An Ode To Those Moving On: 2010 + News Bits

It’s a part of sport, as athletes get older they retire. It’s a fact of life, just like when people get older they die. I know, I know, a morbid analogy. This spring is no different as we have seen a handful more athletes decide to hang up the competitive skis and turn their lives attention to other ambitions.

Biggest team to take a hit was the Swiss, who had four of their athletes retire: Peter von Allman, Reto Burgermeister,  and Laurence Rochat. The Swiss men’s team didn’t take a hit with regards of their top four as Livers, Colonga, Fischer, and the ever improving Curdin Perl will all be back for another season.

Milan Sperl of the Czech Republic also retires after 10 years on the circuit. Like almost all the athletes I will talk about, he will leave a hole in that Czech relay team that seems to pull out those surprise performance (ie. Olympics) as they turn into “Team Synergy”. When I was doing a bit of background, I was surprised to see that he had no World Cup podiums, but even more so only 51 starts in his career. That’s averaging a mere five World Cup starts per season!

But the biggest names to leave the ski world on a competitive level were Sabina valbusa, Rene Sommerfeldt, Sara Renner, Anna Olsson and the great Virpi Kuitunen. For the Finns, it’ll be a big blow, especially after the mediocre season their women’s team had, but they did see some good progress from those in the shadows of Kuitunen and Saarinen, particularly Roponen who turned out to be one of the teams most consist skiers. The question is who will be filling Kuitunen’s spot for the relay team come Holmenkollen in eight months. They have some options such as Krista Lahteenmaki, but at 19 years old, she is still very raw for a distance skier.

Like the Finns, The men’s German team will miss Sommerfeldt. Though his those regular top results were becoming fewer and far between, he was a integral part of the relay team. We will probably see more of Sommerfeldt though. He has already expressed his interest in coaching, but I don’t think he’ll make the jump to coaching as quickly as Hetland did, but could very well see him with a national team in a couple of years. The question I ask whenever I see an elite skier like Sommerfeldt step away from the World Cup is who will replace him in the relay team? Well, there’s Tom Reichelt who is still making steps to be up there with the best, but also the youngster Tim Tscharke who made massive improvements this year, highlighted by his performance at the Olympics.

The last name Valbusa has become a household name for skis fans over the past 18 years. With older brother Fulvio Valbusa being quite successful in his time with 13 World Cup podiums, Sabina Valbusa was also quite the accomplished athlete. She hit the World Cup start line an impressive 219 times in her career where she debuted way back in 1992 in Ramsau. She had one World Cup victory back in 2004 and coincidentally it was the last of her nine individual podiums. That kind of experience and wisdom will be surely missed in the Italian ranks.

Could you write a better perfect ending for Anna Olsson’s career? Winning the final sprint race of the season and her career on home snow was amazing to see, and what a way to retire… on top. She experience will be missed especially for those young Ingemarsdotter’s, Pajala’s, and Falk’s who are transitioning to the big show, but at the same time, the women’s sprint team depth is impressive and still has that experience in the form of Lina Andersson who has been on the circuit now for 12 years and has 94 World Cup starts to her name.

Another story book ending had to be the final World Cup race of Sara Renner’s career. Though Sara wasn’t quite as prolific on the World stage as those mentioned above. She did have some results that many athletes are envious of, including her silver medal in the sprint relay from Torino and World Cup medals on the tough course of Davos in February 2006, and of course her sprint bronze medal from the World Championships in Oberstorf amongst a sea of Swedes ( Emelie Öhrstig, Lina Andersson, and Anna Dahlberg (now Olsson)). Her bronze medal in Canmore year was another fairy-tale like ending as she was able to medal on her hometown course in her 124th and final World Cup race. Her 10th place in the 15km pursuit at the Olympics was a great result and I was really happy to see her end on a high note.

The problem with Sara moving on is who will now lead the Canadian women’s team? The lack of depth is apparent and when you looking down the CPL (Canada Points List) or the Nor-Am results only one name comes to me; Daria Gaiazova. She made big strides this year in her sprinting and showed that she can qualify in the top 30 on any given day which is very positive, but she still has a bit of work to do to be able to step on a World Cup podium. Her distance skiing is pretty decent, and has done very well on the Nor-Am circuit this year, but has a long way to come yet for World Cup racing.

The next in line is Brittany Webster. Undoubtably, the most talented lady on the women’s team who only started skiing late in high-school as cross training for cross-country running. Her performance in the 10km classic at U23′s was mighty impressive with her fifth place considering she sat out all of last season due to a broken leg. She has the potential to be the next face of women’s cross-country and a World Cup medalist as many in Canada would agree with me, but I believe she’s still a couple of years away from reaching those heights.

Aside from the retirees, Vincent Vittoz, who was rumoured to be stepping away from the scene has decided he will be skiing next year. The 34-year old Frenchman had a great finish to the season and definitely looks like he has more gas in the tank for at least one more year. With the late season improvements of Manificat, this team will be really exciting to watch in the relay at Holmenkollen in March.

Other small news bits since the end of the season see the Russian’s do what they do best, the tragic comedy surrounding the Russian team and doping has taken another turn – for the worse – as two-time National Champion Lilija Stepanov had been found guilty of attempting to manipulate doping tests. Basically, she used another athletes urine to avoid testing positive, but untimately failed. A couple of days later, it was found she was abusing both EPO and nandrolone.

In Norway, the Skiforbunet is doing its yearly review of how the season turned out. Mark April 16th on your calendar because that’s when the Norwegian national team will be announced. There have been changes already as junior coach Roar Hjelmeset has taken an even bigger role as his position now encompasses the U23 program too. In this article,  Hjelmeset talks about the U23 athletes such as Hans Krister Holund and  Timo Andre Bakken not being able to make the jump to the big show like their U23 counter parts Panzhinskiy and Tscharnke. Personally, I think it’s a great idea to have a more concrete program that will help the athletes bridge the gap from the junior ranks to the World Cup. We’ve all talked about the lack of depth in the men’s distance team and hopefully this will be that final piece of the puzzle to see Norwegian rise again to their former glory, but it will obviously take a couple of years for these athletes make the transition.

Until next time, enjoy that glorious extra sunlight, spring is a great time of the year isn’t it?

The Favourites Win In Drammen

A very warm day at +7ºC while the snow was  able to stay cool at -0.5°C. The crowds were overflowing and squished up against the security fence which made for an amazing atmosphere around the 1245 meter track. Since it is a city sprint, it is one of the few times that the men and women race the same distance on the circuit. Today belonged to the best sprinters in the world (in my opinion) and the favourites on the day as Bjørgen and Jönsson picking up the victories in some of the deepest fields the World Cup will ever see in a sprint race.

Women

The big surprise of the qualifiers were Jacobsen and Brun-Lie both failing get into the top 30 in front of the home crowd. Even though they failed to make it, there were Norwegian ladies in the top 30. However, in qualification it was the Finnish women who stole the show having three athletes in the top eight and all their athletes in the top 22.

The highlights of the quarter-finals included a huge fall in the third heat on the first downhill of the course which took out the two Swedes Falk and Andersson as well as Japan’s Natsumi. Bjellånes was very impressive in her heat win in the last women’s quarter-final. This was just a sampler of what was to come from the Norwegian as she skier exceptionally strong throughout the day.

The semi-finals saw Saarinen dominate her semi-final just like her quarter-final. Some good skiing from Pajala saw her earn her first ever appearance in a World Cup final. The second heat saw Kowalczyk push the pace hard and this helped Bjellånes and Murnanen ski well enough to get the “lucky losers” spots for the final.

The final was quite exciting and include two Norwegians, two Finns, a Pole and a Swede. Bjørgen had extremely good skis and after falling back of the pace set by Kowalczyk early on, was able to regain the 30 meters lost to the Pole. After going over the steep cornered roller, Bjørgen and Kowalczyk got tangled up and the Pole hit the ground. They were both going around the corner side-by-side and as Kowalczyk went to push off, Bjørgen came up over top of the ski and trapped Kowalczyk in place causing her to fall. To be honest, it didn’t look like there was too much intent in it, it was just a result of tight quarter racing.

This gave Bjørgen a couple ski length lead over the others and ski made no mistake and took the win handily. Saarinen who was in second after Kowalczyk fell came across the line in the runners-up spot while Muranen was able to win the bronze medal in front of Magdalena Pajala. Karianne Bjellånes finally ran out of gas and ended up in fifth on the day.

Results
1. Marit Bjørgen
2. Aino-Kaisa Saarinen
3. Pirjo Muranen

Even with the fall in the final, Kowalczyk has moved that much closer to winning the treble of Crystal Globes. Last time this occurred was in 2006-2007 when Virpi Kuitunen won all three Crystal Globes. Kowalczyk currently has a 104 point lead over Saarinen and Bjørgen is another 34 points behind the Finn. So unless something catastrophic happens of Kowalczyk becomes ill and cannot race in the final two sprints of the season; it looks as though she will be able to hold on.

I was happy to see Saarinen and the rest of the Finns in form and I even though Kuitunen had a strong qualifier, she wasn’t able to make the final. I really hope she has one more podium effort in her before the end of the season as she is planning to retire after the races in Falun. She’s had quite the illustrious career and even though there is an asterisk beside her name for some due to her involvement with the 2001 Lahti scandal, I will always see her as the skier she was when she came back from her ban and put up many great results including a couple World Cup titles.

It was really good to see Muranen back on the sprint podium. The 2001 World Champion was last on the podium almost a year ago when she won a bronze in front of the home crowd in Lahti.

The new faces of Pajala great day to reach their first ever sprint finals. Pajala first caught my eye earlier in the year in the Tour de Ski when she strung together three top 10 placings. I really impressed about how the Swedish program has grown in leaps and bounds over the past couple years, and Pajala is another example as how the depth is increasing for Sweden. Incidentally, it was Pajala’s 22nd birthday today and a fourth place in Drammen is a pretty decent birthday present.

Bjellånes also did extremely well to reach her first sprint final too. To be the second fastest Norwegian out of the 17 that started the race will be of interested for the Norwegians. She has a spot on the team for the Holmenkollen sprints so it will be interesting to see how she fairs in the freestyle technique.

Men

The Norwegian men had 13 in through to the heats but the fastest was a Swede, as it has been the story so often for the past season. With a field as strong as it was, some big names also missed the top 30 on the men’s side including the likes of Petukhov, Svartedal, Dahl, Peterson, Hjelmeset and Jauhojärvi.

The quarter-finals ran smoothly and no big upsets. The biggest name to not make it through was Morilov who was the sixth fastest qualifier, finished fourth in his heat. The semis saw some very difficult heats with the first one including Hattestad, Pazinhsky, Newell, Jönsson, Pettersen and Colliander. The heat saw some great skiing from Newell who lead for a while but was eventually overtaken by Jönsson and his turbo. Pettersen had a difficult heat as he had a poor start due to some sticky/slippy klister got tangled up on the steep-roller which knocked him out of contention. Hattestad surprisingly faded in the home stretch and was no able to move into a spot to send him to the finals.

The second semi had Northug, Brandsdal, Rønning, Larsson, Onda and Lassila. Onda seems to be following in the footsteps of Gjerdalen and wearing non-conventional ski goggles as he opted for a pair of white thick rimmed Ray Bans?. The heat waS quite exciting as Northug had a great tactical heat to move from last to third in the final 500 meters to do enough for a lucky loser spot while Onda won the heat over Lassila to get to his first sprint final of the year.

The final were extremely tight and the same corner that wreaked havoc for Kowalczyk took another casualty. This time the competition was four skiers abreast as they came over the roller and Bransdal went down but had a brilliant recovery and to his credit didn’t give up but the damage was done. Coming into the finishing straight Jönsson was leading Newell and Northug with Onda close behind and you just knew who was going to cross the line first. Northug was able to barely overtake Newell but Jönsson turned his turbo on when he switched to diagonal stride and pulled away enough to wave to the crowd before he crossed the finish line. Northug was able to hold of Newell for the runners-up spot while Brandsdal was able to ski to fourth after his fall earlier. Onda came in fifth while Lassila got tangled up and fell on the final artificial hump before the home stretch and ended up sixth.

Results
1. Emil Jönsson
2. Petter Northug
3. Andrew Newell

Notes: Jönsson continues to impress this season. He has been the fastest qualifier in the seven of the eight races he has entered at the World Cup or Olympic level (the only race he was the fastest qualifier in, he was the second fastest) this season. If I was a coach, I would show his finish to all of my athletes to show how explosive and effective the diagonal stride can be when executed properly. The contrast in body type between him and Hattestad are great while Hattestad has brute strength and not as quick turn over, Jönsson (as strong as he is) has the dynamic crunch and explosion every time he plants his poles, but seamlessly transitions from double-pole to double-pole kick to diagonal so naturally that he can maintain his speed or even increase when he “gears down.” It’s always a pleasure to watch.

Northug managed to increase his lead on Bauer while Ski fans got their first look at his brother Thomas as he was able to qualify in 27th, unfortunately,he was last in his heat after a decent ski. It was interesting to see him ski and some of the similarities he has with Petter in terms of technique. The notable one is his arm placement when they pole, both have wider than usual pole plant which is very distinctive when you compare to other athletes.

Petter has said that Thomas is a stronger freestyle skier and expects him to be in the semis in the sprint on Sunday at Holmenkollen and hopefully he’s right. It’d be pretty neat to see them in the same heat. I’d still have my money on the eldest Northug though.

Yuchi Onda is one skier that thrives in Drammen. This is the third year in a row where he has made the final, yet he has yet to make the podium. Of his nine World Cup top 10 finishes, four have been in Drammen.

On the North American side… Newell on the podium!!! This is huge, after the disappointments of the Olympics of him crashing out in the qualifier, this is going to feel so good and I know the North American ski community is pumped to see him finally step on the podium this year. He looked really strong throughout the day and it’s impressive to see him on the podium in one of the deepest fields of the year.

On the Canadian front, it is official. Drammen is Team Canada’s kryptonite. The Canadian athletes will be the first to tell you that Drammen has never treated them well and the streak continued today as a Canadian male has still never been able to qualify for the top 30 at this race… incredible really.

On a more dismal note, today saw the first athletes caught doping at the Olympic and of course it will be an athlete from cross-country. The athlete who is guilty is Kornelia Marek who tested positive for EPO. Sadly, it explains all her good results which included a 9th in the team sprint, a 6th in the team relay and an 11th in the 30km mass start. Hopefully, she’ll be the first and last caught but I guess we will all start to hold our breath.

On a brighter note, the Holmenkollen ski festival starts on Saturday and I’m pumped to say I will be there in flesh and blood for the festivities and I am really excited to take part in the weekend and cheer on the North American skiers! There’ll be a more in-depth preview for the 30km/50km tomorrow.

Til Then.

Women’s 30km Preview

The final women’s race of the Olympics are upon us and the women will be skiing six 5km loops. There are two different 5km loops (red loop and blue loop) and the athletes will be alternating when they come into the stadium. It will be more like three 10km loops. The weather looks like it will be just as fun as ever with highs of 3°C with rain showers or wet flurries. The waxers at Callaghan Valley have got to be the hardest working staff in any sport over the Olympic period.

The bookmakers have Kowalczyk as the favourite at pretty strong odds of 1.95. Bjørgen is at 2.60 and Saarinen is at 14.00. Basically, they think the 30km will be a two women race. Kowalczyk does have a good track record in this event, but I think Bjørgen will take the victory to add to her gold stash. The only big name not to make the start list is Anna Haag who is still suffering from sickness.

This will be Sara Renner’s final race of her career. She has had a very success career with medals at every level including Olympics, World Championships, and the World Cup. It will be a special race for her and many Canadian ski fans. She has been the cornerstone and face of the Canadian women’s side ever since Beckie Scott retired. The women’s team will dearly miss her as they will be losing not only a world class skier, but a great teammate as well.

Results

1. Bjørgen

2. Kowalczyk

3. Kuitunen

Kowalczyk will try desperately hard to break away from Bjørgen but will not succeed. The Queen of Callaghan will hang onto Kowalczyk and either pull away out sprint her for her fourth gold of the Games. Many have pegged Saarinen for the bronze, but I think Kuitunen will take the final podium spot. She was the only athlete to ski faster than Kowalczyk in the relay and will be looking to win her first individual Olympic medal.

Others that could challenge include Størmer-Steira who has had a very good Olympic, but will fail to earn that elusive individual Olympic medal…perhaps another fourth place. Kristina Smigun- Vähi should have a strong race and will definitely be in the medal hunt. She hasn’t raced since the pursuit where she pulled out so her legs should be fresh compared to the others. Kalla should be up there but since it’s classic, she won’t be nearly as strong.

On a wicked side note, Chandra Crawford and Devon Kershaw will be/were on MTV Cribs! I believe the episode airs on Sunday night at 8:30 EST on MTV. Check your local listings. Now that’s what I call good publicity.

Til Then.