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Nordic Skiing/Biathlon Thread

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I fear that yesterday's race will have the consequence that Sweden will not push for the individual start anymore:eek:
Just like Norway stopped doing so when they realized that with Northug mass start is their best chance to win the 50km.
 
Bavarianrider said:
I fear that yesterday's race will have the consequence that Sweden will not push for the individual start anymore:eek:
Just like Norway stopped doing so when they realized that with Northug mass start is their best chance to win the 50km.

Sweden will push for an individual start regardless of yesterdays results. Had there been an individual race yesterday Olsson still would have won. Södergren would probably also finished better than his 10th place.
 
I really don't understand why Holemkollen is not insisting on the individual start in the 50km World Cup. I mean how disrespectful can you be to your tradition?
In Davos for example, there will be a 30km individial start next year.
The 30km race is a tradition there and Fis allowed them the individual race.
So if you really want, it is possible.
 
Bavarianrider said:
I really don't understand why Holemkollen is not insisting on the individual start in the 50km World Cup. I mean how disrespectful can you be to your tradition?
In Davos for example, there will be a 30km individial start next year.
The 30km race is a tradition there and Fis allowed them the individual race.
So if you really want, it is possible.

The course in Davos used in the 30k does not allow for mass start. It's too narrow, so they don't really have much choice.

As to Holmenkollen. when the mass start was introduced, screams of horror were heard througout the nation:p(especially from the old tradionalists and the athletes themselves). But it seems those involved in Fis had the impression that the mass start was more attractive to the TV viewers. And personally I think they are right. Times have changed from the old days. People are less likely to be interested in the individual start. If things get boring, they might just switch channels.

As for changing back to individual in Holmenkollen now, I hope they don't. The Swedes want to do Falun individual, and Fis seems to be alright with that. But my impression is that the swedes were very keen on individual because of Northugs dominance in mass start, and they wanted to show how "real skiers" do it.

But after Northug won the davos 30k individual and the Val di Fiemme 15k individual, that argument has kind of gone. Well will see. My guess is that ratings will suffer a bit unless they find a better way to show the race to the TV audience.

The 50k in Val di Fiemme shows the potential of a mass start, and luckily the Holmenkollen is next weekend already. So I hope someone will think that they too can do an Olsson. It might just work, or it won't, but at least they will have tried. And then someone else might try, or a team will try or... Well the tactical options are many for the creative racer/team.
 
jsem94 said:
The thing is, it'll be less likely that the individual start will become reality. But it would be a good thing. Olsson was the strongest and would have won an individual race as it seems.

Not if he as a result of the starting order happened to get someone almost as strong following him around the course.;)

For example Gjerdalens bronze in the 15k were he stuck to Cologna for two out of three rounds for a good example of the unfairness of the individual start.
 
Oct 1, 2010
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ToreBear said:
But it seems those involved in Fis had the impression that the mass start was more attractive to the TV viewers. And personally I think they are right. Times have changed from the old days. People are less likely to be interested in the individual start. If things get boring, they might just switch channels.
As a fellow Norwegian, I couldn't disagree more. I used to watch every race, but now I haven't seen a single race in more than five years. Mass starts and sprint races has killed my interest completely and now I care more about cricket, darts, boule and jai alai than about xc skiing. The sport is pretty much dead to me.

Good going, FIS.
 
LouieLouie said:
As a fellow Norwegian, I couldn't disagree more. I used to watch every race, but now I haven't seen a single race in more than five years. Mass starts and sprint races has killed my interest completely and now I care more about cricket, darts, boule and jai alai than about xc skiing. The sport is pretty much dead to me.

Good going, FIS.

How could you Norways let this hapopen?:eek::eek:

After all it's this man from switzerland who robbed us of this beautiful sport
I mean cross country skiing is you sport, you shoudl run the show not some suisse guy

1170065408_3.jpg
 
LouieLouie said:
As a fellow Norwegian, I couldn't disagree more. I used to watch every race, but now I haven't seen a single race in more than five years. Mass starts and sprint races has killed my interest completely and now I care more about cricket, darts, boule and jai alai than about xc skiing. The sport is pretty much dead to me.

Good going, FIS.
Well there are the 10k and 15k Classic individual races in Lahti on Sunday. You could watch that unless it interferes with your cricket of course.:D

Bavarianrider said:
How could you Norways let this hapopen?:eek:

After all it's this man from switzerland who robbed us of this beautiful sport
I mean cross country skiing is you sport, you shoudl run the show not some suisse guy

1170065408_3.jpg
He has been replaced by Pierre Mignerey from France btw.

Anyway we have the head of the XC executive comitee(Vegard Ulvang). But the way that works out is that when we get up in arms about something, we get told by him that we have to be remember that the smaller XC nations have to be heard and that we must lead by a good example. Then we shut up.

So it's:
Somebody complains about something.
Vegard Ulvang, reminds us that we have to be inclusive and be a good example for the good of the sport.
The complainers shut up.

I think we are more interested in getting more people involved in the sport than having it our way. In the end we get more friends to play with, so I think it's a good thing(and I like the new developments).

I think the grumpy nay sayers of the sport are on the other side of the border in Sweden. We just want someone to play with, while they just want to beat Norway.:D
 
Libertine Seguros said:
It's a lot easier to want somebody else to play with when you get bored of whupping everybody you currently play with ;)

Nah we would never be bored by that!

Anyway we want more friends not new ones to replace the old ones. We want to keep beating our old friends, and beat new ones too.:D

Anyway soon the others will improve, and we might just turn grumpy like the Swedes.;)
 
Bavarianrider said:
How could you Norways let this hapopen?:eek::eek:

After all it's this man from switzerland who robbed us of this beautiful sport
I mean cross country skiing is you sport, you shoudl run the show not some suisse guy
I tried finding links regarding the decision of having the 50km in Holmenkollen a mass start (which we "discussed" earlier here). Didn't find much, but I'm pretty sure it was shot down by FIS. But it also seems like it was disagreements in Norway. It seems like the Holmenkollen race were losing spectators, and the medicine was to follow the new style more closely (mass start and shorter laps). Apparently it's more spectator friendly. And, sure, in many ways it is. But not if it kills the actual racing. Most of the people who run the sport is businessmen..Even norwegians...like Vegard Ulvang. So as long they feel they open the sport to the widest possible audience, they won't care how the racing is.


On partly related note...I heard Kaisa Mäkäräinen wasn't very impressed with the world championship. Apparently she was used to more people in local races. And she is right...It's pretty sad. But I'll encourage her to participate in the world championships in Falun in two years instead, so she can get an idea how it can be.
 
MrRoboto said:
I tried finding links regarding the decision of having the 50km in Holmenkollen a mass start (which we "discussed" earlier here). Didn't find much, but I'm pretty sure it was shot down by FIS. But it also seems like it was disagreements in Norway. It seems like the Holmenkollen race were losing spectators, and the medicine was to follow the new style more closely (mass start and shorter laps). Apparently it's more spectator friendly. And, sure, in many ways it is. But not if it kills the actual racing. Most of the people who run the sport is businessmen..Even norwegians...like Vegard Ulvang. So as long they feel they open the sport to the widest possible audience, they won't care how the racing is.


On partly related note...I heard Kaisa Mäkäräinen wasn't very impressed with the world championship. Apparently she was used to more people in local races. And she is right...It's pretty sad. But I'll encourage her to participate in the world championships in Falun in two years instead, so she can get an idea how it can be.

Having Nordic world championchips in a place like Val die Fiemme simply sucks.
Sadly now, it's Falun, Lahti and possibly Zakopane or Oberstdorf in 2019. So the next three Nordic world championchips should be pretty good in terms of atmosphere!
I don't see how a mass start is more friendly to the spectators at the venue. In contrast in a single start you get to see sooooooooooooooo much more of the athletes!
 
Domracheva just dances on the skis. I would have loved to see her like this in Val di Fiemme. Her technique is just SO beautiful and effective, especially the one-skate. Beat Gössner by 93 seconds on this course... just incredible.

Fourcade is also just amazing, dominant. And, no homo, he's one of the best looking athletes out there bar none.
 
To be fair, Domracheva started the season slowly and has really picked up the ski speed late on, while Gössner has said in interviews that she's very tired after a long season she peaked through the middle of.

These trails look genuinely tough, and the altitude is similar to Pokljuka, which also has some really hard trails.

I would really love to see Domracheva in today's form go up against Gössner in her form from Pokljuka on this course. Both are great technical skiers, but in different ways; Miri more dynamic, Dasha more elegant. I think the Dasha of today would win, but it would be a great battle to watch.

Fourcade is boring me to hell. I hope Svendsen remembers how to shoot all year next year, and Bø and possibly also Peiffer can regain their 2010-11 form, otherwise this is going to get really, really dull really quickly. The battle for the crystal globes this year has been chronically awful. Both genders look like having the same person win every single one, and having held the yellow bib from start to finish. As far as I can tell, they've only dropped the leadership of any classification for one day each: Miriam Gössner wore the sprint bib in Antholz (failing to qualify for the pursuit meant Tora took it back) and Andi Birnbacher won the first Mass Start in Pokljuka, then Fourcade took the second - and the bib - in Ruhpolding.
 
Bavarianrider said:
Having Nordic world championchips in a place like Val die Fiemme simply sucks.
Sadly now, it's Falun, Lahti and possibly Zakopane or Oberstdorf in 2019. So the next three Nordic world championchips should be pretty good in terms of atmosphere!
I don't see how a mass start is more friendly to the spectators at the venue. In contrast in a single start you get to see sooooooooooooooo much more of the athletes!
The mass starts are easier. It's very clear cut who leads and how the race is going at all times. But since they are all together, you instead need to make the laps shorter. I don't disagree with you. I want more individual starts again.

Yes...Lets hope it looks more like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=u5d5LyK4rVo#t=170s
And
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=YBHOHCdLjGY#t=44s
:D
 
By the way for those of you who think Biathlon is a bigger sport than Cross Country Skiing. Not even in Germany these is true by any means.

Just compare this.

Number of participants in this weekend's Bavarian championchip in cross country skiing : 360
(And the world cup/continental cup racers don't even compete)

Number of participants in this years German biathlon championchips: Senior championchips in summer + Junior Chamionchis in Winter: 170

So in Bavaria alone there are more than twice as many competitors in Cross Country skiing than biathletes in all Germany
And that doesn't include the houndreds of hobby racers who compete in smaller races local races or the the big marathon events.
Those kinds of things doen't exist at all in biathlon.
 
Apr 18, 2011
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jsem94 said:
It's not as easy to practice biathlon as it is to just practice XC skiing. There's for instance only ONE place in Sweden facilitated for biathlon, and that's Östersund.

LOL what? Quite stupid to put the Biathlon high Schools in Sollefteå and Torsby then.

Östersund,Boden,Piteå,Idre,Dala Järna, Sollefteå,Torsby(Sysslebäck)+ a couple more smaller places have shooting ranges.

The simple truth is that no one cares about Biathlon in Sweden until they understand that they never will make the cut in Cross Country.
 
A key point re GER is that commercial interests seem to think there's better return on their investment with biathlon than with X-C which has obviously had impacts re TV interest and as a spectator event.

With some of the 'smaller' nations where there may not be the scope for a significant budget for both; it's a question of which one to call and it would appear certain nations such as BLR/UKR/AUT even arguably CZE/SVK have gone towards biathlon.
 
Bavarianrider said:
Biathlon is a TV sport only! It has no base at all.

You're Bavarian. You really ought to be aware of the biathlon talent factory down in Kaltenbrunn/Mittenwald that's been churning out top talents for some time now.

There will always be more people competing in XC than biathlon at the grass roots level, for these obvious reasons:
1) to do XC you need skis, to do biathlon you need the rifle as well, and getting those licensed is additional cost;
2) to compete in biathlon you need trails and a shooting range, whereas anywhere you have trails you can do XC skiing.

If you look at the number of participants as the level increases up towards the professional level I'd wager biathlon closes the gap in Germany quite considerably. Sure, we've discussed the tug of love over Miriam Gössner at length (and she's always said she likes biathlon more regardless of which would suit her best, a bit like Lars Berger), but yesterday Vanessa Hinz made her World Cup debut; until a year ago she'd never picked up a rifle, but saw biathlon as the way to go instead of cross-country. Until XC stops losing out to biathlon as the sport the bigger number of the most talented youngsters go to then Germany will be seen as a country where biathlon is bigger than XC.

Besides, here is a photo of the stands at the Tour de Ski in Oberhof. A pretty decent attendance by most accounts, but no way in hell do you see that much empty space at the Biathlon World Cup there.
 
Bubban said:
LOL what? Quite stupid to put the Biathlon high Schools in Sollefteå and Torsby then.

Östersund,Boden,Piteå,Idre,Dala Järna, Sollefteå,Torsby(Sysslebäck)+ a couple more smaller places have shooting ranges.

The simple truth is that no one cares about Biathlon in Sweden until they understand that they never will make the cut in Cross Country.

You're right, I lost my mind there. I knew of the high schools and didn't really think of them.

The point is still the same, it's badly facilitated. Plus, it also requires some skill level in XC skiing already - so it's only natural that XC skiing would have a larger base.