World Championships is looming; Devon and Nat return to cover three days of racing — and two podiums from Jessie Diggins — in Toblach, Italy. We’ll finally get to the mailbag episode next week, so send in your questions if you’ve got ’em: devon@fasterskier.com and nat@fasterskier.com.
This World Cup coverage is made possible through the generous support of Marty and Kathy Hall and A Hall Mark of Excellence Award. To learn more about A Hall Mark of Excellence Award, or to learn how you can support FasterSkier’s coverage, please contact info@fasterskier.com. The FIS World Cup calendar refers to this village as “Toblach,” but there’s more than one name for this wonderful, mountainous place. Located in the Sud Tirol of Northern Italy—a region suspended...
While World Cup Finals were underway in mid-March in Falun, Sweden, a second contingent of top American skiers was lining up roughly 2,000 kilometers south to race in the OPA Cup Finals in Sappada, Italy. Located along the northern edge of Italy near the Austrian border, the small town is nestled among the spectacular, jagged massifs of the Italian Dolomites, roughly an hour’s drive east of Toblach, which typically hosts the final stages of the...
The Tour de Ski’s Stage 5 cliff notes: A feisty race from both Diggins and Brennan. Diggins places third, Brennan fourth. In the men’s race, Schumacher paces to 15th, and a wall of red as Bolshunov is simply peerless.
This World Cup coverage is made possible through the generous support of Marty and Kathy Hall and their A Hall Mark of Excellence Award. To learn more about A Hall Mark of Excellence Award or to learn how you can support FasterSkier’s coverage please contact info@fasterskier.com. With Russia landing seven of the top eight positions yesterday, today’s 15 k classic pursuit started with a wave of red. Or as Maurice Manificat of France described it...
This World Cup coverage is made possible through the generous support of Marty and Kathy Hall and their A Hall Mark of Excellence Award. To learn more about A Hall Mark of Excellence Award or to learn how you can support FasterSkier’s coverage please contact info@fasterskier.com. We have entered the back half of the 2021 Tour de Ski. With five of eight races complete, roughly 45 kilometers raced and a little under 25 remaining, fatigue has...
This World Cup coverage is made possible through the generous support of Marty and Kathy Hall and their A Hall Mark of Excellence Award. To learn more about A Hall Mark of Excellence Award or to learn how you can support FasterSkier’s coverage please contact info@fasterskier.com. Stage 4 of the Tour de Ski introduced a change of scenery on Tuesday with the flanks of the Dolomites sinking from sky to valley floor in Tobalch, Italy....
The hunter becomes the hunted. Looking back on previous tours, Russia’s Sergey Ustiugov has not worn the leader bib going into the pursuit stage except for the 2016/2017 tour in Oberstdorf, Germany. That year, Ustiugov won six of the seven stages, placing second in the mass start classic in Stage 6, but still raced up the final hill climb with a significant buffer for the overall victory. This year, Ustiugov was the man to beat....
In this episode, Devon gets into the nitty-gritty of a lovely day of interval start racing. That’s for real: 15 k for the men, 10 k for the women … all skate. Stage 3 starts a run of three distance races in a row. Overall positions are still in play, but the top-tier are beginning to separate. Lots of Russians today in the top-10 for the men, and a nail biter on the women’s...
Toblach, Italy. A stunning stadium and backdrop with the Dolomites lording over the venue and a steady cling-clang of baritone bells greeted skiers along portions of the course. Stage 3 in Toblach, a 10-kilometer interval start skate, turbocharged the 2019-2020 Tour de Ski (TDS). After two stages, a Stage 1 mass start skate and Stage 2 skate sprint, Russia’s Natalia Nepryaeva sat atop the overall standings. In third overall, Norway’s imminent threat, Therese Johaug, was positioned...
The Tour de Ski (TdS) is well into its teenage years. This year’s edition, the 14th, features three locales and the following races with a few minor new twists to excite this seasonal highlight of cross-country World Cup racing. Lenzerheide, Switzerland (stages 1-2) Dec. 28, 29 Stage 1: 10/15 k freestyle mass start. A mass start initiates the TdS this year, that’s new. It replaces the timeworn prologue. Stage 2: Skate sprint Toblach, Italy (Stages...
*Note: This article has been updated to include comments from U.S. Ski Team B-Tean member, Kevin Bolger Without the visual of the grey and white U23 marker next to his name on an FIS results sheet, it’s easy to forget Norwegian Johannes Høsflot Klæbo is still under 23 years of age. As the Tour de Ski (TdS) celebrates its 13th edition this year, the twenty-two-year-old Klæbo (he celebrated his 22nd birthday this October) is only...
NorAm mini tour (Rossland, B.C.): 10/15 k freestyle pursuits Team Gregg ended the Rossland NorAm mini tour with another double win, with American Caitlin Gregg and her husband Brian Gregg winning the 10- and 15-kilometer freestyle pursuits, respectively, at the Black Jack Ski Club trails. Caitlin capped the long weekend with her third-straight win, a 48.28-second victory over former Canadian biathlete Zina Kocher (Foothills Nordic). Caitlin started first and was first across the finish in 29:02.86,...
Johannes Høsflot Klæbo is making a name for himself. The 21-year-old Norwegian broke a record on Sunday, after taking the men’s 15-kilometer classic pursuit title in Toblach, Italy and tallying his seventh World Cup win this season, the most victories ever recorded by a male skier before the new year. In previous seasons, Norwegians Petter Northug and Martin Johnsrud Sundby had topped out at six. With the win, Klæbo remained the Overall World Cup leader with...
No, this was no ordinary dream. If you woke Sunday to watch the women’s World Cup 10-kilomeer classic pursuit in Toblach, Italy, it was a bit of a nightmare if you were rooting for Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla wearing the yellow bib as the Overall World Cup leader. Kalla began the day with a five-second micro-cushion as the first skier out of the gate after her She also won the gritty no-kick 10 k classic during...
NorAm Mini Tour (Rossland, B.C.): Freestyle sprints On Day 2 of NorAm racing in Rossland, British Columbia, Julien Locke, of the Black Jack Ski Club and Canadian National U25 Team, won the men’s 1.4-kilometer freestyle sprint final on his home trails by just one-hundredth of a second over Evan Palmer-Charrette, of the National Team Development Centre (NTDC) Thunder Bay, in 2:38.13. NTDC Thunder Bay had two on the podium with Julian Smith in third, 0.4...
The premise was simple on the World Cup Saturday in Toblach, Italy, for the women’s 10-kilometer freestyle interval start: with firm tracks, sunny skies and only the timer to dictate the effort, it was a hammertime from the start. The threshold-type race featured two laps on a 5 k course that threw grinding climbs and working flats at the 78 female starters. Early in the race it appeared the red and blue of Norway would...
FIS Cross-Country World Cup (Toblach, Italy): Freestyle team sprint Men |
FIS Cross-Country World Cup (Toblach, Italy): Freestyle sprints Men | Race report Finland’s Kaisa Mäkäräinen posts a 22-second win for her first victory of the season and first time shooting without a miss in an individual race since the Ruhpolding sprint almost exactly a year ago. Dunklee leads North Americans in 33rd and qualifies for the pursuit, along with Canada’s Rosanna Crawford (55th), Megan Tandy (56th) and Julia Ransom (60th). Ski Classics press release. “It...
That’s a wrap, folks! With the 11th Tour de Ski coming to an end on Sunday with the infamous Alpe Cermis final climb in Val di Fiemme, we wanted to share some of the athlete and coach comments that didn’t make it into the race reports. Below are quotes from the last three stages of the Tour, all in Italy. *** Stage 5 (Toblach, Italy): 5/10 k freestyle Men’s report On pre-race feelings: “I think nerves were...