Nordic Skiing/Biathlon Thread

[Kokoso]

If I'm Swede I'd think about crucify Halfvarsson or something. He didn't tried anything to avoid inevitable.

 

[TomasC]

If I'm Swede I'd think about crucify Halfvarsson or something. He didn't tried anything to avoid inevitable.

Agreed, what would you do with Hellner?

 

[ToreBear]

Great race today! Kudos to France, they seem to be on the up.

Nice try Sweden.

 

[Cance > TheRest]

Great race today! Kudos to France, they seem to be on the up.

Nice try Sweden.

Yes Manificat did a great job, considering his strength lies in classical technique, and Backscheider took his chance when he tried to sneak away from Northug/Halfvarsson. Couldn't have gone much better for France, actually.

 

[search]

Yes Manificat did a great job, considering his strength lies in classical technique, and Backscheider took his chance when he tried to sneak away from Northug/Halfvarsson. Couldn't have gone much better for France, actually.

it was a strong race indeed, but Manificat was also lucky he had Olsson with him to bring him back to the front.

 

[search]

the jury has decided to use no salt at all today

 

[python]

the penultimate event, women's 30 k was promising to be one long bore if not for justyna, kalla and saarinen in the start list...even with them, it is still possible for norway 1-2-3-4.

i calculated 1100 m of total climbing. seems a lot. i would understand if kalla did not podium, not her favorite technique after all, but justyna failing a medal today would be unexplainable given her focus on THIS event.

saarinen is probably an outside chance, but i am impartial to this 'almost 40' brave lady..turns out roponen is even older but she ain'r gonna matter.

 

[meat puppet]

Kalla or johaug? Or could weng, niskanen or perhaps saarinen challenge? Any others, justyna or bj?rgen perhaps?

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Weng would be awesome. First career individual win: World Championships 30k. Heia Heidi! Pretty unlikely though, I feel.

 

[meat puppet]

Weng would be awesome. First career individual win: World Championships 30k. Heia Heidi! Pretty unlikely though, I feel.

Well she specialises in distance races, innit, so perhaps perhaps. Not likely, i know. Just hoping for some surprises at least.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Well she specialises in distance races, innit, so perhaps perhaps. Not likely, i know. Just hoping for some surprises at least.

Part of the reason I like her and have been rather worried by her improvements in the sprints this season. The number of distance races on the women's calendar that are barely long enough to merit the name means a lot of the time sprint specialists who are a bit more versatile can compete, the number of races for the proper distance specialists seems to be getting ever lower and so the distance specialists are progressively needing to improve at the carnival sprint events, which is absolutely the reverse of the development I want to see happening, i.e. athletes can break through at the sprint events (which should be a handful of times a season) and progressively need to improve at longer distances in order to be competitive on the World Cup overall.

Johaug is kind of the exception in all of this, of course, and it's less of an issue on the men's World Cup because of there being a) more depth in the field allowing greater specialization, and b) the distances in the distance races being much more clearly separate from the sprint distances.

 

[roundabout]

No Norway TTT from km 0. What's going on?

And then Johaug destroys everyone

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Kalla's skis look good, her glide on the downhill into the stadium after 5k was massive, she went flying past everyone. Kowalczyk's are horrendous at this point in time.

 

[roundabout]

27:30 10K in a 30K ladies classic. Wicked fast.

 

[the sceptic]

Johaug doing a Johan

 

[python]

funny race...bjoergen playing a blocker for johaug for a while
even the finnish girls got bored by her pace. justyna is out.

if i see the hunk woman dropped, i will consider this race worthwhile for me watching

 

[meat puppet]

Gonna be an embarrassing gap if they continue like this. Next lap over m?rdarbacken is the last chance saloon but barring crashes and bonks johaug has this in the bag.

 

[goggalor]

Johaug is so awesome.

 

[roundabout]

Who the hell is Brennan?

 

[goggalor]

I do love these long laps through varied terrains. So much better than the short ones they use on every other distance. The skate loop on the relay was a joke.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

I do love these long laps through varied terrains. So much better than the short ones they use on every other distance. The skate loop on the relay was a joke.

It's nice to see a "cross-country" race actually go, you know, cross-country.

 

[roundabout]

Looks like Bj?rgen has recovered somewhat just when I was looking forward to the prospect of her not getting any medals in the distance races

 

[Libertine Seguros]

I <3 M?rdarbacken.

 

[python]

i lost interest watching.the same sameness...switching to speed skating

 

[Libertine Seguros]

i lost interest watching.the same sameness...switching to speed skating

Bronze battle could still be interesting, especially with Kalla having had to chase on twice after falls, and if Kerttu changes her skis with 5k to go. Unfortunately they're not being given any screen time.