US Ski Team’s Bryan Fletcher had one of those days where everything goes according to plan from the minute he woke up. He broke jumped into 13th place and finished 8th at the World Cup for a new career best at the Nordic Combined World Cup in Ramsau Sunday.
Only a tenth of a second separated Todd Lodwick from third place in the Nordic Combined in Ramsau, Austria.
The US Nordic Combined Team delivered some promising jumping during the provisional round in Ramsau, Austria, Friday. The provisional jumping netted a fourth place for Todd Lodwick and a 15th place for Bryan Fletcher.
When Bill Demong surged to historic Olympic gold in Whistler last year, dropping Austria’s Bernhard Gruber like a Porsche passing a Pontiac, he seemed invincible. So how did he manage not to score a single World Cup point in the opening races this season? It’s a question that has left many scratching their ski hats, not least of all Demong. But thinking through it has brought him back to some of the core principles that...
Only margins out of second place, US Ski Team’s Taylor Fletcher hauled into third place Sunday, climbing out of 28th to secure an extra World Cup spot for the United States.
Bill Demong, who has struggled on the World Cup so far this season, took a decent step up the result list in Saturday’s COC race in Park City/Soldier Hollow.
US Nordic Combined Team seems to be making a pattern of improving on the second day of a World Cup weekend. Bryan Fletcher finished 26th in Lillehammer Sunday, after a 44th place on Saturday.
The Americans faced a tough day both on the hill and on the course during Saturday’s Nordic combined WC in Lillehammer. Mikko Kokslien (NOR) won, ahead of Jason Lamy-Chappuis (FRA) and Felix Gottwald (AUT) in third place. Brett Camerota in 40th place was the top US skier. Taylor Fletcher was 41st, Bryan Fletcher 44th and Bill Demong 45th.
Coming off Bryan Fletcher’s best ever World Cup result with an 18th place at the Kuusamo WC opener last weekend, the US Nordic Combined team is looking to keep building this weekend, and bring the rest of the crew up to standard.
Bryan Fletcher skied into a solid 18th place in the second World Cup competition this season, a career best for the 24-year-old from Steamboat Springs, Colo. Felix Gottwald (AUT) won the race, working from 28th place after jumping to beat Mikko Kokslien (NOR) who started in 21st place.
The US Ski Team nordic combined crew delivered a mixed bag of results at the provisional round in Kuusamo, Finland.
For the US nordic combined team, the FIS World Cup opener in Finland leaves room for improvement. Demong was 32nd, Taylor Fletcher was 35th and Bryan Fletcher was 37th. Brett Camerotta was 40th after the jumping, but did not start the cross-country leg.
An American team entering a winter as a favorite in a nordic sport is kind of like the Detroit Lions somehow starting an NFL season with good odds to win the Super Bowl. But here’s the U.S. Nordic Combined Team, its members entering the 2011 season with targets on their backs. After winning four medals at the 2010 Olympic Games in Vancouver, the squad’s “Big Three” are back, and will headline the American presence at...
Ski jumpers don’t usually begin their careers at age 25. Nor do they progress from their first-ever jump all the way up to an Olympic-sized 90-meter hill in the course of one year. But that’s exactly what Australian cross-country skier Ben Sim is trying to do. There aren’t many athletes out there who have taken an approach like Sim’s and met with much success. But in the U.S., there’s one: Matt Dayton, who took up...
One year ago, Australian nordic combined didn’t even exist as a sport. But over the last few months, the country’s program has been gathering steam not just Down Under, but in both hemispheres. Ben Sim, the cross-country skier attempting to make the crossover to nordic combined, has been making consistent progress on ski jumps in Lake Placid and Park City. And in Australia, officials at two ski resorts responded “favorably” to a visit from an...
It took him four tries, but the U.S. Ski Team’s Kris Freeman can add a victory at the Whiteface Climb to the Castle to his list of accomplishments. “I finally won the Climb to the Castle!” Freeman said. Stymied in three previous attempts by inferior competition with superior rollerskis, Freeman left his teammate Noah Hoffman behind at halfway mark of this year’s edition of the five-mile race, skiing unchallenged to a 39-second victory. Ben Sim, the...
Here is the summary of the recent training trip to Europe for some top U.S. NC Juniors. First, let me explain why we recommend a trip to Europe in the summer. There are several important reasons: The majority of the World Cup and Continental Cup (COC) events are held in Europe. It is important for aspiring WC & COC athletes to travel in Europe, to experience the time changes, different languages, foods, cultures, climates and...
A few days before competing in the Engadin Marathon in Switzerland last March, Ben Sim stood atop a snow-covered hill in Germany. Sim, an Australian, was about to find out whether he could make the jump from cross-country skiing to nordic combined. Literally. Observing were Finn Marsland, the coach of the Australian cross-country ski team, and Fabian Mauz, a German coach who had assisted some Australian athletes at the Junior World Championships in the Black...
There aren’t many people who can spend more time in work boots than cycling shoes and still harbor reasonable hopes of keeping up in a bike race with Tour de France veterans. But count American nordic combined skier Billy Demong as one of the few members of that group. Over the past few years, Demong has been an avid bike racer during the off-season. This summer, though, he’s been more focused on remodeling his house...
