Sometimes the wrong wax call can be disastrous. The Canadian men were reminded of that in La Clusaz, France, on Saturday during the mass start 15 k classic, when they chose a mixture of hard wax and klister on a day that ended up better suited for hairies. Ivan Babikov posted the top Canadian finish in 39th.
On Monday, the Canadians waved goodbye to their tour bus, one only rivaled by Petter Northug's on the Tour de Ski. B2ten founder Dominick Gauthier explains how they paid for all the "rock star" ride, and why it's been a staple for the team for three years.
Alex Harvey, the only team member out of 28 Canadian starters to advance to the knockout rounds, was eliminated in his quarterfinal heat in Saturday's sprint in Quebec City.
Friday's team sprint in Quebec put a premium on endurance—endurance that Canadian Chandra Crawford said she was lacking, as her team failed to advance to the finals.
It’s safe to say the Canadian cross-country teams enjoyed their stay in Park City, Utah. Between their tweets and Instagrams of bluebird days and college football games, it’s not hard to see why. While the Canadian women headed south on Saturday for a Noah Hoffman the only one that hopped in some workouts? JW: Yeah. We would’ve enjoyed having the other guys around, but he was the one that was in town and ready to...
Just over two weeks ago, the Canadian men’s cross-country ski team made the long journey to New Zealand in search of some low-altitude, on-snow volume training. According to head coach Justin Wadsworth, they Snow Farm – New Zealand – August 2012” to sum up their time there, which was mostly a laughing matter. In one scene, the four men stand stand on a treeless trail high above the landscape while taking a break during training....
Drew Goldsack laughs when he thinks about his elementary school days in Alberta, when Royal Canadian Mounted Police officers would come to class and proclaim that they hadn’t drawn their gun in 30 years. A couple of decades later, Goldsack, who crashed in a NorAm sprint final, suffering a concussion and shoulder injury. With his rotator cuff still plaguing him this spring, Goldsack decided to reevaluate his career. He hadn’t really considered retiring until then,...
Justin Wadsworth, head coach of the Canadian National Ski Team, made a deal with his athletes two years ago: if they collectively produced four or more World Cup podiums, he would bring them to Hawaii for a summer training camp. The team surpassed that benchmark and delivered six podiums in 2010-2011 in addition to World Championships gold. Off to Maui they went in June 2011 for Canada’s first camp on the islands. Wadsworth raised the...
Less than a week after racing in Germany last December, Alysson Marshall smiled as she soaked up her surroundings at the Sovereign Lake Nordic Centre in Vernon, British Columbia. The Canadian senior development team member had just completed the first four World Cups of her career and left Europe on an extremely high note. With national team skier Dasha Gaiazova, she placed 21st in the team sprint in Düsseldorf, Germany. Six days later, Marshall won...
Note: This is a brief update on the status of the Canadian National Ski Team.
What do Vegard Ulvang, Bjørn Dæhlie, Marcus Hellner, Charlotte Kalla, Alex Harvey, and Devon Kershaw have in common? Aside from gold medals from the Olympic Games or World Championships? All of them, at one point or another, were coached by Inge Bråten, a fixture on the World Cup circuit who died last week at the age of 63. Bråten led his country’s national team from 1990 to 1994—a period in which Norway collected no fewer...
Though it didn’t quite measure up to the standard they set for themselves on Saturday, Canada continued its strong run of World Cup performances by placing two in the top ten in the Rybinsk 30 k skiathlon on Sunday. Devon Kershaw led the way in sixth with a time of 1:20:47.1, only 9.5 seconds behind the winner Maxim Vylegzhanin (RUS). Alex Harvey was only one second behind Kershaw in eighth, and Ivan Babikov finished 19th...
When Amanda Ammar first saw the start list at the Sovereign Lake Nordic Centre in Vernon, British Columbia, she couldn’t help but think it was comical. Next to her name where her points total should have been was nothing – zero, zilch, nada – as if she had never raced before. Six years earlier, the Alberta native was one of the best cross-country skiers in Canada, making the 2006 Torino Olympics at age 19 and...
Devon Kershaw’s rebound from a disappointing classic sprint in Otepää to a third-place finish in the 15 k the next day certainly had the Canadian excited. He’d been gunning for gold, but the World Champion found it hard to be too upset with a podium finish on what many are referring to as the toughest course on the World Cup. In a phone interview on Sunday, Kershaw was just as happy to learn that some...
Devon Kershaw had it in his head. He wanted redemption. The Canadian National Team veteran hadn’t been entirely pleased with his season so far despite finishing fourth in the Tour de Ski two weeks ago. After several top 10 performances this season, Kershaw took a big hit on Saturday, finishing 40th in the World Cup classic sprint after his pole shattered in his hand and he struggled to find a replacement. With one chance to leave...
When National Development Center Thunder Bay (NDC-TB) Head Coach Eric Bailey announced in December that he was going to retire at the end of the season, the Canadian ski community wondered who, if anyone, could possibly replace him. Over the last eight years, Bailey had quietly built a reputation as a leader at the remote training center, situated at the head of Lake Superior in Ontario. While Canmore gets most of the press these days...
VAL DI FIEMME, Italy – Before Stage 8 of the Tour de Ski, a secret weapon arrived at the Canadian hotel here. It didn’t come in a box; it wasn’t a hi-tech ski wax, or special food or drink. And it wasn’t
TOBLACH, Italy – Ivan Babikov (CAN) will race Stage 5 of the 2012 Tour de Ski, according to Canadian Head Coach Justin Wadsworth. “He’s for sure going to race today,” Wadsworth said. Babikov had a catastrophic crash at the end of Stage 4 of the Tour in Germany, breaking a ski and a pole. Canadian staff initially feared he had broken his wrist. X-rays came up negative, and after an examination by Mireille Belzile—the mother...
OBERSTDORF, Germany – That was more like it. Such was the prevailing mood in the Canadian National Ski Team camp after Devon Kershaw and Alex Harvey finished sixth and seventh in Stage 4 of the Tour de Ski here on Sunday. The day wasn’t perfect,
OBERSTDORF, Germany – Ivan Babikov’s arm isn’t broken, according to his coach Justin Wadsworth. X-rays at a local hospital Sunday afternoon revealed that Babikov’s bones were intact, after a hard crash at the end of Stage 4 of the 2012 Tour de Ski that busted Babikov’s pole and one of his best skis, Wadsworth said. Local physicians gave Babikov a brace, and told him to let pain govern his decisions about racing. Wadsworth said in...