As the title suggests, catching up with Kendall Kramer is no small task. The 17-year-old (as of late June) caught the attention of the cross-country world this past winter with stunning and consistent performances at Lahti, Finland’s Junior World Ski Championships. Although we’re about to rattle off some 2018-2019 results, to be clear this is no athlete who defines themselves solely by the metric of finish rank. That will come across in the interview below. ...
The “First Tracks” series highlights the pregnancy, postpartum, and parenting experiences of noteworthy athletes in cross-country skiing in various stages of their professional careers. The sharing of these experiences can benefit athletes in any stage of their career, whether they are an elite or recreational skier, by demonstrating that it is very possible to return to skiing, competition, and an active lifestyle with a growing family. The series will include the physical challenges of being...
![First Tracks as a New Parent: Caitlin Gregg [Part 1]](https://fasterskier.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/2019/08/Screen-Shot-2019-08-03-at-2.53.11-PM.png)
The “First Tracks” series highlights the pregnancy, postpartum, and parenting experiences of noteworthy athletes in cross-country skiing in various stages of their professional careers. The sharing of these experiences can benefit athletes in any stage of their career, whether they are an elite or recreational skier, by demonstrating that it is very possible to return to skiing, competition, and an active lifestyle with a growing family. The series will include the physical challenges of being...
If you’ve ever set a lofty athletic goal, one that required full commitment, going all in and pulling out all of the stops to optimize your training, you may have searched for strategies to similarly optimize your recovery between sessions, getting you back on the ski trails feeling strong as quickly as possible. In this process, you may have found yourself perusing a seemingly endless array of devices, foods, and drinks, each promising to improve...
Twenty-three-years-old, a mechanical engineering degree from Harvard in hand, and a love for cross-country skiing. Lots of opportunity. Connor Green, raised in Rochester, New York, deep into cross-country skiing, and a brain fixated on asking questions and solving problems through better engineering has brought his services to Biri. He is a product engineer with Madshus AS in Norway. Green was interviewed this past May. After hearing that Green worked for Madshus through a
Singularly focused on winning and the commensurate hardware that validates that supremacy, 48-year-old Luke Bodensteiner will leave U.S. Ski & Snowboard after a 23 year run with the organization. For the last 12 years, Bodensteiner has served as the organization’s Chief of Sport. His job description placed him at the helm of US Ski & Snowboard’s teams. Bodensteiner was a cross-country athlete at the University of Utah, a U.S. Ski Team member, and a two-time...
This is the second story following Kris Freeman as he builds towards his first Ironman triathlon in late July. You can read part 1 here. *** They are not baby steps, but they are incremental steps. Retired elite cross-country skier Kris Freeman has been eyeing the Lake Placid Ironman triathlon on July 28. As part of his step by step race and training plan for the full Ironman, Freeman contested an Olympic distance tri...
A few disclaimers first. Metrics suggest people want quick reads and quick-view content. The above video is neither. Yet it is full of ideas for Olympic sport. On May 22, the Aspen Institute hosted a forum titled the Future of the U.S. Olympic Movement: Reimagining Goals Beyond Medals. It consisted of a two-part discussion captured in this long-form embedded video from the Aspen Institute’s Sports & Society Program. The first part of the video features...
“I am not making them great. They are making themselves great.” – Sverre Caldwell Long-time Stratton Mountain School (SMS) coach Sverre Caldwell will step down at the end of this school year. According to an article in the Bennington Banner, during Caldwell’s tenure, SMS sent 15 cross-country skiers to the Winter Olympics. SMS also had at least one Junior National champion and one World Junior team member for 24 consecutive years. Caldwell was U.S. Ski...
In a year of outstanding performances from junior and under-23 U.S. skiers, Evelina Sutro has been a force to be reckoned with. She had a debut performance of 18th in the 10-kilometer freestyle at World U-23 Championships in Lahti, Finland and went on to sweep every EISA freestyle race this season. Sustaining that benchmark, Sutro placed third last weekend in the NCAA 5 k skate, a mere 1.09 seconds behind winner Julia Richter from the...
Having the season you hope for and actually having that season is the rarefied magic of sport. “I am having the season I hoped for but didn’t expect,” US Biathlon’s Clare Egan said in a telephone call on Jan. 30th. “I got the balance right for the first time since I started training full time. Since for eight years — three of which were devoted to cross-country and five of which were devoted to biathlon....
Twenty-eight-year-old Taylor Fletcher has been nordic skiing and ski jumping nearly his entire life. He grew up training and competing in Steamboat Springs, Colo. He has been racing World Cups since 2010 and is a three time Olympian. The 2018/2019 season has been his best yet. Fletcher began his season with two Continental Cup victories, one in each of his “hometowns”, Steamboat Springs and Park City, Utah. He has also brought a renewed spirit to...
U23 World Championships in Lahti, Finland got rolling on Jan. 21 with a classic sprint. In our quest to check in with some of the North American athletes in Finland, with emailed a list of quick-hit questions to touch base. Graham Ritchie trains with Thunder Bay NTDC and represented Canada at Junior Worlds at Soldier Hollow in 2017 and Goms, Switzerland, in 2018. Ritchie is from Parry Sound, Ontario, best known as the birthplace of Bobby...
U23 World Championships in Lahti, Finland got rolling on Jan. 21 with a classic sprint. In our quest to check in with some of the North American athletes in Finland, with emailed a list of quick-hit questions to touch base. Hannah Mehain is a first year senior athlete studying at Okanagan College. She has been on the Junior National Team and raced at World Juniors the last two years. Mehain also collected a top ten result...
U23 World Championships in Lahti, Finland got rolling on Jan. 21 with a classic sprint. In our quest to check in with some of the North American athletes in Finland, with emailed a list of quick-hit questions to touch base. Braden Becker is twenty two years old and a senior at Williams College. He races with the Williams cross-country ski team and hails from Yarmouth, ME. This is his first Junior World Ski Championships. Do you...
The U23 World Championships in Lahti, Finland got rolling on Jan. 21 with a classic sprint. In our quest to check in with some of the North American athletes in Finland, with emailed a list of quick-hit questions to touch base. Peter Holmes is twenty two years old and skied at the 2015 World Junior Ski Championships in Almaty, Kazakhstan. Holmes placed 27th in the classic sprint earlier this week in Lahti. On Wednesday, he...
Cycling back before you know it — it’s the International Ski Federation (FIS) 2019 Nordic Junior/U23 World Championships in Lahti, Finland which gets rolling with a U20 classic sprint this Sunday. In our quest to check in with some North American athletes in Finland, we emailed a list of quick hit questions. Twenty-two-year-old Evelina Sutro lands in Lahti as a Worlds rookie. Sutro holds Swedish-American dual citizenship and spent high school studying and skiing in...
Cycling back before you know it — it’s the International Ski Federation (FIS) 2019 Nordic Junior/U23 World Championships in Lahti, Finland which gets rolling with a U20 classic sprint this Sunday. In our quest to check in with some North American athletes in Finland, we emailed a list of quick hit questions. Up first, twenty-two-year-old Ian Torchia who skis for both Northern Michigan University and the U.S. Ski Team Development Team. Torchia participated at World Juniors...
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...
Tara Geraghty-Moats started ski jumping when she was nine years old. Fearless for sure, but all part of the multisport athlete’s mojo. But after suffering multiple knee injuries when she was 16, Geraghty-Moats was forced to take a break from ski jumping. That hiatus was a four-year jumping drought that only served to push her into other aspects of nordic sport. During her time away from jumping, Geraghty-Moats competed in cross-country skiing and biathlon where...