By Rachel Bachman Perkins and Gavin Kentch After a successful opening weekend of SuperTour racing in Duluth, Minnesota, athletes, coaches, and techs made the short trek down to Birkieland for three days of racing out of the Birkie Trailhead in Cable, Wisconsin. APU skiers Rosie Frankowski and Tyler Kornfield came into Friday morning as the points leaders for the early-season SuperTour races. By Sunday afternoon, the leaders were, unofficially, Alayna Sonnesyn of SMS and Zak...
By Gavin Kentch and Rachel Bachman Perkins The SuperTour returned this weekend with races in Duluth, Minnesota, held on the new snowmaking courses at Grand Avenue Nordic Center. The weekend included all levels of racing, with green juniors lining up to race alongside the veterans racing on the SuperTour, and a strong sense of community and cross-country ski energy across the board. Skiers like to ski; athletes were glad to be back. Alaska Pacific University...
Team name and location: SMS T2 Team; Stratton Mountain, Vermont Coach: Patrick O’Brien Current roster: Jessie Diggins, Julia Kern, Katharine Ogden, Alayna Sonnesyn, Lina Sutro (women); Ian Torchia, Bill Harmeyer, Ben Ogden, Will Koch (men) Who’s new: Lina Sutro, coming from the University of Vermont ski team Who’s moved on: Sophie Caldwell Hamilton and Simi Hamilton, who celebrated their second wedding anniversary earlier this year, retired from pro skiing last spring and are beginning a new life...
As summer turned to fall, skiers from the Stratton Mountain School T2 team (SMS T2), the Sun Valley Gold Team (SVSEF), and the Bridger Ski Foundation Pro Team (BSF) met in Lake Placid, NY for a collaborative training camp, capped off with two stages of rollerski racing. The weekend featured a freestyle sprint event — The Keys to the Castle — on the rollerski track at Mt Van Hoevenberg, followed by a distance stage dubbed...
For most serious ski racers, the training calendar begins anew somewhere around the first of May. As such, the weeks between the final World Cup races (or Spring Series in a typical year) and the beginning of May is regarded as “off-season”. The primary goal is not necessarily to remain sedentary, rather to fill up your cup. To enjoy the activities that a full training and racing load might prohibit, to (safely) spend time with...
This World Cup coverage is made possible through the generous support of Marty and Kathy Hall and their A Hall Mark of Excellence Award. To learn more about A Hall Mark of Excellence Award or to learn how you can support FasterSkier’s coverage please contact info@fasterskier.com. If you had any question about the strength and depth of the Swedish sprint team, look no further than the qualification list from today’s classic sprint in Falun. Led...
This World Cup coverage is made possible through the generous support of Marty and Kathy Hall and their A Hall Mark of Excellence Award. To learn more about A Hall Mark of Excellence Award or to learn how you can support FasterSkier’s coverage please contact info@fasterskier.com. In case you missed it, yesterday’s 10-kilometer skate in Falun, Sweden was a standout day for the Americans, highlighted by a gutsy victory by Jessie Diggins. How deep into...
In case you missed the discussion on the Devon Kershaw podcast, the Norwegian team made its World Cup return today in Lahti, Finland after nearly two months of training and competing domestically. As predicted, neither their form nor racing gears have not been from this decision. The women in red went 1-2-3 in the 7.5/7.5-kilometer skiathlon, led by powerhouse Therese Johaug who notched her third consecutive win in the event and third career skiathlon win...
You may have heard that the World Cup is returning not only to North America, but also to American soil, within the next few weeks. The world’s best skiers will be contesting sprint races in Québec City on March 14 and 15; a sprint in Minneapolis on March 17; and distance races plus a mixed relay in Canmore on March 20-22. For all six races, including the five across the border, the U.S. has an...
We’ll start with the weather: think all over the place. A moving target for meteorologist with moisture spitting from the skies, and air masses swirling this way and that making the trees sway like a mamba line along the course. A wax tech’s nightmare scenario? Yes. It certainly trended in that direction. By all measures, this was Therese Johaug’s, Norway’s latest version of a cross-country skiing record-breaker, stage and tour. Of six stages total, she...
The day began in Trondheim with a centimeter of snow, which then transitioned to big blue skies for the thousands of fans attending the fifth stage of the Ski Tour 2020, a 1.5 k classic sprint. The Norwegians can throw a cross-country race party. The scene, despite the different setting, was reminiscent of the festive cowbell and camp-out sideshow of Holmenkollen’s Frognerseteren. It’s not quite the Yankee stadium of cross-country skiing, but a sign that in...
The countdown is on. Marathon season is underway and we are inside the final two weeks before the American Birkie. At this point, “the hay is in the barn” when it comes to training, but there is still time to dial in a nutrition plan to stay fueled and all the way from Cable to Hayward. For pro tips, FasterSkier reached out to last year’s Birkie winner, Alayna Sonnesyn (SMST2), for insight into the system...
As always, it was a reset: a new day at the start of a World Cup race. On Sunday, the ribbon of snow in Falun, Sweden offered an opportunity for a sixty-six women field to race head to head in a 10 k mass start freestyle race. With a course that some noted was softened in difficulty by eliminating the infamous Moderbakken climb — which has become a feared incline on the World Cup circuit...
Not the backdrop one might expect from Scandiavia in mid-winter, rather, green grass, bare ski jumps, and a ribbon of snow were found in Falun, Sweden. However, what was lacking in snow was made up for by a densely packed crowd of cheering fans, erupting as athletes flew by in the women’s classic sprint. An occurrence that might meet our expectations is that the Swedish women showed up on home turf. Johanna Hagström won the...
Onward and upward. Day two in Oberstdorf, Germany featured a 1.5-kilometer classic sprint with three sharp toothlike climbs. Seemingly riding the edge of their capability inside the tracks, athletes pumped their way up each pitch before wrapping around a bend and descending an equal grade back toward the stadium. After what Matt Whitcomb called an “off day”, the Americans demonstrated their ability to rebound. To not let the sensations or disappointment from one day percolate...
Here at FasterSkier, we do not play the odds. Some contributors we know play Noah Hoffman’s Fantasy League – but we steer clear of rolling the dice on cross-country skiing. But the women’s skiathlon events on the World Cup may not be the biggest payouts since in recent history they have been a lock. Oberstdorf in Oberstdorf, Germany — the site of next year’s Nordic Ski World Championships — required no crystal ball of an...
Yesterday’s snow coated Nové Město, Czech Republic, clinging to the tall pines and masking the unsettling contrast of the man made ribbon of snow. Though wintry precipitation continued to fall, cheering crowds filled the stadium, ringing bells and sounding horns as racers passed through. Picking up where they left off after the skate stage, athletes set out onto the arduous tracks for a 10-kilometer classic pursuit. Steep climbs, sharp curves, and gentler though rippling terrain...
“It has everything,” Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla told FIS before the start of the 10-kilometer interval start skate in Nové Město, Czech Republic. Though she was describing the steep uphills and working downhills, found along the 5 k track, it might have also been an apt description for what the weather had in store. As athletes headed out on course, the light icy precipitation transitioned into chunky white flakes accumulating on the deteriorating ribbon of man...
Racing at the 2020 U.S. Senior Nationals wrapped on Tuesday with a 1.5-kilometer classic sprint. Although the day came down to six skiers in both the men’s and women’s finals — as is the norm — what flummoxed a few skiers of note were the dicey conditions, which left the tracks covered with slow-me-down lake effect snow. Post-race interview with Hunter Wonders Canada’s Julien Locke (CNST) won the men’s final in 4:03.83 — a time...
FasterSkier’s American Birkebeiner coverage is made possible through the generous support of New Moon Ski & Bike in Hayward, Wisconsin. While you are at the Birkie be sure to visit New Moon Ski & Bike for all your local expertise. Falling snow. Not too frigid temps. And a layer of fresh snow overlaying the 50 kilometers of undulating terrain for the 2019 American Birkebeiner. Perhaps no matter the conditions, it is cross-country ski racing paradise....