Note: This is the second preview in a quick-and-dirty series on U.S. elite teams. We asked coaches to send their 2012/2013 rosters and tell us what’s new for the coming season. We will be publishing additional reports over the next few weeks. Teams are presented in no particular order. Team: Bend Endurance Academy (BEA) Coach: Ben Husaby Roster: Dakota Blackhorse-von Jess, Reitler Hodgert, Lars Ellefson Who’s new: Hodgert, moving up from junior ranks Who’s missing:...
Note: This is the first of a quick-and-dirty preview series on elite teams in the U.S. We asked coaches to send their 2012/2013 rosters and tell us what’s new for the coming season. We will be publishing additional reports over the next few weeks. Teams are presented in no particular order. Team name: XC Oregon Coaches: J.D. Downing (coach/program director, 15th year) National /International Elite Roster: Santiago Ocariz, Oliver Burruss, Matt Briggs; Carolyn Ocariz, Stephanie...
It was almost as if Aino-Kaisa Saarinen read Kikkan Randall’s mind. Longtime acquaintances, the two international cross-country superstars knew the best time to find each other – for a warmdown, a distance ski or just a chat. Finland’s two-time Olympian and multiple world champion, Saarinen caught Randall before a morning run in March at the World Cup Finals in Falun, Sweden. Fortunately for Saarinen, the sprint World Cup winner was in mid-thought. “I saw her...
In the months following its first camp of the year in Bend, Ore., the U.S. Ski Team (USST) has several new training destinations planned along with its old standbys: the men and women will split up and head to Alaska, Sweden, Austria and Germany over the course of the summer. And for the first time since its first trip to New Zealand 10 years ago, the Snow Farm is completely off the schedule. The women’s...
When Carolyn and Santi Ocariz clicked into their rollerskis slightly more than two months ago, neither really knew what they were in for. The Wisconsin couple heard plenty of stories about the places they’d travel through. They took to heart the warnings about crazy drivers, snakes and treacherous temperatures while crossing America’s heartland. It might not be hot when they left, but it could get brutal, and the elements could change 180 degrees by the...
The U.S. biathlon community may be small, but one benefit of its size is that almost everyone can gather each year in October for a training camp at Soldier Hollow. This year, the senior national team is joined in Utah by the junior national team as well as biathletes from the Maine Winter Sports Center, Durango and as far as Canada. Inviting everyone brings training quality up, said national team women’s coach Jonne Kahkonen, who...
The Mt. Greylock Roller Ski and Roller Blade races are back. The event, a benefit for the Northern Berkshire Special Olympics, will be held on Sunday, October 16th, at 10:00 A.M. beginning at the Mt. Greylock Visitors’ Center in Lanesboro, MA. Brought to you by Berkshire Outfitters and FasterSkier.com the race will prove to be a great fall workout and a blast… after all there is just one hill, it just happens to be 8...
The fifth annual Climb to the Castle roller-ski race took place on Saturday, September 17th in Lake Placid, New York. Kris Freeman (USST) edged out biathlete Tim Burke (USBA) in the men’s race, and Liz Stephen (USST) skied to a decisive victory over Ida Sargent (USST) in the women’s event. Women’s Results Men’s Race Report Women’s Race Report Men’s Race Video Women’s Race Video
On Saturday, September 17th, the New York Ski Education Foundation hosted the fifth annual Climb to the Castle rollerski race. Kris Freeman (USST) won the men’s event, while Liz Stephen (USST) took the top spot for the women. A selection of photos from the race are below. Click on a photo for a larger version.
No rain, no wind, a brilliant shining sun coming up over the mountains, and rapidly warming temperatures— perfect conditions for the 2011 edition of the Climb to the Castle Rollerski Race. Kris Freeman (USST) made the most of the fine day, defending his 2010 title in impressive fashion, battling with Olympic biathlete Tim Burke for much of the race, before surging ahead with less than 500 meters to go. Burke was a close second, with...
On a brilliant sunny day in Lake Placid, New York, Liz Stephen (USST) extended her Climb to the Castle podium streak to five in a row, earning her first victory in the challenging five-mile hill climb since the inaugural event in 2007. Stephen and US Ski Team (USST) teammate Ida Sargent overcame an early deficit to Tara Geraghty-Moats (CNSC), turning the 45 minute test into a two-woman race by the end of the first mile....
If you are thinking that it is a little early for the Climb to the Castle rollerski race you would be right. The annual five-mile grind to the top of Whiteface Mountain in Lake Placid, New York, hosted by the New York Ski Education Foundation (NYSEF) has historically been held in October. The race is timed to coincide with the US Ski Team’s (USST) fall training camp and that two week block was shifted to...
LAKE PLACID, N.Y. – In theory, moving up the annual U.S. Ski Team camp in Lake Placid from October to mid-September made sense. It allowed space for a final dryland camp in Park City, Utah, where the USST athletes could train at higher elevations and follow up on tests taken earlier in the year. Also, September usually brings better weather than October in Lake Placid. In nearly 10 years of training in upstate New York,...
LAKE PLACID, N.Y. – Rollerskiing through thick fog on a sleepy Thursday morning, several U.S. Ski Team and National Training Group athletes wheeled into the Olympic Jumping Complex parking lot. Almost an hour before their 9 a.m. sprint workout, the small group arrived earlier than some of the venue’s staff, but they weren’t the first athletes there. As they pulled up alongside a row of parked vehicles, a few skiers recognized one another, and without...
Several members of the U.S. Ski Team and National Training Group came out for Day 2 of the Lake Placid USST dryland training camp on Thursday, competing in a classic rollerski sprint. Over the two-hour time trial, six women and nine men raced four times — the women on a 1.3-k loop and the men over 1.5 k. Everyone advanced to the finals, and the idea was to go hard. Here is a recap...
Sunny skies and warm October weather greeted race organizers and skiers for the Mt. Kearsarge Rollerski Time Trail Series up in Warner, New Hampshire. Organizers suffered a slight setback as fallen trees block the road halfway up the mountain, which forced them to move the start down the road for a 2.4 mile climb. Skiers were invited to use either skate or classic techniques to scale the eight percent average grades. The series is hosted...
Take a 12-mile ferry ride from Rockland, Maine to North Haven Island at the end of October, and you might find yourself watching the Maine Winter Sports Center’s (MWSC) annual Lobster Roll rollerskiing race. The perfect roads and low traffic, “make for one of the most scenic rollerskiing experiences possible,” according to Andy Shepard, President of the MWSC. On October 30, athletes from MWSC, Bates, Colby, Bowdoin, UMO, UMPI, along with other individuals, undertook the...
5K/10K Trail Run, Walk or Nordic Walk – This exciting new event at Lapham Peak State Park in Delafield, Wisconsin will utilize both the park trails and the ice age trail. It will start and finish by the Evergreen Shelter. The word Bergkönig means “Mountain King” in German. For those of you who are not familiar with the park, the course involves numerous hill climbs, technical sections, and flights of stairs. The race should be...
Tom Keefe and Sarah Tory captured the Mt. Greylock Rollerski Race on Sunday, outdistancing their closest competitors by several minutes each. Tory, a senior and the women’s captain at Williams College, defended the title she picked up her junior year, while Keefe, a former UNH and Maine Winter Sports Center standout, took the men’s title in his first rollerski race in four years. Beautifully paved and featuring a mix of steep switchbacks, steady climbs and,...
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.