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U.S. Ski Team

Bender Bags Another Classic Sprint Title, ‘What I Really Wanted to Do Here’

MIDWAY, Utah — There was a dampness in the room, and an odor that clung to the walls like plastic. Yet athletes continued to enter, with one after another pulling open the doors to the Soldier Hollow venue (SoHo) volunteer building. Once inside, many made a beeline for the race committee’s makeshift front desk. Race bibs and start lists, however, were not what they sought. Close to an hour had passed since the final female...

TDS Stages 5, 6, 7: Toblach/Val di Fiemme Quotes

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...

MIDWAY, Utah — With four grueling uphills per lap, the new U.S. Cross Country Championships women’s 10-kilometer nine years. Maybe flats are easier to find on Gregg’s Twin City turf than the hills that abound in SoHo. But the 36 year old still considers herself a climber. Gregg proved a point after she won by 2.2 seconds in the women’s 10 k freestyle on Saturday, the first day of nationals: put a hill, any hill, in front of her and...

Friday Rundown: Diggins 1st, Bjornsen 3rd in TDS Stage 5; Crawford Gets Season Best in Oberhof

FIS Cross-Country Tour de Ski Stage 5 (Toblach): 5/10 k freestyle Men’s report Two U.S. women on the podium. Remember when that happened with Kikkan Randall and Sophie Caldwell back in 2015 World Championships, with Jessie Diggins and Caitlin Gregg in the 10 k freestyle? Well, it just happened again, this time with Diggins placing first and Sadie Bjornsen third in the women’s 5-kilometer freestyle individual start on Friday at Stage 5 of the Tour de Ski...

Nordic Nation: Competition Analysis with Grover and Diggins

Diggins placed fourth in that race. The FIS Competition Analysis is a tool coaches and skiers can use to see exactly where they skied effectively, and where they may have lost time. In Davos, pretty much Diggins skied fast. FIS Competition Analysis from the Tour de Ski’s stage 4 women’s 10 k freestyle pursuit in Oberstdorf, Germany; Diggins placed fifth and her U.S. teammates had an impressive day as well. Other references: 

Ustiugov Continues to Sweep; Harvey Clings to 3rd in Stage 4 Pursuit

Could Russia’s Sergey Ustiugov be the first cross-country skier to perform a seven-stage sweep? He’s certainly well on his way, after collecting his fourth Tour de Ski win in a row on Wednesday in the men’s 15-kilometer freestyle pursuit in Oberstdorf, Germany. Ustiugov’s four-stage streak alone is unprecedented. Until this year, no other nordic skier in the International Ski Federation (FIS) has been able to complete such a feat during the Tour. Not even Norway’s defending overall World...

TDS Stages 1 & 2: Val Müstair Bonus Quotes

With the opening stages of the Tour de Ski  in Val Müstair, Switzerland, behind us, we wanted to share some athlete and coach comments that didn’t make it into the race reports: *** On training over the holidays leading up to the Tour: “We were in three different main locations over Christmas: France, Austria, and Switzerland, depending on which athlete you were. You kind of come back and see where everybody is. I think we all know each...

Seven-Stage Tour de Ski Starts Saturday

It’s time for the International Ski Federation’s (FIS) 11th Tour de Ski. The 2017 edition takes place in three countries and four different venues. Racers will compete in seven stages over the course of nine days. The grueling Alpe Cermis — a 9-kilometer freestyle hill climb in Val di Fiemme, Italy — will be featured again as the final race to determine the overall Tour de Ski (TdS) results. Directly leading up to the multi-stage event, currently out...

Original e-blast) Eastern Cup Race Report A really productive and fun first weekend of racing at Craftsbury. A little bit of everything when it came to snow and weather! Day 1: Classic Interval Start Cold temps overnight on a manmade base, but a lot of fresh new snow the day of the race. For kick wax we were on a very thin Toko Green Base binder ironed in. We ended up on kick wax from another brand....

e-blast) TokoUS.com. The specific link is here. You can drill down on a specific region too of course. How to Wax Backcountry Skins With all of the snow falling recently and plenty more on the way, people might be heading into the mountains for some backcountry skiing. Here is a quick video on how to best wax backcountry skins by Toko Tech Team member Erich Wilbrecht. See entire video library

After Hot World Cup Start, Patterson Needs Nationals to Make Lahti Team

Caitlin Patterson of the Craftsbury Green Racing Project had a red-hot start to her World Cup season, finishing 28th in the 10-kilometer classic in Kuusamo, Finland, and thus scoring World Cup points in the very first weekend of racing. But since then, not everything has gone perfectly for last season’s SuperTour leader. In the Lillehammer mini tour, she failed to crack the top 30 in any individual races and finished the tour 42nd overall. “A lot of...

World Cup Skiers Wrestle with McLaren Report, Want Action From FIS

DAVOS, Switzerland — The evening before the skate sprint in Davos – Andy Newell’s last World Cup competition of 2016 – the U.S. Ski Team veteran stood in the dark outside the temporary trailer his team was using as a wax cabin and talked about doping. In particular, he talked about systematic doping in Russia and has maintained his innocence since , in her extensive investigation of retroactively-awarded Olympic medals, called this “the butterfly effect...

Sprint Masters Newell and Randall Still Seeking Top Speed

DAVOS, Switzerland–A few years ago, there was rarely a World Cup sprint where the U.S. Ski Team’s Kikkan Randall and Andy Newell weren’t fighting for a top spot in the heats. The bread and butter of the U.S. sprint squad, the pair defined what was possible for American skiing in the modern era. But this season neither has made it into the quarterfinals of a sprint yet. On Sunday, Newell just barely missed the heats:...

Diggins Fourth in Davos: Now I ‘Realistically Expect to Be in the Fight’

DAVOS, Switzerland — Coming off a won the day. “Working on the long distances, it’s still a ways to catch up to the girls at the top,” Diggins said. “But it’s a long season, and we have a lot of belief, a lot of sparkles on our side.” By 10 k into the race, she was up into fifth place, and within a second of the time laid down by Nathalie Von Siebenthal of Switzerland....

Lillehammer, Östersund & West Notes & Quotes

Three days of racing, more than a dozen North American skiers, and one FasterSkier on-site reporter was there to witness it all — including Women | Women | Women | Diggins’s 5 k victory “Jessica can be either in the front or in the back when it comes to classic. I thought that if she has a good day, then we and Marit can try to chase Heidi, and that would be a really nice group....

Leading Up to Lillehammer, U.S. Team Talks Midweek Race Prep

We hear a lot about the details of a cross-country ski racer’s day on race day, but what about those four or five days in between? What do World Cup racers do then, in the middle of the week? FasterSkier Norwegian contributor Aleks Tangen ventured to Lillehammer on Wednesday and Thursday to find out. *** LILLEHAMMER, Norway — The first mini tour of the World Cup season starts today — Friday — in Lillehammer. A year ago at...