With fewer than two weeks remaining until the Ski Tour Canada visits Gatineau, Montreal, Quebec City, and Canmore from March 1-12, we spent some time breaking down the provisional North American picks and estimated costs for Canadian nation's group skiers at the season-ending World Cups.
Ivan Babikov's a World Cup racer, not a marathon specialist, but on Saturday, Feb. 20, he'll be one of the favorites at the 2016 American Birkebeiner in northern Wisconsin. He decided to do the race a week ago. “I remembered how crazy the Birkie is and how much people there care," he said. "This is their local Olympic Games, so I’m pretty pretty psyched to be going."
In soft conditions, Norway’s Maiken Caspersen Falla busted apart the final of the women's classic sprint in Stockholm, Sweden. She saved her powerful stride and double pole for the last half kilometer, where she appeared to engage the afterburners, winning the day by 3.3 seconds.
Eastern Canadian Championships drew nearly 800 racers in a FIS points race leading up to the Ski Tour Canada, and on the second and third days of racing last weekend, several top racers traded spots atop the podium. Michael Somppi handed Kevin Sandau his first distance loss, and Andy Shields won the classic mass start.
Norway's Petter Northug showed his versatility as an all-rounder, winning Wednesday's classic sprint in Drammen, Norway. His quick double pole and quicksilver skate skis won out the day. The U.S. Ski Team's Simi Hamilton placed 11th overall while Canada's Alex Harvey posted his second-best sprint result of the season in 20th.
Cendrine Browne used home-course advantage to command the women's classic individual start and freestyle pursuit last weekend at the NorAm at Mont Sainte-Anne, Quebec. She won the latter by nearly a minute and a half. Meanwhile, Bob Thompson led an NDC Thunder Bay podium sweep on Saturday, and Andy Shields skied away to the pursuit win on Sunday.
It's been a steady climb of success for the U.S. women's cross-country team. On Sunday in Nove Mesto, they took a collective step higher in the 4 x 5 k relay, placing second to a hard-charging Norway, while besting Finland by nearly 14 seconds.
Maurice Manificat has been waiting for this win all season despite being on the podium twice in the last two months. On Saturday, he beat Norway's Martin Johnsrud Sundby for his first World Cup victory since 2013. For Sundby, it was a small speed bump on his way to seize control of the 2015/2016 World Cup overall.
Three Canadians missed the heats by slim margins on Saturday, with Len Valjas placing 31st for the third time in a World Cup skate sprint this season and Maya MacIsaac-Jones finishing 31st in the women's race, followed by Dahria Beatty in 32nd. “It’s a great start, it’s exciting and that’s why we have them over [there],” head coach Justin Wadsworth says.
Martin Johnsrud Sundby won his third-consecutive Tour de Ski by a record-breaking 3 minutes and 15 seconds and another Norwegian, Finn Hågen Krogh, bested a tight chase pack for second overall. Russian Sergey Ustiugov captured third, and Alex Harvey led the North Americans in 14th at the end of the eight-stage Tour.
Martin Johnsrud Sundby showed he's still got it, winning Saturday's 15 k classic mass start ahead of Norwegian teammate Niklas Dyrhaug and Kazakhstan's Alexey Poltoranin, for nearly a 1 1/2-minute head start in Sunday's final climb. Alex Harvey notched seventh on the day for 12th overall heading into the final stage.
Finn Hågen Krogh knows a lot about ups and downs, and has formed somewhat of a pattern at this year's Tour de Ski. However, the Norwegian had one of his career-best races on Friday, winning the 10 k freestyle by 3.6 seconds ahead of teammate and overall Tour leader Martin Johnsrud Sundby. Noah Hoffman placed 19th to lead the U.S., and Canadian Alex Harvey finished 37th and is now 15th in the Tour.
Len Valjas double poled past Italian sprint star Federico Pellegrino at the end of the first men’s classic sprint quarterfinal to earn a spot in the semifinals and ultimately lead the North American men in 10th in the fourth stage of the Tour de Ski in Oberstdorf, Germany.
Canada's Alex Harvey started seventh and finished ninth to maintain his place in the top 10 of the Tour de Ski after three stages, and American Noah Hoffman posted the 17th-fastest time of the day to finish in the top 25 for the second-straight day in Lenzerheide, Switzerland.
Recovering from his first sprint final in a year, Martin Johnsrud Sundby of Norway took a while to really get going - but then collected a win in the 30 k classic mass start, plus enough bonus seconds to give him a 1:18 lead in the Tour de Ski. Canada's Alex Harvey was in podium position until "blowing up" 3 k from the finish.
In a World Cup sprint, 31st has a little extra bite. Ask Len Valjas. He’s been in that position twice in the last three freestyle sprints. On Friday, the Canadian World Cup Team sprinter finished one-hundredth of a second behind 30th, which would have qualified him for the heats in the 1.5-kilometer skate sprint, the first stage of the Tour de Ski in Lenzerheide, Switzerland. Just over two weeks ago at another Swiss race site...
It's not often that a NorAm leader turns down their start rights on the World Cup. But Kevin Sandau has a good reason to do so: he's focused on prepping for the last period of World Cups, which will happen at home in Canada.
Therese Johaug once again dusted the women's field, this time in the 10 k classic individual start at the World Cup in Toblach, Italy. There, two U.S. women finished in the top 20, about two minutes behind her.
“The skis felt sticky,” is what Canadian National Team Head Coach Justin Wadsworth said about his team’s thoughts on their shortcomings on Saturday in the World Cup freestyle sprint in Toblach, Italy.
Devon Kershaw is onto something so far this season, and on Saturday, the 32-year-old Canadian World Cup Team member rolled to his best individual result of the season. Teammate Alex Harvey finished 2 seconds behind him in 22nd.