The following article was originally published on FasterSkier on October 15, 2008. It was written by CXC (Central Cross Country Skiing) athletes Kristina Owen and Heather Zimmerman. Roughly contemporary photos have been added for this reprinting; the pictures that originally appeared with this article are no longer available. The piece is simultaneously from very much another era, yet also completely timeless. On the one hand, “Caitlin Compton” now has a different last name; Jessie Diggins,...
Race results and records from the last 10 year of the Climb to the Castle rollerski race up Whiteface Mountain near Lake Placid, N.Y., courtesy of the New York Ski Educational Foundation. Guess who's won it five times?
In this revived Pro Workout, Caitlin Gregg (formerly Caitlin Compton) explains how to deal with challenging and unexpected circumstances, especially before race day. “You need to have the ability to be flexible and to understand that there are some things you can’t control,” she said back in 2010. “But there are tons of options. The beauty of cross-country skiing is that we do lots of cross-training in the offseason.”
The 38th annual American Birkebeiner, held in sub-zero and single-digit temperatures with record particpation, saw two sprint finishes to crown the men’s and women’s Birkie freestyle champions and a pair of UVM alums ski to sizable victories in the Birkie Classic on Saturday. Norwegian Tore Martin Gundersen won the 50K Birkie Freestyle race with a time of 2:00:32.8, furiously outsprinting his nearest opponent, Benoit Chauvet of France, by less than a second. Twenty seconds later,...
CXC dominated both the men’s and the women’s fields Sunday. Garrott Kuzzy (CXC) won the men’s 15K mass start skate race at Michigan Tech Sunday, leading a whole group of CXC racers along with surprise comeback kid Adam Kates (Big Thunder). Caitlin Compton (CXC) won the women’s 10K skate, over a minute ahead of teammate Maria Stuber.
Michael Sinnott (SVSEF ODT) won the men’s 10K classic at Michigan Tech by a good second to Adam Katey (Big Thunder), while Maria Stuber (CXC) won the women’s 5K classic by almost 5 seconds over Carolyn Freeman (UWGB).
The USSA SuperTour stays in the Midwest this weekend, moving from Minneapolis to Houghton, Michigan, and the fields are huge, deep and competitive: this is a battle of collegiate, Junior Olympics Qualifiers as well as FIS SuperTour racers.
Different day, different distance and different technique, but the results were the same. CXC Elite teammates Caitlin Compton and Garrott Kuzzy won the 10/15km classic mass start events on the second day of the SuperTour Mayor’s Cup. The duo also took top honors in Saturday’s 5/10km freestyle race. Compton skied to a solid 20 second victory over UAF’s Raphaela Sieber in the women’s race. The weekend was also a CCSA collegiate event and midwest junior...
Whether or not home-course advantage has much impact in cross-country skiing, the CXC Elite Team had no problem defending their local snow. SuperTour racing moved to the Midwest for the Mayor’s Challenge – two days of racing in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Last week combined an EISA collegiate carnival with the Lake Placid SuperTour, and this week was similar, swapping out the Central Collegiate Ski Association (CCSA) for the EISA. The races are also Junior Olympic Qualifiers...
Just before the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association (USSA) named its team traveling to the 2011 World Championships in Oslo, Brian Gregg got a voicemail from U.S. Ski Team Head Coach Chris Grover. Gregg, a strong domestic skier on CXC’s Team Vertical Limit, was ranked eighth nationally, and had a shot—albeit a small one—at being selected to the group heading to Worlds. But the news from Grover was disappointing: Gregg’s results had been good, but...
Calgary, Alberta/Bethel, Maine – Fast and Female’s third annual US X-Country Ski Festival held on Sunday, January 9 in Bethel, Maine will go down in history as a tremendous success. Hosted by Gould Academy, the event saw 140 girls from Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire between the ages of 9 to 19 years old take part in a day of inspiration with female Olympic ambassadors and US Cross-Country Ski Team athletes Morgan Arritola and New...
The Alaska Pacific University women’s team was finally dethroned on Thursday—but it took a world-class athlete to do it. After Holly Brooks and Sadie Bjornsen took the first two races of this week’s U.S. National Championships in Rumford, the U.S. Ski Team’s Liz Stephen finally broke up the monopoly with a persuasive win in the women’s 20 k. Brooks preserved her squad’s pride by placing second, 58 seconds down, while Morgan Arritola (USST) was third....
Despite surprising herself with top-10 and podium results in the early season, Caitlin Compton is headed into US Senior Nationals knowing that her racing will only get better.
In the past, our “Pro Workout” series has featured a single training session from an elite North American skier, but this week CXC’s Caitlin Compton gives us a slightly different take. Instead of detailing a favorite workout, Compton addresses an oft-ignored aspect of race preparation – the ability to respond to challenging and unexpected circumstances. Over the past several years, major North American events have been disrupted by everything from volcanic eruptions to frigid temperatures...
With 15 titles over the past decade, Kikkan Randall has turned the U.S. National Championships into something of a one-woman show. In the 2010 edition, which was held in her hometown of Anchorage, she swept all four events—collecting nearly $5,000 en route to wins in two distance races and a pair of sprints. This year, the country’s fastest women will assemble at Black Mountain in Rumford, ME. But when the first event of the championships...
While racers on the World Cup have voiced concern over the mini tour format following the FIS World Cup mini-tour in Kuusamo, Finland, earlier this season, North American racers overwhelmingly welcome the format.
“Jessie Diggins basically blew by us on the last lap,” said Holly Brooks, who was leading the tour Sunday morning. Sadie Bjornsen (APUNSC) also gapped Brooks at the end, and left Brooks in third place for the overall Nor-Am minitour.
Holly Brooks (APU) followed up her second place in Friday’s sprint with an 8.2-second victory over Jessie Diggins (CXC Elite) in the women’s 5 k freestyle on the second day of the Rossland NorAm mini-tour. With extremely fast conditions, Brooks flew around the course in just over 12 minutes. “I knew it was going to be fast,” said Brooks, “but I didn’t know it would be that fast.” Diggins’ CXC teammate, Caitlin Compton, finished third,...
Holly Brooks of Alaska Pacific University Nordic Ski Club won the 10K skate race with almost a minute to spare to Caitlin Compton (CXC) in second place in extremely soft conditions. That was just the first race of the day.
You had to look hard, but the signs were there. Over the past two years, Kate Fitzgerald’s results had been steadily progressing, topping out with a 14th place at last year’s U.S. Nationals. A few weeks ago, she was nearly as fast as 2010 Olympian Holly Brooks in a time trial with her club, Alaska Pacific University (APU). And in Thursday’s double sprint qualifier, she finished third and fifth. Still, no one expected Fitzgerald’s victory...