Not only has Norway dominated cross country World Cup podiums, but their skier have also taken home more than half of the available prize money. Marit Bjørgen alone has won 1/3 of the total money available to the women's field. How does everyone else stack up, and how does this relate to World Cup points?
Without the big show of Marit Bjørgen in Saturday's classic sprint, Norway's Ingvild Flugstad Østberg rose to the occasion, notching her first World Cup classic-sprint victory and fourth podium of the season.
There was wind. There was fog. There were crashes. In a normal World Cup relay, 12 spare rounds and a penalty loop would place a team far back indeed. But in Oberhof, Germany, today, it represented excellence - and Russia claimed their third-straight men's relay victory.
With a goal of a top eight on Saturday, the Canadians did two places better to tie a team-best sixth in the IBU World Cup men's relay in Hochfilzen, Austria. Russia won it by 20 seconds over France, and Norway was another 7.7 seconds back in third.
Emil Hegle Svendsen, the third-winningest man in World Cup history, said earlier this year that he was losing motivation for biathlon. Well, with perfect 20/20 shooting and a monster win in Östersund, Sweden, he's remembering exactly what he loves about the sport: winning.
Logging too many hours to ski fast? The debate is raging in Norway, where Olympian Frode Estil weighed in last week when he argued that many skiers are obsessed with logging hours at the expense of training quality. Longtime coach Mona Hjellsand strongly agrees.
After a disastrous 2014 event which saw the title race canceled on race morning due to dangerously high winds in the mountains, there has been much soul-searching in Norway as to how the Birkebeiner ski marathon can go forward (or whether the organizers were being wusses).
Norwegian ski star Petter Northug has been sentenced to 50 days of jail, among other punishments, for driving while intoxicated, crashing his car, and then lying to police about what happened. It's unclear how this will affect his quest for gold at Falun World Championhips in February.
One author's take on the whole Northug fiasco, including the consequences it could hold for the 28-year-old Norwegian skiing star.
Therese Johaug could be the Norwegian Ski Federation's MVP. But can they keep her? "She’s going to make more money than both Petter Northug and Marit Bjørgen," one expert says. "The girl has everything, so the sponsors will be willing to pay very much."
Russian anchor Anton Shipulin using perfect shooting and blistering skiing to emerge as the fastest of a four-man lead pack in the waning minutes of a scintallating men's biathlon relay race, capitalizing on a stunning collapse by Norwegian anchor Emil Hegle Svendsen.
A rookie and veteran teamed up to claim a gold medal for Finland in the men's Olympic team sprint, after a finish that was marred by a crash in the lead pack.
For Norway, the country's collapse at the Olympics has prompted fevered news coverage, and speculation that the team’s coaches, and ski technicians, could lose their jobs after the games.
On Saturday, Marit Bjørgen and the Norwegian women wore black armbands in the Olympic skiathlon to honor teammate Astrid Jacobsen's brother, who died unexpectedly the day before. The IOC didn't like that one bit, likening it to a political statement, which is banned at the Games.
Most studies of how climate change will impact the ski industry focus on downhill skiing, and on losses like tourism dollars and jobs at ski resorts. But what about welfare and happiness? In Oslo, a team of researchers explored how much skiers were willing to pay, in time and money, to reach trails under different weather conditions - and determined that skiing has a very high value, indeed.
Bryan Fletcher and Todd Lodwick narrowly missed the podium in the 2 x 7.5-kilometer sprint in Ramsau, Austria, finishing fourth for U.S. Nordic Combined's best result in a team sprint. "We train all summer and to have a result like [this] is humbling,” Lodwick says. “We’re really, really proud to put Norway in its place and to know that we are the fastest team out there, whether it’s by a second or ten seconds, it doesn’t matter."
Fresh snow couldn't keep the US women's relay from matching their best ever 4.5 Classic/Free Relay time. Randall, Bjornsen Stephen and Diggins claimed a bronze medal despite near disaster and broken ski pole. A second US women's relay team clinched 12th to close the second weekend of World Cup racing
While the Norwegian women's team seized a predictable victory in the Lillehammer World Cup 4 x 5 k relay on Sunday, Finland and the U.S. duked it out for second, with a late crash taking the Americans out of the running for their best-ever relay result.
The Canadian men showed signs of recovery and an upswing in their second weekend of racing, with Alex Harvey leading the team in 16th in Saturday's 15 k classic individual start at the World Cup in Lillehammer, Norway.
The latest research used Norwegian and French World Cup skiers to look at how VO2Max and heart rate variability fluctuate over the course of one or several seasons. Plus, a new kind of "neurodoping" is now possible, using electrical currents or magnetic fields to make your brain better at everything.