Erik Bråten – FasterSkier.com

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Canadian National Ski Team Community News Olympics RacingCyr and Ritchie faked it til they made it – to the best classic team sprint finish in Canadian men’s history

Rachel PerkinsFebruary 17, 2022

During the opening weekend of World Cup racing in Ruka, FIN back in November 2021, Canada’s Antoine (Tony) Cyr popped an 11th place finish in the first distance race – a tough 15-kilometre classic won by Finland’s Iivo Niskanen, now a gold medalist in the event. After the race, Cyr wrote to FasterSkier that the course had suited him with its long uphills and frigiddig conditions; temperatures were near zero degrees Fahrenheit ( -17 C)....

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Camps Canadian National Ski Team News OlympicsAn Inside Look at the Canadian Olympic Prep Camp

Gerry FursethJanuary 29, 2022

The Canadian Prep Camp in Sovereign Lake and SilverStar, BC prior to the 2022 Beijing Olympics sounds like a nordic skier’s heaven. A two-week ski vacation with 100 kilometres of perfectly groomed snow. A private room above a great coffee shop (pain au chocolate!) and next door to some great beer. January weather just below freezing with enough falling snow to make every day a hardwax day. Two weeks of what locals call superhero snow. A...

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Canadian National Ski Team News RacingSome Changes to Canada’s High-Perfomance Staff and Bråten returns as World Cup coach.

Jason AlbertJune 8, 2021

Nordiq Canada announced earlier this week a reorganization of its high-performance team in the run-up to the 2022 Paralympic and Olympic Games. Kate Boyd, who had been hired as Nordiq Canada’s high-performance director in September 2020, will become the high-performance director of the Para-Nordic team. “Looking at the critical year ahead, and the expectations placed on our Paralympic athletes to not only repeat our success from 2018, but to also ensure the tradition of excellence with this...

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Feature InterviewsFine Tuning with Katherine Stewart-Jones and Erik Bråten: A Two Way Street

Jason AlbertFebruary 18, 2021

Canada’s Katherine Stewart-Jones landed on the World Cup this season beginning in January – and late January at that. The Canadian National Team remained off the race circuit until then due to a variety of issues related to the pandemic. Domestically, Canada took a hard stance on running races. When Stewart-Jones and her teammates raced in Lahti on January 23, their only “race” experience since the end of last season were head-to-head efforts within...

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Canadian National Ski Team Continental Cup RacingCanadian Racing Update

Gerry FursethDecember 8, 2020

Nordiq Canada’s first major change announcement on November 16th was the decision to cancel the Period I trip to Lillehammer, Dresden, and Davos. (The Lillehammer races have been postponed, and have not been officially rescheduled.) “For us, it was chatting with our medical experts, assessing the situations here at home and what we were seeing happening overseas,” said Nordiq Canada’s High Performance Director Kate Boyd. “We had never planned to go to Ruka. And then...

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General Interviews NewsDiscussing the Building Blocks with Canadian National Team Coach Erik Bråten

Jason AlbertJune 29, 2020

At twenty-seven-years-old, Canadian National Team coach Erik Bråten brings youthful energy and a spirit that fosters independence amongst his athletes. Originally from Oslo, Norway, and new to the Canadian system in November 2018, Bråten has the dual task of shepherding a crop of young Canadian talent and assisting veteran athletes like Dahira Beatty and Katherine Stweart-Jones to achieving consistent in-the-points racing on the World Cup. Recently, Bråten has helped Nordiq Canada organize and produce a series...

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Resources TrainingListening in: Nordiq Canada’s Webinar – Group vs Individual Training

Jason AlbertJune 18, 2020

As part of an ongoing webinar series, Nordiq Canada held a webinar titled Group vs Individual Training. Senior National Team athlete Dahria Beatty, National Team coach Erik Bråten, Para Nordic head coach Robin McKeever, and sports psychologist Jon Coleman were on the panel. For any person interested in learning about the yin-yang of individual versus group training sessions, the video, which runs nearly an hour, is well worth a viewing. Bråten, originally from Norway, was hired...

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Continental Cup RacingCanmore NorAm / SuperTour / Nationals Weekend Wrap-up (Updated)

Gerry FursethDecember 9, 2019

Updated with more quotes. The first three race days of both the NorAm and SuperTour series are complete and the athletes and coaches are digesting the lessons. It was free sprints Friday, classic distance Saturday, and interval start free technique distance on Sunday. The men started the Sunday with a four lap 15km followed by the women doing a 3 lap 10km. CGRP’s Ben Lustgarten nailed the pacing to win Sunday’s race in 42:56.0, just...

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Canadian National Ski Team Continental Cup RacingRebuilding Canada: Less Europe, More North America

Gerry FursethDecember 2, 2019

Canada is moving into a new era in skiing. An era with less World Cup podiums and more emphasis on developing future podium athletes. “Train at what you want to be good at. If its climbing, climb. If it is chess, play chess. Ski training has many elements of course, but in the end the best training to race fast is to race.” — Erik Bråten, National Team Head Coach In the near future,...

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Canadian National Ski Team RacingNordiq Thunder 2019: Notes, Quotes, and Photos

Gerry FursethNovember 17, 2019

The unofficial kickoff to the western Canadian racing season was held on November 13th and 14th. The traditional King’s Court sprint and interval start distance races are now called Nordiq Thunder — a re-brand from Frozen Thunder – but the relaxed feel and clockwork organization remain the same. With no trip selections on the line, the 93 sprinters and 105 distance racers were there to test their fitness and tune up for the races that...

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Canadian National Ski Team General NewsNordiq Canada: Ringing in the Changes

Gerry FursethNovember 5, 2019

When Cross Country Canada announced last March that they would be rebranding as Nordiq Canada, they were emphatic the new name was a symbol of their readiness to make changes. Those changes are starting to happen. One holdover from last season is Erik Bråten, the young Norwegian brought in to shape the development pipeline. After one year on the job, Bråten is still enthusiastic and now the sole head coach. Louis Bouchard has stepped down...

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Canadian National Ski Team General NewsMeet the Coach: CCC’s Erik Bråten

Gerry FursethNovember 23, 2018

Cross Country Canada hired Erik Bråten as the new national team coach on November 1st, joining Louis Bouchard. After a short delay to get a work permit, Bråten arrived in Canada on November 15th. Regular readers will know the highlights of his resume: Graduate of the Norwegian School of Sports Science. Winner of the coach of the year from the Norwegian ski federation. Previously Head Coach at Team Kollen, the junior team constituted from clubs...

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Canadian National Ski Team General NewsCross Country Canada: The Reboot Part Two

Gerry FursethNovember 23, 2018

This is the second part of FasterSkier’s report on the state of high performance cross-country skiing and athlete development in Canada. You can read part one here. Cross Country Canada (CCC), as the national governing body for cross-country skiing in Canada has the difficult task of steering a rather large ship. The idea in steering the ship is to maintain a path requiring little quick and nimble maneuvering. Survey the landscape, mine the data, set...

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Racing World CupWorld Cup Preview #10: Canada

Gerry FursethNovember 9, 2018

Welcome to FasterSkier’s World Cup Preview, where we check in with the top-10 teams from last year’s FIS Cross Country World Cup tour before the season starts. The World Cup begins with a classic sprint in Ruka, Finland on Nov. 24th. *** Canada Overall in Nations Cup Last Year: 10th Women’s Ranking 2017/2018: 18th Men’s Ranking 2017/2018: 8th Canadians to Watch: Canada has shape-shifted it’s world cup team as part of a larger restructuring of...

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Canadian National Ski Team General NewsBouchard Announced as Canada’s Head Coach while Norway’s Bråten Joins CCC as a National Team Coach

FasterSkierNovember 1, 2018

It has been a transition year for Cross Country Canada (CCC). Back on June 7th, CCC announced the hiring of Nic Lemyre as its High-Performance advisor. Lemyre is Canadian but lives and works in Oslo, Norway. With the reshuffling of Canada’s staff, up until today, CCC had not formally announced its World Cup coaching roster for the 2018-2019 season. Back on August 11th, CCC posted a job announcement for “Head Coach, Canadian Senior Cross Country...