Nordic Skiing/Biathlon Thread

[Mayomaniac]

I just saw the result, 3 different nations on the podium in a men's distance race this season?!
Considering that the Finnish Messias just came back after his break and had a nasty crash 2 fmdays ago finishing 2nd today bodes well for the 50km race at the WC.
Cyr finishing inside the top 10 today is impressive. He was a big talent in the junior ranks.

 

[KZD]

Very interesting results in Les Rousses.

First of all, Klæbo beaten in two race out of three is something new this season. His 8th place in the 10k skating was actually not bad as the level was pretty high but him losing the classic sprint against Jouve is a surprising outcome that gives us some hope that he might finally lose his sprint crown in the Worlds. I might be wrong be I don't think he will dominate these Worlds like his biathlon counterpart will likely do. Niskanen and Poromaa also giving us some hope for the 50k.

In the women's nice to see Andersson in great shape, she and Karlsson can really dominate the distance races. On the hand, Skistad seems to be able to put up a fight against the Swedes in the sprint for a chance. Good to see Claudel with a podium outside of Alpe Cernis and a shame that Pärmäkoski is still far from her best. Weng totally out of shape, if she doesn't improve risks being out of the Worlds team.

 

[Mayomaniac]

Very interesting results in Les Rousses.

First of all, Klæbo beaten in two race out of three is something new this season. His 8th place in the 10k skating was actually not bad as the level was pretty high but him losing the classic sprint against Jouve is a surprising outcome that gives us some hope that he might finally lose his sprint crown in the Worlds. I might be wrong be I don't think he will dominate these Worlds like his biathlon counterpart will likely do. Niskanen and Poromaa also giving us some hope for the 50k.

In the women's nice to see Andersson in great shape, she and Karlsson can really dominate the distance races. On the hand, Skistad seems to be able to put up a fight against the Swedes in the sprint for a chance. Good to see Claudel with a podium outside of Alpe Cernis and a shame that Pärmäkoski is still far from her best. Weng totally out of shape, if she doesn't improve risks being out of the Worlds team.

Cyr also showed that his result in Val di Fiemme wasn't a fluke, he got another top 10 in a classic mass start race, but this time on a much harder course.

But yeah, if Niskanen can keep up like that in his first racing weekend after a longer break (an Covid + another break before that) and having a bad looking crash 2 days ago things might get interesting in the 50km race, as long as his skis are good. The Swedish duo could also fight for medals, I just fear that they might have Calle race every single race, because they don't have that many great options.

On the women's side it doesn't look great for Norway in the distance races. Sure they could pick up a medal or 2, but they could also end up with no individual distance medals at all...

 

[Erwin]

Cyr also showed that his result in Val di Fiemme wasn't a fluke, he got another top 10 in a classic mass start race, but this time on a much harder course.

But yeah, if Niskanen can keep up like that in his first racing weekend after a longer break (an Covid + another break before that) and having a bad looking crash 2 days ago things might get interesting in the 50km race, as long as his skis are good. The Swedish duo could also fight for medals, I just fear that they might have Calle race every single race, because they don't have that many great options.

On the women's side it doesn't look great for Norway in the distance races. Sure they could pick up a medal or 2, but they could also end up with no individual distance medals at all...

Iivo hinted in the Finnish interviews that he's currently under a very heavy training load and is expecting to become a lot better in the races to come. If he manages to nail his preparations, he will be strong in Planica, but will that be enough to beat JHK and the Norwegian armada who maybe had a bit subpar skis today? Maybe, if all the stars align.

Kerttu was exceptionally strong today. This was a horrible track for her with the technical & icy downhills and very steep herringbone climb that she can't handle, and she still managed to crush everybody bar Ebba who was also ridiculously strong up that steep hill. Krista on the other hand was a huge disappointment. There has been a mysterious illness going around in the Finnish team, at least Lindholm is suffering from that and probably Krista as well. No other reason for her to be this bad.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Bulls, you usually have your ear to the ground on what's going on in the Russian scene, what's this I see of Veronika Stepanova training with a rifle? From her comments that came with it about TV exposure and the XC fed extending invites to various biathletes to increase the field at the XC nationals so maybe they should reciprocate, it's hard to tell how much of it is actual interest in biathlon, and how much of it is her clowning on the poor work of Välbe and co. in organising the national XC scene since they were exiled from the World Cup.

 

[DenisMenchov]

Bulls, you usually have your ear to the ground on what's going on in the Russian scene, what's this I see of Veronika Stepanova training with a rifle? From her comments that came with it about TV exposure and the XC fed extending invites to various biathletes to increase the field at the XC nationals so maybe they should reciprocate, it's hard to tell how much of it is actual interest in biathlon, and how much of it is her clowning on the poor work of Välbe and co. in organising the national XC scene since they were exiled from the World Cup.

It's mostly this.

Stepanova has kind of a movie star personality, she thrives on being in the spotlight. And with so little coverage of XC skiing in Russia now, she always finds a way to get herself in the media.

 

[BullsFan22]

Bulls, you usually have your ear to the ground on what's going on in the Russian scene, what's this I see of Veronika Stepanova training with a rifle? From her comments that came with it about TV exposure and the XC fed extending invites to various biathletes to increase the field at the XC nationals so maybe they should reciprocate, it's hard to tell how much of it is actual interest in biathlon, and how much of it is her clowning on the poor work of Välbe and co. in organising the national XC scene since they were exiled from the World Cup.

Probably what Denis said. Välbe likely is losing motivation after the international season was taken away and her responses to the criticism of lack of tv for xc bear that out. Stapanova does seem to like the spotlight, and Välbe said it’s not even her that’s posting, but someone else. Obviously I have no idea, but more importantly Välbe and the federation have screwed the pooch with the tv rights this season. The wrong season you want to do that, with all of the Russian elite staying at home.

 

[DonAragona]

I take back all criticism I made of the course.

A tough decisive distance course(with THAT hill) and a brilliant sprint course with something for everybody combined with that crowd amount to a great World Cup...more races in Les Rousses, please!

Andersson should enjoy her moment, she won't get that climb in Planice which was cleary the deciding factor in her 2 victories...can you imagine Johaug on that course?

 

[Mayomaniac]

Oh yes, Les Rousses overdelivered!

Maybe I'm beating on a dead horse, but do we actually need technique zones in classic mass start races? One one hand we probably need them in the youth and junior ranks to have kids learn proper skiing technique and we probably should still have them in individual start races, on the other hand not having them in longer classic races with a mass start could increase the crossover between Ski Classics and the World Cup. I doubt the FIS actually wants that, but the idea of having some of the long distance specialists come over for 2-3 long races per season would be interesting.

 

[KZD]

I was watching the mass-start races in the junior Worlds, impressive performance from the Norwegian Milla Andreasen dropping hard the Swedish Lisa Eriksson in the last lap. The most surprising part is that she is just 17 so maybe she will be the leader of their 'weak' distance squad in a few years.

In the men's Finnish, Niko Antolla lead almost the whole race (reminds me of Niskanen) but the Holbæk from Norway did a Klæbo and attacked for the win in the last lap.

 

[BullsFan22]

I watched the races as well, and there was a worry that the Norwegians would sweep, 1-4, thankfully that didn’t happen. The Norwegians have certainly mastered the art of wheelsucking, from juniors to seniors.

 

[Mayomaniac]

In the end is was a good race from Ghio, who is one year younger than Anttola and Holbaek. He was already 8th in the individual start last year and looking at how strong he was on the climbs on the final lap he would have been fighting for a medal even if it was a 10km individual start.

In the end I doubt the Norwegians could have worked much more, even Holbaek was hanging on for dear life on some of the longer climbs.

On the women's side Andreassen is super impressive. Also a shoutout to De Martin Pinter, who ended up 5th and 4th so far. She's from Padola, so she's almost a local girl.

On the World Cup side, Klaebo and Golberg are also racing both the sprint and the individual start in Toblach. I feel like they might end up overracing between the end of the Tour and the WC because they are so focussed on not letting the other gain a deciding lead in the overall world cup.

 

[OJRvE]

Norway are bringing the following to Planica
Tiril Udnes Weng
Lotta Udnes Weng
Heidi Weng
Anne Kjersti Kalvå
Ragnhild Gløersen Haga
Anna Svendsen
Silje Theodorsen
Helene Fossesholm
Astrid Øyre Slind
Ingvild Flugstad Østberg
Kristine Stavås Skistad
Ane Appelkvist Stenseth


Johannes Høsflot Klæbo
Hans Christer Holund
Pål Golberg
Harald Østberg Amundsen
Simen Hegstad Krüger
Even Northug
Martin Løwstrøm Nyenget
Sjur Røthe
Håvard Solås Taugbøl
Didrik Tønseth
Erik Valnes
Sivert Wiig
+ Emil Iversen for 50k as reigning champion.

A bit surprised of the omission of Myhrvold. She was 3rd in Val do Fiemme and is not even alternate for sprint.

Sweden will present their squad later today but it’s basically known already. Svahn and Grate are pretty much confirmed. Burman, Häggström and Rosjö to complete the mens squad. Only real question mark is what they will do with Oskar Svensson.

 

[Mayomaniac]

In the u23 20km mass start today I guess Bergane has to be the big favourites on the women's side, alongside Laukli (who is clearly better in skating races) and Kälin.
I do question what the first 2 get out of racing an u23 WC, the same can be said about Schumacher and Ree, even if the later has been pretty bad recently.

On the men's side it's pretty much Schumacher vs the Norwegians. Regarding the Italians I actually expect Ticco (who has finished ahead of Bing in an Alpencup classic individual start) to do better than Elia Barp, who is better in skating races.

 

[Mayomaniac]

Norway are bringing the following to Planica
Tiril Udnes Weng
Lotta Udnes Weng
Heidi Weng
Anne Kjersti Kalvå
Ragnhild Gløersen Haga
Anna Svendsen
Silje Theodorsen
Helene Fossesholm
Astrid Øyre Slind
Ingvild Flugstad Østberg
Kristine Stavås Skistad
Ane Appelkvist Stenseth


Johannes Høsflot Klæbo
Hans Christer Holund
Pål Golberg
Harald Østberg Amundsen
Simen Hegstad Krüger
Even Northug
Martin Løwstrøm Nyenget
Sjur Røthe
Håvard Solås Taugbøl
Didrik Tønseth
Erik Valnes
Sivert Wiig
+ Emil Iversen for 50k as reigning champion.

A bit surprised of the omission of Myhrvold. She was 3rd in Val do Fiemme and is not even alternate for sprint.

Sweden will present their squad later today but it’s basically known already. Svahn and Grate are pretty much confirmed. Burman, Häggström and Rosjö to complete the mens squad. Only real question mark is what they will do with Oskar Svensson.

Wait, so Iversen actually managed to sneak his way in?
Ok, I assume it's just for the free slot he gets in the 50km race and nothing else...

 

[OJRvE]

Wait, so Iversen actually managed to sneak his way in?
Ok, I assume it's just for the free slot he gets in the 50km race and nothing else...

Yes it was explicitly stated it was only for the 50k. Press would have gone crazy otherwise. Now it seems they are mostly happy, although I saw some criticism of including Nyenget and Wiig instead of Tildheim. In my opinion it was a correct decision though since Wiig and Nyenget are number one reserve in Sprint and 50k respectively while there are multiple options for 15k.

For the U23 I think the rest of the Norwegian woman are dangerous. Föyen was second to Andersson in Falun (although 2 minutes back, but as you saw this weekend its not bad). Bergane had this tendency of opening too hard in masstart races, it’s pretty ridiculous.

For the mens side I am curious to see Swede Gustav Kvarnbrink. He usually does one good race a year, and last year it was in the U23 worlds. He is a tall guy with a lot of potential in the classical style but as I mentioned almost always disappoint. Unlike most other Swedish male skier he is actually quite likeable.

 

[Mayomaniac]

Yes it was explicitly stated it was only for the 50k. Press would have gone crazy otherwise. Now it seems they are mostly happy, although I saw some criticism of including Nyenget and Wiig instead of Tildheim. In my opinion it was a correct decision though since Wiig and Nyenget are number one reserve in Sprint and 50k respectively while there are multiple options for 15k.

For the U23 I think the rest of the Norwegian woman are dangerous. Föyen was second to Andersson in Falun (although 2 minutes back, but as you saw this weekend its not bad). Bergane had this tendency of opening too hard in masstart races, it’s pretty ridiculous.

For the mens side I am curious to see Swede Gustav Kvarnbrink. He usually does one good race a year, and last year it was in the U23 worlds. He is a tall guy with a lot of potential in the classical style but as I mentioned almost always disappoint. Unlike most other Swedish male skier he is actually quite likeable.

It's interesting that Norway isn't bringing Skistad to the sprint in Toblach, but I guess with the WC being classic and the Weng twins being almost a lock for the teamsprint it's not really needed.

Yeah, I'm not that sure about the u23 women,since I rate Laukli much higher in the skating individual start.

How tall is that Swedish guy? A guy that went to highschool with was just over 2m tall (and had a 213cm wingspan) and a top 10/top 5 skier in South Tyrol while also being the best 50 and 100m Swimmer around here (made it to the NC and got a 36th place in the Elite race, against all the top guys). Absurd double poling strength.

Also, thank god all Italian wintersports went back to the classic Azurri look for the upcoming various WCs, I wasn't a fan of the navy blue with a tricore vomited on the crotch...

 

[BullsFan22]

The Swedish men have always had one or two really tall World Cup level skiers. Besides Anger, there’s Oskar Svensson, before them there were Daniel Rickardsson, Jesper Modin, Johan Edin…The world juniors in Canada I see Anton Grahn, 2 meters +. And even Truls Gisselman is pretty tall. It’ll be interesting to see how they develop.

 

[Mayomaniac]

Ok, I didn't expect Lohmann to be that strong, she should have attacked earlier on the final lap. You kinda have to feel sorry for Bergane after making the race hard from the start and leading until the final climb.
2 Norwegian, 2 Germans and 2 Swiss in the top 6, that's nice. I also didn't expect Di Centa to finish inside the top 10, better than expected.

 

[OJRvE]

How tall is that Swedish guy? A guy that went to highschool with was just over 2m tall (and had a 213cm wingspan) and a top 10/top 5 skier in South Tyrol while also being the best 50 and 100m Swimmer around here (made it to the NC and got a 36th place in the Elite race, against all the top guys). Absurd double poling strength.

He is not super tall. 1.9 maybe. Actually, he doesent look as tall as he used to in this field.

In Scandinavia you will never see any outliers. We have medical treatment for everyone that trends below 1.5 or above 2.0

 

[Mayomaniac]

Ok, didn't expect the French to place 2 guys in the top 5 . Pretty passive, but smart racing by Vika, the Swiss and the Japanese Ryo (probably not related to that Ryo) were a bit unlucky, the were really strong.

 

[BullsFan22]

Ok, didn't expect the French to place 2 guys in the top 5 . Pretty passive, but smart racing by Vika, the Swiss and the Japanese Ryo (probably not related to that Ryo) were a bit unlucky, the were really strong.

The Swiss botched their tactics, and Ryo doesn’t have a sprint. Maybe he didn’t have the strength to make a move, but he looked very good. I just knew that one or two of the Norwegians would just draft and attack in the final portion of the race.

 

[Mayomaniac]

Now that idiot Zorzi is complaining about the course in France, that you can't have such a steep, hard climb 6 times in a 20km race, because people will get lapped too easy. The guy always complains about race organizers and logistics, (sometimes he even has a point like when he said that the Biathlon lap in Lillehammer is probably too narrow for a mass start) but when it's a race that takes place in Italy everything is great.

He's working for Andorra, so he should be happy because Altimiras got his 2 best season results besides the Alpe Cermis on that course, but nope. Almost as smart as Schlicki...

Sweden will present their squad later today but it’s basically known already. Svahn and Grate are pretty much confirmed. Burman, Häggström and Rosjö to complete the mens squad. Only real question mark is what they will do with Oskar Svensson.

So Svensson indeed missed out on the spot. Well, it's not like any of the sprinters besides the youngster Anger is clearly better than the rest, so it can happen.

 

[Bavarianrider]

The profiles of the loops in Planica actually look quiet interesting.
There`s a good mix of loops with various climbs of medium length and some loops with one really long climb with a nice elevation gain. No overly long flat sections, either.
So on paper this looks promising (of course, we have to see it it reality first) and this makes the absence of the Russians even more depressing. We coould have seen some great racing there. Now only hope is that we will see at least an intense fight bewtwen the Norwegians themselves or some weather drama.

 

[Mayomaniac]

So apparently Klaebo is gonna drive back and forth between Passo Lavazè and Toblach every day this weekend. What a diva, Tobach is also at moderate altitude (pretty decent for those flatlanders actually) and staying in the nearby area for 2 nights (you could even find places higher up, stay in the hotel on the Plätzwiese at 2,000m of altitude if you're that obsessed with sleeping at altitude) but apparently he likes to go full Olsson before a big event. Well, it's not like flying back home from Sochi to train at home between the races, but not that far away...

In other news Calle doesn't want to taper back his training 1-2 weeks before the WC and wants to train until the day before the event starts. I hope he knows what he's doing, but it could be another Calle brainfart...