Thursday. Roughly 1,000 skiers from 26 different nations, from the predictable (Norway, Finland) to the unexpected (Thailand!), made their way to the Oppland region for seven days of competition and up to four races per athlete, three...
Last Saturday, the American women placed fourth in the U20 relay at 2019 World Junior Ski Championships. In any other year before 2017 this result would probably be headline news; considering that the Americans had the youngest team in the race (you can compare athlete birthdates from the women’s race here if you really want to get into the minutiae), this may well be headline news next year, or the year after that, when the same...
ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Gus Schumacher spent last winter traveling the world for ski racing, including laying down the season’s most dramatic anchor leg, non-Jessie Diggins edition, to bring the U.S. men’s relay team from fourth to a historic second at World Juniors. The then-high school senior also spent the season touring the country to plan his future in ski racing, talking with multiple NCAA coaches to discuss their programs and weigh everything from coaching philosophy...
A quick look at ski-related news from around the web as we wait for the Tour de Ski to start: – As anyone reading this site is likely aware, retired American skier Kikkan Randall went public with a breast-cancer diagnosis in July of this year, mere months after teaming up with Jessie Diggins to win a gold medal at the Pyeongchang Olympics. But what happened after that? The Anchorage Daily News (ADN) recently published a...
Note: FasterSkier is accepting submissions for regional race reports, including for juniors racing. If you would like to see a particular race circuit covered and have the writer with the will to do it, please have them email info@fasterskier.com. Be sure to include a link to results, and preferably a few original race photos with proper credits. GOVERNMENT PEAK RECREATION AREA, outside Palmer, Alaska — On a day that had a decidedly old school feel,...
As FasterSkier staff stroll into an upcoming weekend with no cross-country World Cups, it’s time to scramble and score some holiday gifts for friends and loved ones. Christmas is around the corner. It’s never too late for Hanukkah (Hanukkah ended on December 10). In this first gift idea for the season, Anchorage, Alaska’s supple leopard Gavin Kentch brings limberness to our lives. *** 2018 gift guide – Supple Leopard What’s one book that Crossfit...
(This evening, the CBC reported that voters opposed to Calgary’s bid for the 2026 Winter Games won 56.4% of the vote. According to the CBC, these are unofficial results.) The Olympics are a global spectacle, but all politics is local. And when the two truisms go head-to-head in today’s plebiscite vote in Calgary, Alberta, local threatens to win. At stake is the future of one of three remaining host cities for the 2026 Winter Olympic...
The 2018/2019 season will be the last for NCAA skiing at the University of New Mexico (UNM), following a unanimous vote by the Board of Regents to cut skiing, along with two other teams, on Friday evening. The Board’s decision is effective immediately. If nothing changes, then the men’s soccer team, women’s beach volleyball team, and men’s and women’s ski teams will play out this season, then be eliminated on July 1, 2019, at the...
(Note: This article was updated Thursday afternoon with information about a pending lawsuit and quotes from a New Mexico state legislator and a representative of Southwest Nordic Ski Club.) * * * The men’s and women’s cross-country ski teams at the University of New Mexico (UNM), previously saved following a groundswell of support in spring 2017, may be on the chopping block again. A meeting has been scheduled for this Friday, Aug. 17, to consider...
The 91st annual Mount Marathon Race, one of the oldest footraces in the country, once more descended on the small town of Seward, Alaska, on July 4. Crowds estimated at up to 30,000 perennially throng to the waterfront community, population less than 3,000, to watch racers push themselves up a steep mountain and hurl themselves back down. At the end of the day, a pair of Alaska Pacific University (APU) skiers, Jessica Yeaton and David...
As discussed last week in 30-kilometer classic mass start at 2018 Spring Series this past March in Craftsbury, Vermont. She crossed the finish line in third, leading out a four-racer chase pack to claim the final podium spot in the final race of her career. She followed U.S. Ski Team (USST) teammate Jessie Diggins and USST and APU teammate Sadie Bjornsen, who took first and second in a tight finish. Randall was the oldest skier...
Kikkan Randall competed in her first World Cup race in 2001, and her last in 2018. In between, she won 14 World Cup races, three Sprint Cup Crystal Globes, three World Championships medals, and one Olympic gold medal accompanied by one very enthusiastic broadcast call from Chad Salmela. She appeared in television ads, received the Skis to the City from the mayor of Anchorage, and had an ice-cream flavor named after her. And long before...
This article has been updated with additional information on pro skiers who volunteered with Skiku, and additional pictures from Montana and New York. * * * It’s the last week of April. Skier New Year, May 1, looms next Tuesday. It’s roughly six months till So, caveat lector: Just because your favorite skier has been taking a well-deserved break from finding and curating Instagram-worthy content for your enjoyment, this doesn’t mean that they’ve been sitting on their...
ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Hannah Rudd had never raced a 50 k before. Jack Novak was doing his second one in as many weekends. They took different paths to get there, but both ended up in the same place on Sunday afternoon: first in the flagship 50-kilometer freestyle race of the Tour of Anchorage. The 30th annual Tour (pearl anniversary!) set off from Service High School, beneath the foothills of the Chugach Mountains at the eastern...
You may have noticed that Kikkan Randall and Jessie Diggins American women win first gold medal in cross-country skiing Best line: “When President Obama first got inaugurated,” Randall said, “I had a dream that I was sitting on Air Force One talking to him about cross-country skiing and telling him it is a really cool sport but didn’t get enough attention. He said [in the dream] when he became president, he would help make cross...
ANCHORAGE, Alaska — No two races are exactly alike, the saying goes, and there’s a lot of truth to this cliché. But if you step back just a little bit, two race days can start to look awfully similar to one another. For example, for the second time this week, a Hanneman brother won the sprint qualifier, Reese Hanneman won the final, and Alaska Pacific University (APU) put three athletes in the final and two on...
ANCHORAGE, Alaska — It turns out that Caitlin Patterson does have a weakness: Swedes. The 27-year-old Craftsbury Green Racing Project (CGRP) skier was denied her first outright victory of the week when she crossed the finish line second to Hedda Bångman, a former member of Sweden’s U23 National Team who now skis for the University of Colorado Boulder (CU), in the women’s 20-kilometer classic mass start at the 2018 U.S. Cross Country Championships on Sunday morning...
ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Friday was a good day for Team Hanneman and its friends. Younger brother Logan Hanneman won the qualifier, older brother Reese Hanneman won the final, and Alaska Pacific University (APU) put three skiers in the final and two on the podium in the men’s freestyle sprint on a bluebird day at Kincaid Park on Day 2 of racing at the 2018 U.S. Cross Country Championships. A long day of sprint racing got...
(Note: This article has been updated to include comments from Noah Hoffman.) ANCHORAGE, Alaska — It was a day of homecomings and returns at snowy Kincaid Park for the first day of the 2018 U.S. Cross Country Championships. Scott Patterson returned to his childhood training grounds with a convincing victory, Noah Hoffman returned to racing at U.S. nationals with second, and Matt Liebsch returned to the nationals podium with third in the men’s 15-kilometer freestyle individual...
Note: We’re seeking submissions for this year’s “U.S. or info@fasterskier.com with the subject line: “Fall Skiing”. Deadline for submissions is Nov. 3. *** HATCHER PASS, above Palmer, Alaska — Winter is in the eye of the beholder, but whatever you’re looking for to mark the skier’s favorite season, this spot at 3,500 feet in the Talkeetna Mountains probably has it. Seven kilometers of groomed trails? Check. Literally Extra Blue conditions? Check. A nearby lodge with a...
