With the 2017/2018 season officially in the rearview, FasterSkier is excited to unveil its annual award winners for this past winter. Votes stem from the FS staff, scattered across the U.S., Canada, and Europe, and while not scientific, they are intended to reflect a broader sense of the season in review. This set of honors goes to outstanding North American biathletes on the international circuit. *** Rosanna Crawford, Biathlon Canada Rosanna Crawford had been close to...
With the 2017/2018 season officially in the rearview, FasterSkier is excited to unveil its annual award winners for this past winter. Votes stem from the FS staff, scattered across the U.S., Canada, and Europe, and while not scientific, they are intended to reflect a broader sense of the season in review. This set of honors goes to outstanding North American junior athletes across all nordic disciplines. *** Ben Loomis, U.S. Nordic Combined Team In late January,...
In three weeks time, biathlon’s World Cup circuit will move to Russia. But a number of the sport’s stars won’t be there – and others plan to attend, but aren’t very happy about it. In an Executive Board session in PyeongChang, South Korea, a few weeks ago, the International Biathlon Union (IBU) decided to go on as planned with World Cup races in Tyumen, Russia, even though the Russian Anti-Doping Agency is still not compliant...
The following was submitted to FasterSkier by John Morton, a former U.S. biathlete and two-time Olympian (1972 and 1976) who has attended 10 Winter Olympics as “either an athlete, a coach, the Biathlon Team Leader, Chief of Course or, more recently as a spectator,” according to his bio (at end of article). Today, Morton, 71, lives in Thetford, Vermont, and works in trail design. *** I’ve had the remarkable good fortune of attending 10 Winter Olympic Games....
In his own unique style, special guest Cosmo Catalano from
FasterSkier would like to thank Fischer Sport USA, Concept2, team sprint, Bjørgen surpassed Bjørndalen’s medal total by one. She added gold to her collection on Sunday after taking the win in the women’s 30-kilometer classic mass start. All told, Bjørgen now has 15 Olympic medals, eight of them gold. She claimed the win in the final race of the Olympics in 1:22:17.6 hours. Finland’s Krista Pärmäkoski claimed silver (+1:49.5) and Sweden’s Stina Nilsson earned bronze...
FasterSkier would like to thank Fischer Sport USA, Concept2, Report Marit Bjørgen went out with a bang. Skiing in presumably the final Olympics race of her illustrious career, the most-decorated Winter Olympian in history simply skied away from a strong field less than 10 kilometers into Sunday’s 30 kilometer classic mass start, earning the 15th Olympic medal of her career (and eighth gold) in dominant fashion. Behind her, Finland’s Krista Pärmäkoski (+1:49.5) and Sweden’s Stina Nilsson (+1:58.9) rounded...
FasterSkier would like to thank Fischer Sport USA, Concept2, stated his plans to retire after the 2019 World Cup Finals in Québec City. “I was just so motivated to be around to see the first Olympic medal for men get hung around a [Canadian] neck. That’s what drove me every day,” Kershaw reflected. Coming into the 2018 Winter Games, Harvey, 29, was the favorite for a country that has yet to claim an Olympic medal...
FasterSkier would like to thank Fischer Sport USA, Concept2, reigning 15 k classic world champion, Niskanen said that he has embraced a selective peaking strategy. For the last two years he has focused on two championship classic races: the 15 k in Lahti, and Saturday’s 50 k. “Two years after Sochi, I trained so hard and tried to do too many things and have too much races and I got easily sick,” Niskanen said....
FasterSkier would like to thank Fischer Sport USA, Concept2, International report who had publicly questioned the validity of the Russians’ performance in Sochi soon after the 50 k skate concluded, exclaimed of Larkov, “I’m not sure where he got the power to run up that hill like that.” A few seconds later, Harvey outlunged Sundby for fourth, +2:43.6 to +2:43.7. Holund was sixth (+2:50.1), Daniel Rickardsson of Sweden another minute back in seventh (+3:50.4), Czech Martin Jaks eighth (+4:10.5),...
FasterSkier would like to thank Fischer Sport USA, Concept2, Four years ago in the men’s relay in Sochi, Russia, Svendsen as Norway’s anchor had been in the medal hunt until the final shooting. There, he used all of his spares and still left a target standing, which sent him to the penalty lap. After leading by as much as 20 seconds in the middle of that race, Norway finished fourth. But as they say, that’s biathlon. And on...
FasterSkier would like to thank Fischer Sport USA, Concept2, Full report Germany were the favorites coming into this men’s relay and Erik Lesser started them off with a near-perfect relay leg to sit in first place, but shooting collapses by Benedikt Doll and Simon Schempp left the team with bronze medals at the finish. On a windy, gusty day, the relay instead came down to a race between Norway and Sweden. Coming into the last shooting stage Fredrik Lindström of Sweden and Emil Hegle Svendsen of Norway were...
Madshus USA, Boulder Nordic Sport, and Swix Sport US for their generous support, which made this coverage possible. PYEONGCHANG, South Korea — In this episode of Nordic Nation, FasterSkier sat down with U.S. cross-country skier, Kikkan Randall — known by some as Kikkanimal — to discuss her fifth and final Winter Olympics, as well as what lays ahead for the Anchorage, Alaska native. On Wednesday evening earlier this week, Randall and teammate Jessie Diggins paired up to take...
Like the rest of the U.S. cross-country skiing community with a watchful eye on the Olympics, Bill Koch had been waiting for Olympic women’s freestyle team sprint unfold via live timing on the computer — numbers rather than images — as opposed to a live broadcast. When he saw USA rank first at the finish, becoming the first Americans to do so in an Olympic cross-country race (and the first to win a medal since his...
After the posted separately. Roundtable Q & A Q: Where and with whom did you watch today’s race? Chandra Crawford: In my living room at 3 am with my husband Jared. 1.5 year old Kyla was crying a bit upstairs but she had to wait for the race to finish to be over-enthusiastically consoled. She was probably wondering what her mom was so excited about. Nancy Fiddler: Today is my birthday, and I got up to...
(Note: This article has been updated to include clarification from Sara Mae Berman on her results in the 1971 national 50-kilometer ski race in Putney, Vermont) *** What did John Caldwell have to say after the Olympic Roundtable with Brooks, Vordenberg, Fiddler, and Crawford
You may have noticed that Kikkan Randall and Jessie Diggins American women win first gold medal in cross-country skiing Best line: “When President Obama first got inaugurated,” Randall said, “I had a dream that I was sitting on Air Force One talking to him about cross-country skiing and telling him it is a really cool sport but didn’t get enough attention. He said [in the dream] when he became president, he would help make cross...
FasterSkier would like to thank Fischer Sport USA, Concept2, mixed relay team placed fifth two days ago). Öberg passed Bescond to claim silver for Sweden, 10.7 seconds back, while Bescond anchored France to bronze (+17.6), ahead of Norway in fourth (+29.7), Slovakia in fifth (+38.4), Switzerland in sixth (+43.5), Poland in seventh (+43.6), Germany in eighth (+53.9), Italy in ninth (+1:04.1), and Canada in 10th (+1:33.4). The U.S. finished 13th (+2:01.9) of 18th teams. With...
FasterSkier would like to thank Fischer Sport USA, Concept2, Full report Ranked just 10th coming into today’s women’s relay, the team from Belarus stole the show with Darya Domracheva skating across the line to claim the fourth Olympic gold of her career after strong efforts from Nadezhda Skardino and Iryna Kryuko, both of whom have stood on the World Cup podium before, and newcomer Dzinara Alimbekava, a 22-year-old newcomer with just 11 World Cup starts to her name. It was the first relay...
FasterSkier would like to thank Fischer Sport USA, Concept2, U.S. women’s team sprint Olympic gold medal and all. But now that we’ve had a little time to breathe, FasterSkier wanted to bring you the best of the interviews that didn’t make our initial race reports. (Don’t worry, plenty more on this historic gold to come!) Kikkan Randall, Team USA’s first-leg skier: “It’s an amazing feeling. This is something the American team has been working for...