To race at the World Championships at Holmenkollen on home turf in February is maybe one of the biggest moments in a Norwegian skier’s career. The Norwegian Ski Association just announced their criteria for naming athletes to that team.
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Female ski jumpers have waited 86 years for their sport to be included at the Olympic Games, and now they will have to wait six more months. The International Olympic Committee’s (IOC’s) executive board announced Monday that a decision about whether to add women’s ski jumping to the program for the 2014 Olympics in Sochi would not be made until next spring—quashing the hopes of athletes and supporters who had hoped for a definitive ruling....
Estonian Sees Fairbanks as World Cup Launch Pad
Nathaniel HerzOctober 25, 2010
In the early fall, World Cup hopefuls fan out across the globe, fine-tuning their approaches on glaciers in places like Ramsau, Austria, or Tignes, France. This year, you can add an American spot to the list: Fairbanks, Alaska. Fairbanks may not have the same cachet as those European locales, but for Vahur Teppan, it’s got a lot going for it. Teppan, a native of Estonia and an alumnus of the University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF),...
While it might be tempting to grind your skis based on the long-term weather forecast, which calls for a cold, wet and stormy La Nina season with lots of snow dumps, experience is the best guide.
In its continuing effort to aid the development of American cross country ski racers, the National Cross-Country Ski Education Foundation (NCCSEF) will help send a contingent of U.S. athletes to Finnish Lapland in November. Comprised of nine athletes from the NCCSEF subsidized trip, a Craftsbury Green Racing Program contingent and U.S. Ski Team athletes, over 20 Americans will test their fitness and speed against some of the strongest athletes from Finland, Estonia, northern Sweden, Russia, Belarus,...
USST’s European Campaign Set to Start in Finland
Nathaniel HerzOctober 21, 2010
More than 150 training days, countless kilometers of rollerskiing, and dozens of loads of dirty laundry: A summer and fall’s worth of preparation will be put to the test in just over two weeks, when the U.S. Ski Team (USST) makes its departure for Europe. All seven members will fly to Finland on November 7 for a weekend of tune-up racing north of the Arctic Circle in Muonio. From there, the squad will part ways,...
It’s hard to fly under the radar when you’re 6’2” and one of the best sprinters in the world. But Torin Koos is giving it his best shot. Koos, who was dropped from the U.S. Ski Team (USST) this spring, has been quietly reloading for the upcoming season with the Methow Olympic Development Project (MODP), a two-person team based in central Washington. He has been off the grid, living in a cabin 15 miles from...
Does your office need a laser biathlon set to hold the room together? Do your kids want a copy of the 1980 Lake Placid Olympics Official Coloring Book? Trying to get a head-start on your Christmas shopping? Check out
FIS Interviews Charlotta Kalla and Jean-Marc Gaillard
Nathaniel HerzOctober 20, 2010
Charlotte Kalla is Sweden’s rising star of Cross-Country skiing. The 23 year-old youngster stormed into World Cup in 2006. A year later she captured her first World Cup podium in Beitostoelen. In 2008 she won Tour de Ski. She is Olympic Champion from Vancouver over 10 km Free. FIScrosscountry.com had a chance to talk to Charlotte in Ramsau. FIS Cross-Country News: Charlotte, media reported you would be back at Tour de Ski this year. Why...
“Driven,” “opinionated,” and “uncompromising” are probably three of the best words to describe U.S. Ski Team (USST) coach Pete Vordenberg, but you can’t forget “thoughtful,” too. Vordenberg, the team’s head coach from 2006 until this spring, is one of the few ski coaches out there who can claim to have authored a book. With his blend of pragmatism and passion, he sat at the helm of USST for four years, during which the program went...
Since sprinting was first introduced, at the 2001 World Championships in Finland, the International Ski Federation (FIS) has constantly fiddled with the format. The number of heats, the number of athletes in each one, and the total number who qualify for the rounds—all have been altered at one point or another. But one of the most contentious—and significant—changes has been the length of the sprint race. Changes Were Necessary, Officials Say According to FIS Cross-Country...
After making the U.S. Ski Team for the 2010 Olympics in Whistler, the 28-year-old from Anchorage officially cut her work hours to part-time this summer. Brooks still coaches at Alaska Pacific University, but with hopes to make the US team for the 2011 World Championships in Oslo, her own training is no longer an afterthought.
Russian media are reporting that former Olympic champion Yevgeny Dementiev intends to return to skiing for the 2011-2012 season, after serving a two-year ban for a positive drug test. Dementiev, 27, had retired after his sample from the Tour de Ski in January, 2009, turned up traces of the blood-boosting drug EPO. But
There is no mercy for the Russian biathletes who want to return to the World Cup after sitting out their doping suspensions. They can’t race before they repay prize money they earned while cheating.
If Vegard Ulvang gets run out of Europe, it appears that he still could safely make his home in North America. Ulvang is the chair of the International Ski Federation’s cross-country committee, which is considering the introduction of a new race format that includes five kilometers of climbing followed by five kilometers of technical downhill. Scandinavians have reacted to the idea with derision: Norwegian Eldar Roenning told the newspaper Nettavisen that the idea was “the...
OSLO, NORWAY – Norwegian national team racers object to FIS plans of introducing alpine cross-country races.
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Inspired by Brother, Driven by Dreams
Inge ScheveOctober 13, 2010
ENGERDAL, NORWAY – For as long as she can remember, Maja Solbakken wanted to do everything her older brother Martin Andersen did. Siblings of accomplished athletes often feed off the energy and determination of their brother or sister — that is true not only for those on the World Cup circuit, but also for those who are the second-tier. The youngest of three siblings, Maja, 16, grew up in the rural Norwegian community Engerdal, close...
The New England Nordic Ski Association (NENSA) will launch a new adaptive skiing program this winter, centered in the greater Boston area. Leveraging a $100,000 grant from the U.S. Olympic Committee, the initiative, which targets disabled veterans, will partner with area hospitals and operate out of the Weston Ski Track for its first season, then likely expand to other ski areas in New England over the next three years. A search for the program’s director...