Just over a week ago, five U.S. Ski Team women and one Canadian packed their bags in various parts of the world and set off to meet in Sweden. Usually faced with the task of preparing for months of overseas travel, some might have scratched their heads. What do you bring for just two weeks? Americans Kikkan Randall and Liz Stephen had already been in Europe for nearly a month, first competing in the Blink...
The first North American to arrive in Sweden last week, Canadian Chandra Crawford came two days earlier than everyone else, starting her journey Wednesday in Östersund near the Norwegian border. There, she visited Canadian national-team technician Micke Book and his family, and rollerskied before making her way 460 kilometers north on Friday. Up in Torsby, the home of Sweden’s famous ski tunnel, she worked out alongside U.S. Ski Team members Kikkan Randall, Liz Stephen, Holly Brooks, Jessie Diggins and...
My favorite place on earth is here among the Haag family in Orsa. Ok, maybe being home in Vermont with my own family is pretty high up there too, but this is about as good as it gets. A few pics from our ski today. 3 hour skate tour a...
So, Kikkan and I finished up at the Blink Festival and have moved on to a small town outside of Steinkjer, Norway. We are staying with the Lillefjell family, Frode, who was Kikkan's coach a few years back at APU had put us up and has been showing up (a...
As Kikkan Randall rounded the last corner in the final of today’s rollerski sprint at the Blink festival in Sandnes, Norway, she was in perfect position to go for the win – and she began revving up for dash to the line. But the American, who won the Sprint Cup on last season’s World Cup circuit, was on pavement, not snow, and she was on matched rollerskis, not her own equipment. All of that added...
Still feeling a bit like fish out of water on faster-than-normal rollerskis, U.S. Ski Team members Kikkan Randall and Liz Stephen jumped in anyway Friday, the second day of the Blink Festival in Sandnes, Norway. After both cautiously approached the start of yesterday’s 7.5 k climb, where men /
Kikkan and I are on our annual Scando summer training trip together and this year it has taken us to the Blink rollerski festival in Sandnes, Norway for a week. Yesterday was our first race, an uphill climb called Lysebotn Opp, which we took a 2 ...
At the far end of a fjord in southwest Norway, a handful of the world’s best cross country skiers gathered on Thursday to race each other up 7.5 k of winding road on rollerskis. Hundreds of spectators lined the last few meters of the Lysebotn Opp with to cheer on their favorite athletes in the first race of the 2012 Blink Festival. In the women’s race the Norwegian fans were not disappointed. Therese Johaug (NOR)...
As skiers go, there aren’t many out there more inexhaustibly enthusiastic than Liz Stephen. Her energetic description of the technique changes she’s currerntly working on, for example, could inspire you to momentarily want nothing more than to strap on your rollerskis and hit the pavement. The U.S. Ski Team A-team member certainly has plenty to be happy about: Stephen posted top-20s twice during the regular season, a first for the 25-year-old. As the 28th-ranked female...
The Blink Ski Festival, touted as the largest summer ski event in the world, takes place in Sandnes, Norway, every July and attracts some of the best skiers in the world. This year its international lineup extends to the US; Kikkan Randall and Liz Stephen will be joining an impressive lineup of other world-class nordic athletes at the festival, which runs July 19 – 21. The rollerski festival features biathlon and cross-country events for juniors...
I found Vermont Peanut Butter in a cupboard in Utah!!! So psyched!!!If you haven't tried their peanut butters, get on it! Check it out here:Vermont Peanut Butter CompanyHEY!!! I'm back!!! I took a long break from skiing and anything ski related, includ...
In the months following its first camp of the year in Bend, Ore., the U.S. Ski Team (USST) has several new training destinations planned along with its old standbys: the men and women will split up and head to Alaska, Sweden, Austria and Germany over the course of the summer. And for the first time since its first trip to New Zealand 10 years ago, the Snow Farm is completely off the schedule. The women’s...
Life at Sognefjell centers around skiing twice a day; skating in the morning and classic in the afternoon. There are four great meals a day. We add in a trip down to the Sognefjord, and we complete the “Willie’s” uphill roller ski time trial in honor of our friend Willie Neal. A lot of top US skiers have enjoyed this one. US Team members Simi and Liz Stephen have both gone twice. Each year is...
With the Super Tour in our neighborhood last week we got to see some fast skiing! Craftsbury Outdoor Center hosted the tour finals and closed out the week with a Fast & Female Clinic on Sunday. Several girls in our Mansfield Nordic Club attended Fast and Female and raved about it (see their comments below). But some other interactions with the USA and Canadian women gave insight to their class, beyond their fast skiing. At...
With SuperTour Finals and U.S. Distance Nationals wrapping up in Craftsbury, Vermont, the North American ski community can call it a wrap on another season. Despite a general lack of snow, the finale in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom was a success – particularly for the U.S. Ski Team’s Kris Freeman, who after a disappointing World Cup season returned to the States to claim the overall win at SuperTour Finals and then the national title in the...
CRAFTSBURY, Vt. – Shaking out the legs, clicking into their skis and moving their bodies just before the Friday’s 30-kilometer mass start at U.S. Distance Nationals, about 50 women looked straight ahead, all likely thinking the same thing. This is it. One more and we’re done. Some prepared for 20 times around a 1.5 k loop thinking each was a victory lap. Afterward, they’d be finished for the season. Four to five months of racing...
JAY, Vermont — The fourth and last stage of the 2012 SuperTour Finals was a 1.8 k suffer-fest up 1,079 vertical feet of a blue run at Jay Peak. Watch it unfold from the two spots on the course we had the cameras rolling.
JAY, Vt. – Every uphill has to end at some point. But what if it’s a mountain, and what if you can’t see the top? Nearly 70 women and 90 men probably thought something along those lines as they ascended a 1.8-kilometer freestyle hill climb at the Jay Peak alpine resort on Wednesday. As part of the SuperTour Finals, the event was a pursuit with the mini-tour leader starting first and the rest of the...
CRAFTSBURY, Vermont — Even though she now has a World Cup podium to her name, a win at SuperTour Finals had eluded Sadie Bjornsen (APU/USST) until Sunday morning, when she claimed the 10 k mass start classic on the second day of racing at the Craftsbury Outdoor Center. Rain isn’t usually at the top of the list of desirable ski conditions, but as the snow soaked through prior to start, Bjornsen couldn’t wait to start...
