Blue skies, some uncountable number of ski fans estimated in excess of 105,000, the most prestigious individual ski race in the world, and all of it in Oslo, the self-anointed ski capital of the world. Such a day could end only one way: with Petter Northug once again accelerating away from his competition in the last 400 meters of the World Championship 50 k freestyle on his home turf. A World Cup men’s 50 k...
With a handful of gel packets stapled to his bib, American Noah Hoffman would have blended in better at the American Birkebeiner than into Sunday’s 50 k freestyle at the 2011 World Ski Championships. But make no mistake: the way he was skiing was still world-class. Hoffman made it more than 30 kilometers rubbing shoulders with the World Cup podium’s usual suspects—Petter Northug (NOR), Lukas Bauer (CZE), and Maxim Vylegzhanin (RUS)—before finally succumbing to the...
At just 22 years old, Canadian Alex Harvey is already in possession of a World Championships gold medal, thanks to his victory in Wednesday’s team sprint—something his father, legendary skier-cyclist Pierre Harvey, never earned in his career. But the younger Harvey will have to wait at least one more year to equal Pierre’s 1988 win in the prestigious Holmenkollen 50 k. In Sunday’s 50 k freestyle at the storied venue in Oslo—the final event of...
The scene at Holmenkollen for the men’s 50km freestyle mass start today was nothing short of spectacular. With an estimated 105,000 fans packed in around the courses 8.3km lap it was an environment that the sport of Nordic skiing has never been witnessed before. Here are some images from along the course.
A World Championship 50k, let alone one at Holmenkollen, is not usually a race that one just jumps into, but US Nordic Combined star Billy Demong is doing just that. Not literally, of course—though he certainly has the chops to pull off such a feat. With Kris Freeman opting to sit out the freestyle event scheduled for 1:00PM in Oslo, Norway, a spot on the US squad opened up. The 50 k is second only...
The decision by Canada’s Alex Harvey to skip Friday’s World Championships relay left a train of his disappointed teammates passing through the mixed zone after the race. Of all four athletes, Len Valjas probably summed it up best: “It’s probably a good call—it just sucks for us.” Each of the Canadian starters had his own take on the situation, ranging from relative indifference to stern disappointment. But while it was clear that many of them...
When Therese Johaug crossed the finish line as a World Champion in the 30K skate, Mom and Dad were among the first ones there to greet her in the paddock.
Carrying the hopes of a nation on your shoulders is hard enough. But when your shoulders are as small as Therese Johaug’s, it’s a feat nothing short of monumental. In the penultimate race of the 2011 World Ski Championships, the 5’2” Johaug did something that so many larger women had tried and failed to do all season: she beat her teammate Marit Bjoergen. Buoyed by the cheers of an estimated 100,000 spectators packed dozens deep...
The dealers on the Fischer / Swix trip to Norway headed up the hill today from Oslo to Holmenkollen, like many we were part of the massive crowd. With a blue sky overhead and downtown Oslo as a background, fans piled along the course of the ladies’ 30km freestyle race today at Holmenkollen everywhere they could. The stadium was filled to capacity and space along the race course was hard to find, it was an...
The American women have had highs and lows at World Championships in Oslo this week, packing three finishers in the top 30 in both of the first two races but also watching Kikkan Randall’s medal hopes in the sprint evaporate in a crash. And while the U.S. made the final in the team sprint and placed ninth in the relay, neither of those performances were quite as good as some were hoping for. On Saturday,...
Second chances are few and far between in professional sports, but with the International Ski Federation adding a second Nordic Combined Team event to the 2011 World Championships, Germany had just that. After taking the silver in the first team competition on Monday, Germany extended an impressive streak of five straight World Championships finishing second. The extra opportunity would not change the results however, and the Germans once again came up short, this time by...
Much to the Americans’ and Canadians’ chagrin, the men’s 4 x 10 k relay at World Championships on Friday did not unfold as it often does. “At the start, they usually jockey for a bit,” Canadian leadoff skier Stefan Kuhn told FasterSkier. “But one Swede, Daniel Rickardsson, was thinking otherwise today, because he had two bad races. So he wanted to prove a point.” Instead of a tactical first leg, where many of the teams...
Martin Johnsrud Sundby and Eldar Roenning, the first two skiers for Norway’s 4x10km relay team sat in the Photo Press Center, eyes glued to one of the many television screens, watching the race unfold. The tension was high – no laughing or joking, not even a smile. Tord Asle Gjerdalen was on track for Norway, and he, along with Sweden’s Anders Soedergren, had just been reeled in by the chase pack. The race was now...
Late last February, Canadian Alex Harvey got the tag from his teammate Devon Kershaw to ski the second leg of the 4×10 k men’s relay at the Vancouver Olympic Games. Kershaw was having a bad day, and he’d dug his team into a hole—Harvey started out his race with a 30-second deficit to the leaders. The 22-year-old Quebec native fought as hard as he could, burying himself in an effort to chase down Norway, Sweden,...
The 4×10 relay may very well be the marquee event of a major cross-country ski championship, providing the ultimate national bragging rights, and requiring four skiers to turn in top performances. The last time a race of this magnitude was held on Norwegian soil was in 1997 at the World Championships in Trondheim. Norway dominated that event, putting over two minutes on the field and taking some measure of revenge for the beating handed out...
It certainly seems cliché, but it did actually happen. As Marit Bjoergen made her way down the homestretch, Norwegian flag in hand, the impenetrable fog of an Oslo March began to dissipate, the forecasted sun making its first stadium appearance, and illuminating yet another celebration of gold. As expected, Norway skied clear of the field to win the women’s 4×5 kilometer relay, besting Sweden by 36 seconds. Finland, continuing a strong Championships, took bronze. The...
With a squad consisting of Alex Harvey, Devon Kershaw, Ivan Babikov, and Len Valjas, Canadian Head Coach Justin Wadsworth thought his team would have a chance at its second World Championship medal in three days in Friday’s men’s relay. But those chances have just taken a hit. According to Wadsworth, Harvey, who won gold with Kershaw in Wednesday’s team sprint, will skip the relay, worn out by a tough race and a long day in...
The eyes of the ski world may have been focused on Oslo today, where the Norwegian women ran away with the win in the 4 x 5 k relay, but the biathlon world is focused on Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia, where World Championships kicked off today with a mixed relay. And while the result was the same – Norway on top by a solid margin – the route to victory was a lot more challenging for Norway’s...
Feisty, unintimidated, and encouraging—if ultimately overmatched. That’s probably the best way to describe Jessie Diggins’ effort at World Championships on Thursday, in which she anchored the U.S. women to a ninth-place finish in the 4×5 k relay. It’s also an apt description of the performance of the entire U.S. team, which fought hard to its best World Championships women’s relay result in over a decade, but was ultimately left three minutes behind the winning Norwegians....
When Dasha Gaiazova started the 4 x 5 k relay at World Championships in Oslo on Thursday, she still had a hangover. Was it from drinking? No. “We went to bed on time,” Gaiazova told FasterSkier, promising that the women’s team had behaved themselves and not celebrated too hard. But after her teammates Alex Harvey and Devon Kershaw won the men’s team sprint in thrilling fashion on Wednesday and got to stand atop the podium...