She can still be inconsistent. She’s far from her best here and so is Andersson. Hasn’t been the same since Trondheim. Still hasn’t got back to top shape since she got Covid.
Not surprising to see the alpine nations doing well.
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She can still be inconsistent. She’s far from her best here and so is Andersson. Hasn’t been the same since Trondheim. Still hasn’t got back to top shape since she got Covid.
Not surprising to see the alpine nations doing well.
Oh, and the fact that, for years, he used to get a nervous breakdown on the first prone shoot of a big occasion. Even something as harmless as the first race of the season, in fact.
Even with that early attack Vermulen managed to get his first career podium.
After today, I am pretty sure that bar any injury or sickness, Amundsen is going to win the World Cup as none of the other top4 Norwegians look good.
After today, I am pretty sure that bar any injury or sickness, Amundsen is going to win the World Cup as none of the other top4 Norwegians look good.
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The Norwegian V2 monster strikes back and Vermeulen seems to be back in his start of the season shape.
Also another top 10 result for Barp.
Also another top 10 result for Barp.
I was very pleased to see Vermeulen get his podium after his efforts early on; fun to see him so excited about it.
So if you only use one syllable of the word you are exempted from taking it to the clinic?
after the world cups, Vermeulen will stay in the US for another week to do the American Birkebeiner, on February 24th.
Is there anything that makes him sus outside of him being Austrian and him becoming better this season?
I’ve been listening to his podcast and he’s very open about the problem with being Austrian and that the historic shadows that hangs over him and that was one of the reasons why he left Austria and moved to Norway.
Today the organizer in Planica extended the technical zone and added another. Yesterday they had planned two zones as well but the icy made it infeasible according to the Swedish TV announcer.
Really cool racing in the Womens U23.
The Swedish girls started crazy fast and faded on the last loop. Hoffman lost steadily the first half and then caught up second by second and won gold just a second ahead of Nadja Kählin (which also had a strong last loop) and the Swedes ended with 3rd and 4th instead of 1st and 2nd as it looked like for a long time.
Bergane 5th, not a good Championship for her.
The Swedish girls started crazy fast and faded on the last loop. Hoffman lost steadily the first half and then caught up second by second and won gold just a second ahead of Nadja Kählin (which also had a strong last loop) and the Swedes ended with 3rd and 4th instead of 1st and 2nd as it looked like for a long time.
Bergane 5th, not a good Championship for her.
Unfortunately, unless a miracle occurs it is highly unlikely a full length Birkie (51k skate, 55k classic) will be held this year. I live in the Minneapolis Minnesota area (site of next weeks WC and about 2.5 hours drive from Birkie Trailhead) and aside from a week of cold weather in January we have quite literally not had winter this year. We've only had 7.5"(19 cm) of snow since last October and no natural snow is present at all currently, and little if any in the forecast. Just last week we endured days of high temps around 55f (~13c). It is going to turn colder here but unless we have a couple big blizzards the best the organizers will be able to do is a shortened race on snowmaking loops. A big shame for the 50th anniversary edition of the race.
Also a huge bummer is the lack of snow here in Minneapolis; this time last year we were a veritable winter wonderland, this year zero natural snow skiing is present and currently most of the snowmaking loops are shut down as well. We have been stuck in an extremely strong El Niño weather pattern which for us almost invariably means very warm and dry winters; last few years we were in the counterpart La Niña cycle which usually means "real" winters; colder and much snowier. In big snow years Minneapolis has ski trails through large sections of the city, starting at Wirth Park (site of the WC) and down to and across a beautiful chain of lakes right in the heart of Minneapolis. Quite beautiful and a shame that won't be available to show the athletes, for training, touring, just loosening up. It's a miracle the WC is even going to be held; a lot of hard work went towards maintaining the artificial snow they had, and then it's going to be full throttle snowmaking next week as it thankfully turns colder. A local alpine ski area has donated up to 16 additional snow guns which will help. It's a complete sellout; from what I hear 10000 spectators for both days.
The really cool thing is the organizers are handing out free Jessie Diggins masks to everyone coming through the gates so there should be hundreds of not thousands of fans wearing Jessie masks during the races!!
Just joking about the last part, hopefully LS and BF22 didn't have heart attacks reading that....
To my eyes poor Bergane always looks so 'pained' skiing, like she's having the exact opposite of fun. Maybe it's just the pressure of being a young Norwegian on the circuit or maybe I'm seeing something that isn't there but the vibe just doesn't seem healthy to me. We've seen Fossesholm and others struggle mightily with that too, and it certainly doesn't seem like a recipe for longevity in endurance sport. Very much hope I'm reading her wrong.
I've had the same impression, but maybe it's just her face. You know how they used to say about Ivan Basso that he was smiling on the climbs.
Yes, it's really hard to know which is why I tried to qualify my comments a bit. To me it's not just her face, I just have this intangible sense of her being really stressed when watching her ski that I don't get watching others. And yeah, I do recall that about Basso!
I believe they did! I think part of it was he was retiring and that was his last race, so definitely a special occasion.
Jacquelin finally looks back a bit. Still got JTB and Samuelson to come through shoot 2 and 3 Norweigans to come into shoot 1
The French men have got their mojo back too, so could well be that their ski prep team have absolutely nailed it, because the women being that good isn't all that surprising but their men have tanked most of the time this season.
Also now that he's competing for the US and not New Zealand, Campbell Wright gets access to that prep plan that means the American biathletes always overperform their season norms at championships. He's been promising for a long time limited by the budget that the New Zealand team could offer him and he was kind of an ersatz member of the US team already, but there's a disproportionate number of the American team's best results in the last 15 years that have come at the Worlds or Olympics. He'll struggle to maintain this kind of spot on ski speed though when on 10/10 he's barely ahead of the likes of Tarjei on 8/10 out of standing.
Also now that he's competing for the US and not New Zealand, Campbell Wright gets access to that prep plan that means the American biathletes always overperform their season norms at championships. He's been promising for a long time limited by the budget that the New Zealand team could offer him and he was kind of an ersatz member of the US team already, but there's a disproportionate number of the American team's best results in the last 15 years that have come at the Worlds or Olympics. He'll struggle to maintain this kind of spot on ski speed though when on 10/10 he's barely ahead of the likes of Tarjei on 8/10 out of standing.
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