As Kerry Lynch’s career was ascending, Walter Malmquist’s career was peaking. Graduating from New Hampshire’s Holderness School, he joined the U.S. nordic combined team in 1974, retiring at the end of the 1980-1981 season. Competing in the 1976 and 1980 Winter Olympics, his best finish was 12th the 15 k nordic combined event in the 1980 Games, in Lake Placid. Today, Malmquist is a volunteer coach at the Holderness School, Proctor Academy, and Andover Outing...
As the ski season for Steamboat Springs Winter Sports Club (SSWSC) wound down, juniors coach and former World Cup nordic combined skier Kerry Lynch answered questions via phone and e-mail with FasterSkier correspondent Peter Minde. A three-time nordic combined national champion, Lynch raced from 1979 until 1987, and his international success presaged the later successes of Ryan Heckman and the current crop of U.S. nordic combined skiers. A participant in the 1980 and 1984 Winter...
After many years on the national and international stage, 2010 Olympian Haley Johnson is calling it quits. 29-year-old Johnson, who had several of the top U.S. women’s finishes in biathlon events in the last five years, was nominated for the national team again this year. So it came as a surprise to some that she turned down that nomination and is instead moving to Denver to finish her college degree and get married. “She called...
(Note: this is first in a series of interviews with the coaches and staff of the U.S. biathlon team.) When Per Nilsson took over head coaching duties for the U.S. biathlon team after the 2006 Olympic Games, the U.S. men had already begun a slow ascent in the nations cup standings, climbing from 20th place in 2003 to 15th after Torino. With Nilsson’s help, the rise has continued: the men have now finished either 10th...
@font-face { font-family: “Times”; }@font-face { font-family: “Cambria”; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 10pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: “Times New Roman”; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; } Great Britain doesn’t have a strong history in biathlon, and even less so on the women’s side. In 2006, Emma Fowler became the first British woman to compete in biathlon at the Olympics; in Torino, her top finish was 67th in the sprint. But things might be changing,...
Both cross-country skiing and biathlon have welcomed their shares of stars over the past few years, but few, if any, have exploded onto the scene as quickly as Tarjei Bø. Last season, the 22-year-old Norwegian won an Olympic gold medal as part of the Norwegian relay team, but his best finish on the World Cup circuit was fourth. This year, though, he has come on like a freight train. After collecting his first World Cup...
The Russian Ski Federation has been the black sheep of the cross-country ski world over the past five years, with no fewer than 20 of its athletes receiving bans for doping rules violations between 2007 and 2010. In June, former world champion and Olympic medalist Elena Vyalbe became the new president of the federation, as some firm rhetoric came down from on high in the country’s sport structure – one official said that Russia’s culture...
VTXC team member and former University of Vermont (UVM) standout Juergen Uhl, a 2009 NCAA champion in the men’s 10 k classic, recently competed at the World University Games in Erzurum, Turkey. Unfortunately, Uhl came down with the stomach flu upon arriving in Turkey, which stymied his efforts on the trails. Nevertheless he finished 25th in the 10 k classic and 42nd in the 15 k continuous pursuit while representing his home country, Germany. Uhl...
FasterSkier had the chance to catch up with Corey Schwartz, Head Ski Coach of University of New Hampshire (UNH) to get some of his thoughts on skiing. Schwartz has been the head director of the UNH ski program for 25 years, during which he has mentored 27 student-athletes to 37 All-American team selections. He himself skied as a Wildcat for three NCAA Championship teams, and as coach served for both the Eastern USSA Sr. Committee...
As the SuperTour heads to Lake Placid, the ski community can learn a lot if it just takes a minute to look around. Two-time winter Olympic venue? Check. A love of sports bordering on the insane? Check. More snow than Rumford? Check. But one of the best lessons might be about giving back to the community. Olympic biathlete Haley Johnson, who was born and raised in the Lake Placid area, returned to her hometown after...
At a Fast and Female event in early December, a multi-time World Cup medalist stood in awe of what the program was offering to young girls. “It’s amazing what can change the course of a kid’s life, and hopefully this will change it for the better,” she said. Chandra Crawford? Kikkan Randall? Nope. This time, it was top Canadian alpine skier Kelly VanderBeek. Fast and Female, which was founded by Crawford in 2005, is a...
Following mixed results in the early season, the U.S. Ski Team’s Liz Stephen raced to the top World Cup result of her career in last weekend’s 15 k freestyle in La Clusaz, France—a race she finished a half-second ahead of her friend and teammate Morgan Arritola. Stephen is now at home in Vermont, training in advance of the 2011 U.S. National Championships in Rumford, ME, which begin on January 2. FasterSkier caught her to chat...
After a lackluster season last year, Chelsea Holmes, a member of the new Far West Farm Team, had the best results of her career at the West Yellowstone Ski Festival over Thanksgiving weekend, finishing ninth in the classic sprint, fourth in the skate race, and eleventh in the classic race. Holmes, originally from Alaska, was a three-time NCAA qualifier for the University of Nevada (UNR) and an NCAA All-American in 2008. So she certainly has...
Five years ago, Sarah Konrad made history as the first U.S. woman to compete in two different sports at the same Winter Olympics. In Torino, Konrad finished 32nd in the 30 k mass start in cross country and was part of the U.S. relay team. She also contested both the individual and sprint events in biathlon. In the three-year period from 2005 to 2007, Konrad racked up some of the best results for U.S. women...
… And the job is right…. It’s a match made in heaven. That’s pretty much how Robin Brooks feels about being the head coach of the Glacier Nordic Team in Whitefish, Montana. Sometimes coincidences just seem to happen at the right time. Brooks was looking for a new home, Whitefish was looking for her.
The first race of the men’s World Cup biathlon season isn’t until Thursday, but one U.S. man has already seen action: Russell Currier competed in a 10 k IBU Cup sprint last Saturday in Beitostolen, Norway. The International Biathlon Union (IBU) requires that all athletes competing in the World Cup to first finish an IBU Cup race – the next level down – within 15 percent of the leader. Currier, after proving himself to the...
Chandra Crawford and Dasha Gaiazova are currently the only women on the Canadian World Cup squad. But their lack of teammates hasn’t held them back so far: Crawford, a 2006 Olympic gold medalist, won the FIS sprint in Rovaniemi that weekend, and Gaiazova skied to 24th place in the World Cup sprint in Kuusamo, en route to 48th place overall in the mini-tour. Crawford didn’t have an excellent start to the World Cup season, but...
Last year, Noah Hoffman was just another young athlete on the U.S. Ski Team’s Continental Cup squad. He was in the pipeline, developing towards a bright future, and wrapped up the season with a couple of SuperTour podiums, a fifth-place finish at U.S. Nationals, and a great race in Switzerland that nobody heard about. At SuperTour Finals, he finished second in the hill climb, his most high-profile domestic result of the year. In other words,...
The thermometer is stuck on -5F, the wind is blowing, and the schedule calls for a six-and-a-half hour shift. But people don’t flock to West Yellowstone over Thanksgiving just to ride the water slide at the Day’s Inn or have a go at a beginning pilates class. They are here to ski, and to ski on the latest and greatest equipment. Representatives for all the major ski gear companies set up shop as part of...
Astrid Jacobsen (NOR), sprint world champion in 2007 in Sapporo has a difficult period behind her with several injuries in the past couple of years. Now she seems to be on the right track for Oslo 2011. For the 23-year-old Norwegian, the upcoming World Championships in Oslo will be something special as it is her real home championships – she lives in Oslo. On her Road to Oslo 2011, Astrid Jacobsen took some time and...