Noah Hoffman knew he had to shake UVM senior Scott Patterson with every ounce of energy he had in Saturday's three-lap 15 k skate at SuperTour Finals. By the end of the second lap, Hoffman had built a nearly 5-second lead and extended it to 11 seconds through the finish.
After a one-year hiatus, our Skier of the Year awards are back. We start with the collegiate category, where for the first time in FasterSkier’s history of giving such prizes Americans took both of the top honors: NCAA freestyle champions Miles Havlick (University of Utah) and Joanne Reid (University of Colorado).
After taking third in the prologue at OPA Cup Finals in Toblach, Italy, Sadie Bjornsen followed up on Saturday with an outright win in the second stage of the mini-tour, a 5 k individual classic. Sam Tarling led the U.S. in the men's 10 k and Paddy Caldwell had his best classic race of the year in the junior division.
Caitlin Patterson led the American squad at the Madona, Latvia, Scando Cup with a ninth-place finish in the 10 k freestyle mass start on Thursday. Eric Packer, meanwhile, had a "breakthrough" race in the 20 k — he was 16th, only 24 seconds out of first.
Caitlin Patterson and Erik Bjornsen led the Americans on Thursday at the U23 World Championships in Liberec, Czech Republic. Patterson was 14th in the women's 10 k freestyle and Bjornsen skied his last few kilometers with the race winner to place 15th in the 15 k.
Sophie Caldwell and Erik Bjornsen posted personal bests in the classic sprint at U23 World Championships in Liberec, Czech Republic. The Americans each made it as far as the semifinals; Caldwell finished ninth and Bjornsen was 10th.
Here you were thinking Torin Koos was a sprinter. Think again: he won his eighth career national title on Sunday in the 30 k mass start classic, his second of the week. He bested Erik Bjornsen and David Norris in second and third in a close, hard-fought race at Soldier Hollow.
The action at the 2013 U.S. Cross Country Ski Championship heated up this morning when the senior men started off the day with the 30 k classic mass start. Six laps of the challenging 5 k loop at Soldier Hollow made for an exciting race as eighteen skiers were together in the lead pack for the majority of the race, but during the final kilometers only a handful of men were in contention for the national title. As they climbed Soldier Hollow's fabled Hermode's Hill for the final time it was Torin Koos (BSF) who made a decisive move to claim the national title with Erik Bjornsen (USST/APU) and David Norris (MSU) finishing second and third respectively. Check out our footage of the race.
It’s been almost two weeks since the Americans competing in Canmore found out they’d earned World Cup spots as part of the nation's group. The initial excitement now abated, the athletes racing the mass start classic and skiathlon on Thursday and Sunday want to ski within themselves and not let the bright lights of the World Cup get too blinding.
WEST YELLOWSTONE, Mont. — Friday’s distance results in the first SuperTour of the season weren’t easy for everyone to swallow, especially not Ryan Scott of Ski & Snowboard Club Vail/Team HomeGrown. His coach Eric Pepper racked it up as a bad day. “He went out a little hard, blew up pretty hard [and] didn’t have great legs,” Pepper said on Saturday. Still, seeing he ranked 78th in the 9-kilometer skate individual start hurt. “That was...
CRAFTSBURY, Vermont — Looking calm and relaxed as he finished the two-lap 3.2 k freestyle prologue on Saturday morning, Simi Hamilton (SVSEF/USST) skied to a comfortable win in the opening event of the SuperTour Finals at the Craftsbury Outdoor Center. He beat Sylvan Ellefson (Team HomeGrown) by 6.6 seconds, and in a tie for third, Noah Hoffman (Team HomeGrown/USST) and Erik Bjornsen (APU/USST) both claimed bronze (+11.5). Kris Freeman (USST), skiing for Team HomeGrown this...
The second and final nordic race of the 2012 NCAA’s was held on a blue-bird Bozeman day which reached 60 degrees by race’s end. Spectators who witnessed the 15 and 20 kilometer mass start classic races on Friday were treated to non-stop action and nail-biting finishes in both the men’s and women’s events, as the title for both races ended in a two-way sprint to the finish line. In the men’s 20k it was a...
RUMFORD, Maine – For most of the racers in the men’s 30km classic mass start at the United States Cross Country Ski Championship there was one long effort, but for Noah Hoffman it was ski 20km and then race 10km as fast as he could. Watch how things played out for Hoffman and the rest of the field. Full Race Report: “Hoffman Uses Smarts, Grit to Win 30 K”, by: Alex Matthews
RUMFORD, Maine – There was no sugarcoating it. U.S. Ski Team member Noah Hoffman wasn’t happy with his performance on Thursday at the 2012 U.S. Cross Country Championships. The 22-year-old had gone out too hard in the men’s 15 k freestyle individual start at Black Mountain. The definitive race leader for the first two laps, Hoffman dealt with the consequences of his pacing – or lack thereof – on the last two. With the fourth-place...
Sylvan Ellefson (SSCV/Team Homegrown) took home his second winner’s check of the weekend with his victory on Sunday in the Bozeman, MT 15 k classic. He bested the rest of the field by a significant margin; Erik Bjornsen (APU/USST) was his closest competitor at 30.8 seconds back. Montana State University’s David Norris rounded out the men’s podium in third (+40.6). Asked if he could sense a win as he warmed up on Sunday morning before...
Going into the 15 k classic race in Rumford, APU’s Lars Flora had a total of four national championships to his name. But to say that he had endured a dry spell would be an understatement: it had been 1098 days since his last title, which came in Houghton, MI in 2008. After two tough seasons, and a demoralizing defeat in Sunday’s sprint, the 32-year-old Flora finally broke through on Thursday to collect his fifth...
Tyler Kornfield nipped Alaska Nanook teammates David Norris and Erik Soederstrom in the second race of the 15th Annual Flint Hills Resources Town Race Series, the Fairbanks Youth Sports Classic Sprint, Saturday, December 4, in the late-afternoon dusk at Birch Hill Recreation Area. Kornfield’s photo-finish victory gained him a measure of revenge agains Soederstrom, who last year at the USSA National Championships in Anchorage pipped Kornfield in the Men’s Final. For a little club race,...
A mini tour is more than just three days of racing. The strategic and tactical elements require racers to pace for the whole tour starting with the first event. Every stride, every pole plant counts. That’s an important lesson, as the tour format gains hold on the FIS schedules.
FAIRBANKS, AK – Alaska Nanooks skiing head coach Scott Jerome announced the signing of two in-state talents, as David Norris and Eric Ryan have autographed National Letters of Intent. Norris, a native of Fairbanks, and Ryan, of Anchorage, will join the Blue and Gold in the fall and both will train for their first collegiate ski season by running on the trails with the cross country team. The 19 year-old Norris skied the past six...
Today was the second day of racing here in Presque Isle and was the first day of distance, with the J2’s skiing classic 5ks, while the J1/OJ women and men skied 10k and 15ks. The J2 girls started at 10a.m and the boys at 10:30. The conditions for this race were hard and fast making the race very interesting. Corey Stock of New England and Cole Morgan of Intermountain (who also celebrated a birthday today)...