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Jason Albert

Jason lives in Bend, Ore., and can often be seen chasing his two boys around town. He’s a self-proclaimed audio geek. That all started back in the early 1990s when he convinced a naive public radio editor he should report a story from Alaska’s, Ruth Gorge. Now, Jason’s common companion is his field-recording gear.
U.S. Ski Team Nomination Breakdown with Head Coach Grover

Shortly after the U.S. Ski Team (USST) medalist at the World Junior Championships, made the objective criteria that way.” Below are the eight A-team athletes and Ogden, who was renominated to the development “D” team, that met the USST’s objective criteria for team selection. A Team Men Simi Hamilton (Stratton Mountain School Elite Team) Andy Newell (SMS Elite) Women Sadie Bjornsen (Alaska Pacific University) Sophie Caldwell (SMS Elite) Jessie Diggins (SMS Elite) Kikkan Randall (APU) Ida Sargent (Craftsbury Green...

Nordic Nation: Training and Intensity with Dr. Stephen Seiler

80/20 Rule — the easy to hard intensity ratio when it comes to training sessions, has been well publicized. Seiler believes easy days should be truly easy, meaning walking the hills may be mandatory. If the easy days are easy, then the hard days are hard. He espouses a fidelity to training models with little, if any, in-between efforts; that means no middle-of-the-road intensity. And his observations come straight from Norway. “… They know what gets you...

Hoffman Heads East to Reboot: ‘I Never Felt Totally Done’

At 27, Noah Hoffman has had a singular goal — to be one of the best cross-country skiers in the world. From his hometown of Aspen, Colo., to the Sun Valley Ski Education Foundation in 2007, to the U.S. Ski Team (USST) in 2008, Hoffman evolved into the country’s top distance skier. Internationally, Hoffman (who switched clubs in 2009 to join Ski & Snowboard Club Vail) raised expectations after placing second in the 15-kilometer classic at the 2012 U23 World...

A Lock Since 2008, Hoffman Not Renamed to U.S. Ski Team

Monday afternoon, Noah Hoffman big-volume 2016/2017 training load and subsequent lackluster results, as well as his near off-the-grid month adventuring in Utah’s desert country. As of late Monday night, the 2017/2018 U.S. Ski Team (USST) nominations had not been released publicly. USST Head Coach Chris Grover declined to comment on the team’s newest iteration or Hoffman not being renamed to the team until a formal announcement is made through the U.S. Ski & Snowboard Association (USSA). Team...

USA Nordic Transitions as Jarrett and Schafer Step Down

Listed at the bottom of a U.S. Ski & Snowboard Association (USSA) press release Until 2014, USSA managed the U.S. Nordic Combined Team. The team is now run by USA Nordic, yet Jarrett’s position has remained under USSA’s umbrella — they continued to pay his salary. With the 2014 split, Jarrett’s responsibilities grew as he took on both coaching duties as well as some of the logistics of running a team. “Honestly, it’s amazing he lasted as long...

Nordic Nation: Tom Hall’s Take on Own The Podium

Tom Hall as a guest. If you’re into elite canoe and kayak, Hall may be a familiar name: he’s a 2008 bronze medalist from the Beijing Olympics in sprint canoeing and represented Canada internationally for twenty years — he retired from competitive sports in 2012. Today, Hall is a journalist and editor as well as the interim executive director for for a Canadian athlete advocacy organization called Own The Podium (OTP), (nordicnation@fasterskier.com. Podcast: Play in new window |...

FasterSkier’s Nordic Combined Athlete of the Year: Bryan Fletcher

With the 2016/2017 season officially in the rearview, FasterSkier is excited to unveil its annual award winners for this past winter. Votes stem from the FS staff, scattered across the U.S. and Canada, and while not scientific, they are intended to reflect a broader sense of the season in review. This honor goes to the outstanding North American Nordic Combined athlete on the World Cup. Previous categories: Collegiate Skiers of the Year | U.S. Continental...

Wednesday Rundown: SuperTour Finals Skate Sprints

U.S. SuperTour Finals (Fairbanks, Alaska): Freestyle sprints On Wednesday the 2017 U.S. SuperTour Finals, also referred to as Spring Series, the last of the year’s elite level sprints went down in Fairbanks, Alaska. The women raced a 1.5-kilometer course while the men skied a slightly longer 1.6 k course, both run at the Birch Hill Recreation Area in Fairbanks. Earlier in the week, Jessie Diggins of the Stratton Mountain School (SMS) Elite Team and U.S. Ski...

Monday Rundown: SuperTour Finals Skiathlon

U.S. SuperTour Finals (Fairbanks, Alaska): Women’s and men’s skiathlons The first day of racing was skiathlon day at the 2017 U.S. SuperTour Finals, also referred to as Spring Series, in Fairbanks, Alaska. It marked the World Championship medal in a classic event, it is still one of those things for me I am always going to feel like I am trying to fix it, always trying to work on it, which is good.” Diggins has...

Bjørgen Owns Holmenkollen 30 k with More Than 2-Minute Win; Randall 20th

OSLO, Norway — The modernist Holmenkollbakken ski-jumping hill lords over the otherwise bucolic Holmenkollen ski venue. It’s certainly one of the wonders of the modern nordic sport world as the steel structure arcs elegantly toward the sky. At times during the men’s 50-kilometer classic mass start on Saturday at Holmenkollen, the sun glared off the jump, giving it the appearance of a polished silver spaceship. During the women’s 30 k classic mass start on Sunday, fog descended...

Sundby Secures World Cup Overall with Holmenkollen 50 k Win; Harvey 6th

OSLO, Norway — Here’s something dizzying: six times around an 8.3-kilometer course with a total vertical gain of just over two thousand meters. In non-metric terms, all 47 finishers on Saturday’s Holmenkollen 50 k classic race accumulated roughly 6,574 feet of climbing. On the sharp end of the race for most of those kilometers were Norway’s Martin Johnsrud Sundby and Finland’s Iivo Niskanen. They were the animators for the hordes of Norwegians lining the course...

Brandsdal Outduels Klæbo for Drammen City Sprint Win

DRAMMEN, Norway — The stage was set around 1:30 p.m. Wednesday when a homegrown Norwegian made good in front of a spectator-lined 1.2-kilometer classic course smack-dab in the middle of Drammen’s city center. It was a day of contrast that began with blue skies and ended with a deep chill and falling snow as thumping music pounded and the gothic Bragernes Church loomed. In between, the clouds amassed and the classic tracks stayed firmed for...

Hopes Dashed for Finland and Norway, Russia Claims Team Sprint Gold

LAHTI, Finland — The breath taken out of a nation. Throughout the lifetime of a sporting fan, high-stakes races or games offer the chance for seared-into-the-neurons moments, things you remember for an eternity with the distinct recollection of where you were and what you were doing when the news came down. But those are exceptionally rare moments. And depending on what side of the equation you’re on, they can be mile high or a mile...

Bow Before The Queen: Bjørgen, 15 Times a World Champ, Wins Skiathlon

LAHTI, Finland — Electric. With every jumbotron shot of Finland’s Krista Parmakoski or a glimpse of her powerful compact-frame as she lapped through the stadium, the hometown Finns were electric. White and blue flags waved. Like anywhere in the world when a brilliant athletic performance unfolds in the home country, the roars for Parmakoski were deafening. From the start, she emitted a big dose of hope for fans in Lahti during Saturday’s 15-kilometer skiathlon at the...