LIBEREC, Czech Republic – A pair of medals Sunday at the FIS Nordic Ski World Championships in Liberec has boosted the U.S. Ski Team back into the medals count lead with four, including three gold, after eight of 20 Championship events. American Todd Lodwick (Steamboat Springs, CO) won his second gold in three days in nordic combined Sunday, with teammate Billy Demong (Vermontville, NY) taking silver. The World Championships continue through March 1. There are...
Pyeong Chang, Korea – Lowell Bailey (Lake Placid, NY) turned in a personal best 18th place finish in the Men’s 15K Mass Start competition on Saturday evening. Bailey finished 2:21.5 behind Dominik Landertinger of Austria, who won the first race and World Championship of his career in 38:32.58. The 20-year-old did not take the lead until approximately 1.5K before the finish when Ole Einar Bjorndalen, feeling fatigued waved the youngster to take the pace. Landertinger...
Pyeong Chang, Korea – Finishing 10th in the relay competition and in front of the defending World Champion Norwegian really made the whole team proud. It was the best World Championship relay finish for the women since ninth place finish in 1997. Lanny Barnes started first and managed to stay clean in the first shooting. That put her already in a good position, with only two extra shots in the second shooting she managed to...
Liberec, Czech Republic – Justyna Kowalczyk (POL) won the women’s 15km pursuit at the Nordic World Championships in Liberec. American Liz Stephen finished 15th. Kowalczyk claimed her second medal in two races at the Championships. She won the bronze in Thursday’s 10km classic. Kowalczyk edged out Norweigan Kristin Stoermer Steira by 1.7 seconds. Aino Kaisa Saarinen (FIN), the gold medalist in the 10k took the bronze, +8.0. A lead group, consisting of the top three...
Liberec, Czech Republic – Kris Freeman skied his best race in 6 years, finishing 4th in the World Championship 15km individual start, just 1.4 seconds out of the bronze medal. Freeman had a very similar result in 2003 in Val di Fiemme, Italy, also finishing 4th, 2.1 seconds out of third. “Fourth place is just not the place you want to be at World Championships. This has happened to me twice now. I don’t know...
Liberec, Czech Republic – Kris Freeman (USA), battling compartment syndrome, turned in his best result in six years, finishing 4th in the men’s 15km classic in Liberec. Veteran Andrus Veerpalu (EST) edged hometown favorite Lukas Bauer (CZE) for the gold. The 38-year old Veerpalu, skiing in his eighth World Championships, trailed Bauer for much of the race, taking over the lead after the 12 kilometer mark and skiing to a 6.3 second victory. Veerpalu won...
LIBEREC, Czech Republic – American Todd Lodwick (Steamboat Springs, CO) laid down two lengthy jumps and led the cross country to win the gold during a mass start at the FIS Nordic Ski World Championships in Liberec Friday. Lodwick’s first career major event medal comes on the heels of teammate Johnny Spillane’s (Steamboat Springs, CO) gold in 2003 and Billy Demong’s (Vermontville, NY) silver in 2007. “Words cannot describe it. The biggest thing about my...
LIBEREC, Czech Republic – Lindsey Van (Park City, UT) stunned the field with a massive second jump Friday to become her sport’s first world champion. Van, tied for fourth after the first jump, soared 97.5 meters to take a strong win over first round leader Ulrike Graessler of Germany in the debut of women’s ski jumping at the FIS Nordic Ski World Championships in Liberec. “This is for everyone. This is for all the women...
Liberec, Czech Republic – Aino Kaisa Saarinen (FIN) won the first gold of the 2009 World Championships, skiing to victory in the women’s 10km classic. Sarah Renner placed 9th for Canada, and Kikkan Randall led the US in 26th. Saarinen started fast and maintained the pace, leading at both intermediate check points. This was the first World Championship medal of her career and first gold in either the World Championships or the Olympics. She did...
My preparation for the 15k classic in Valdidentro was different from any other race I have done before. My compartment syndrome has limited me to ten hours of training per week and has also kept me off of the world cup circuit for nearly a month. My time off was apparent in two ways. First I was very rested and fresh, second my sense of pace was way off. I felt relaxed and controlled going...
Pyeong Chang, Korea – Haley Johnson (Lake Placid, NY) turned in an outstanding 23rd place today in the Women’s 15K Individual at the Biathlon World Championships. The 23rd place is a personal best for Johnson at the World Cup level and the best US women’s result at World Championships since Rachel Steer placed 17th in the Pursuit in 2005. Johnson cleaned the first three stages, before missing on her 19th shot in the 20-shot competition....
US and Canadian starters in the Women’s 10km Classic World Championship Race. US Starters Bib Name 7 Morgan Smyth 14 Laura Valaas 35 Morgan Arritola 41 Kikkan Randall Canadian Starters Bib Name 21 Perianne Jones 23 Shayla Swanson 64 Sarah Renner 76 skiers are scheduled to start the race.
Universal Sports will provide same day delay coverage of the entire Nordic World Championships in Liberec. This includes all Cross-Country, Nordic Combined, and Jumping events. The full schedule can be viewed on the
The FIS instituted a new protocol to deal with the large number of entrants in the individual start races at World Championships – a qualification race. These races were run today. 250 men and 150 women registered for the 10/15km classic individual start races. In order to decrease the numbers, FIS required women with more than 120 distance FIS points and men with more than 90 distance FIS points to qualify in special races. The...
Visit the Universal Sports Nordic World Championship page Cross-Country US There will be no surprises here. The US foursome of Kikkan Randall, Andy Newell, Torin Koos and Kris Freeman have been well ahead of the rest of the US for some years, represent the hope for medals. Freeman, suffering from compartment syndrome, can only race classic, limiting him to Friday’s 15km classic individual start and a leg in the relay. The 15km has been Kris’...
Pyeong Chang, Korea – Tim Burke (Paul Smiths, NY) missed two shots in his final stage of shooting and finished 14th in this afternoon’s 20K Individual competition at the Biathlon World Championships. Going into the final shooting stage, Burke was in sixth place. “I am so nervous, I cannot look” said coach Per Nilsson who knew that clean shooting would put Burke on the podium. But the third and fifth targets did not fall and...
KLINGENTHAL, Germany – By: Lindsey Sine – Billy Demong (Vermontville, NY) packed in the sixth World Cup win of his career Sunday, finishing seventh in the jumps and second in the cross country to take the win in the last World Cup before Nordic World Championships begins Feb. 19. “Luckily we were able to get another round of jumping off today. It was pretty windy, but it was an awesome competition. It was pretty intense...
Pyeongchang, Korea – Tim Burke (Paul Smiths, NY) finished 11th in what he called “the hardest 10K I have ever done” at the Biathlon World Championships. After a week of warm daytime temperatures and a full day of rain yesterday that destroyed much of the snow, few athletes expected to compete. Somehow, the organizers were able to spread their 2,000 cubic meters of stored snow over a 2.5K course to allow the competitions to proceed...
KLINGENTHAL, Germany – The U.S. Ski Team’s Billy Demong (Vermontville, NY) finished fifth Saturday during a Nordic combined World Cup in Germany, just missing the podium in a four skier sprint for the number three spot. Finland’s Anssi Koivuranta won the competition to retain the lead in the World Cup standings. “It was a little tough. It was the first comp back and it was OK obviously to get fifth but, generally speaking, it wasn’t...
Pyeong Chang, Korea – Warm winds and heavy rain have battered the course and even forced the cancellation of the opening ceremonies. The organizers are working through the night to try and improve the situation, but even the entry of the athletes has been postponed to the morning so the coaches can see the conditions before deciding on the seeding, if there will be a competition at all. Training was canceled today in an effort...