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Nordic Skiing/Biathlon Thread

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Apr 22, 2012
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Re:

Libertine Seguros said:
Then again, they managed to achieve a defensively raced, negative 50k at Falun in a race that went over Mördarbakken five times...
I have to disagree partly. That wasn't very defensive race.
 
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Kokoso said:
Libertine Seguros said:
Then again, they managed to achieve a defensively raced, negative 50k at Falun in a race that went over Mördarbakken five times...
I have to disagree partly. That wasn't very defensive race.
Mainly because of Södergren, but nobody else seemed to want to race until very late on, though the conditions may have had something to do with that, Olsson wanted to make some moves early on but snowfall made the Val di Fiemme tactic unrealistic. Once Olsson gave up, apart from Södergren everybody seemed content to wait for the last time up Mördarbacken.
 
Apr 22, 2012
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Libertine Seguros said:
Kokoso said:
Libertine Seguros said:
Then again, they managed to achieve a defensively raced, negative 50k at Falun in a race that went over Mördarbakken five times...
I have to disagree partly. That wasn't very defensive race.
Mainly because of Södergren, but nobody else seemed to want to race until very late on, though the conditions may have had something to do with that
Exactly, conditions were important. So at the end it wasn't that defensive race. Pace was high, they've really tried to get rid of Northug who managed to hang there, mainly because of the snowfall. Every Mördarbakken he was going backwards only to catch them downhill and on the flatter parts.
 
Jan 3, 2016
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Great win for Diggins in the 10K today, Weng 2nd and Haga in 3rd. Also impressive win for Cologna in the 15, Sundby in 3rd behind Harvey.
Didn't like seeing Klæbo showing off before he crossed the line when he won the sprint yesterday, shows a lack of respect.
 
Oh well, just watched Austrian TV. They said that athletes complained about the easy tracks.
They interviewed one of the organizers and he said that the tracks were designed like this ON PURPOSE, as they want to use These tracks for tourists in the first place after the Wolrds next year and so they made rather modest climbs and downhills, and longer flatish sections. :rolleyes: :eek: :eek:
 
Bavarianrider said:
Oh well, just watched Austrian TV. They said that athletes complained about the easy tracks.
They interviewed one of the organizers and he said that the tracks were designed like this ON PURPOSE, as they want to use These tracks for tourists in the first place after the Wolrds next year and so they made rather modest climbs and downhills, and longer flatish sections. :rolleyes: :eek: :eek:
What the actual?

There's plenty of the course from the König Maximilian Lauf they can use for tourists and not dumb down the World Championships. The whole point of the World Championships is to test the best skiers in the world, not to test tourists.
 
Libertine Seguros said:
Bavarianrider said:
Oh well, just watched Austrian TV. They said that athletes complained about the easy tracks.
They interviewed one of the organizers and he said that the tracks were designed like this ON PURPOSE, as they want to use These tracks for tourists in the first place after the Wolrds next year and so they made rather modest climbs and downhills, and longer flatish sections. :rolleyes: :eek: :eek:
What the actual?

There's plenty of the course from the König Maximilian Lauf they can use for tourists and not dumb down the World Championships. The whole point of the World Championships is to test the best skiers in the world, not to test tourists.

That's exactly what he said :eek: So don't expect anything to change for next year. 50km race will be a snoozefest for 48km theres no way around this :eek:
 
that sounds completely untypical for Austria. Usually Austrians have the opinion harder=better. Even in seefeld the Austrian TV comentators were always proud to tell everyone that they have one of the hardest courses for nordic combines.
Then again it's absolutely typical for austrians to f*ck up the organization of big events, so it's not that surprising after all.
 
Gigs_98 said:
that sounds completely untypical for Austria. Usually Austrians have the opinion harder=better. Even in seefeld the Austrian TV comentators were always proud to tell everyone that they have one of the hardest courses for nordic combines.
Then again it's absolutely typical for austrians to f*ck up the organization of big events, so it's not that surprising after all.

Well they spent the last two days boasting about how toufgh the tracks are during the races :rolleyes:
However, in today's evening summary they had to admit that the athletes complained about the easy tracks, that don't allow for much action in mass start.
The Problem is that nex year will be even far worse in the 50km race as it's a longer Loop with much more flat sections but basically the same climbs. At least there won't be a skiathlon anymore, most likely.
 
The track was definitely not the toughest. Too much flat and the downhills fast. Slightly technical but nothing to difficult. They need to change it up for the World's next year. The sprint course for the women is way too easy. Seefeld/Innsbruck is a beautiful area with endless possibilities but they seemed to have used a less difficult track, which is too bad.
 
For the first time in my memory the Norwegian womens XC team don't look like they will run away with everything at a major championships. I suspect they will still win a boatload of medals, but other than the relay and possibly the 30k (just due to strength in depth, i wouldn't place money on any of them right now) they don't look odds on to win everything as they normally do.
Stina is probably favourite for the sprint, Kalla for the 10K, and possibly the skiathlon unless they drop her in the classic leg, and the team sprint is a lottery.
 
Sep 25, 2009
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^^agree with the assessment, particularly when one looks at the latest weng, falla and bjoergen performances, but the depth of the international field of the women capable of 'stealing' the norway thunder isn't that deep...kalla, nillsson, parmakoski, diggins...i am in difficulty to to find more. in general, the norwegian lady's team average age is one of the oldest and may point to a remote concern if i was their head coach.

and of course, the absence of johaug is a substantial 'medal reducer'.

their men look better but again, even in the absence of the a-team from russia, take the klaebo factor out, and the picture is less unbalanced that we are used to in the word cup races.
 
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python said:
^^agree with the assessment, particularly when one looks at the latest weng, falla and bjoergen performances, but the depth of the international field of the women capable of 'stealing' the norway thunder isn't that deep...kalla, nillsson, parmakoski, diggins...i am in difficulty to to find more. in general, the norwegian lady's team average age is one of the oldest and may point to a remote concern if i was their head coach.

and of course, the absence of johaug is a substantial 'medal reducer'.

their men look better but again, even in the absence of the a-team from russia, take the klaebo factor out, and the picture is less unbalanced that we are used to in the word cup races.

Strangely betting sites have Bjoegen as favourite to take home most Gold medals out of all female athletes (2/1), must be based on history rather than form, Dahlmeier is next favourite at (8/1).
On the Mens side Klaebo is massive favourite (3/4), with Boe and Fourcade both at 8/1 (they cancel each other out i suppose).
 
Oct 18, 2016
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Singer01 said:
Strangely betting sites have Bjoegen as favourite to take home most Gold medals out of all female athletes (2/1), must be based on history rather than form, Dahlmeier is next favourite at (8/1).
On the Mens side Klaebo is massive favourite (3/4), with Boe and Fourcade both at 8/1 (they cancel each other out i suppose).

Which betting site is offering that? I'd say that those odds are because of relay medals, as the probability of Klaebo and Björgen winning 2 relay gold medals is higher than the probability of Dahlmeier, Bö or Fourcade doing it.
 
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Erwin said:
Singer01 said:
Strangely betting sites have Bjoegen as favourite to take home most Gold medals out of all female athletes (2/1), must be based on history rather than form, Dahlmeier is next favourite at (8/1).
On the Mens side Klaebo is massive favourite (3/4), with Boe and Fourcade both at 8/1 (they cancel each other out i suppose).

Which betting site is offering that? I'd say that those odds are because of relay medals, as the probability of Klaebo and Björgen winning 2 relay gold medals is higher than the probability of Dahlmeier, Bö or Fourcade doing it.
https://sports.bwin.com/en/sports/26/betting/the-olympics-specials#categoryIds=795,20&eventId=&leagueIds=&marketGroupId=&page=0&sportId=26&templateIds=0.5778800702923468
 
Re: Re:

Singer01 said:
python said:
^^agree with the assessment, particularly when one looks at the latest weng, falla and bjoergen performances, but the depth of the international field of the women capable of 'stealing' the norway thunder isn't that deep...kalla, nillsson, parmakoski, diggins...i am in difficulty to to find more. in general, the norwegian lady's team average age is one of the oldest and may point to a remote concern if i was their head coach.

and of course, the absence of johaug is a substantial 'medal reducer'.

their men look better but again, even in the absence of the a-team from russia, take the klaebo factor out, and the picture is less unbalanced that we are used to in the word cup races.

Strangely betting sites have Bjoegen as favourite to take home most Gold medals out of all female athletes (2/1), must be based on history rather than form, Dahlmeier is next favourite at (8/1).
On the Mens side Klaebo is massive favourite (3/4), with Boe and Fourcade both at 8/1 (they cancel each other out i suppose).
Surprised to see that Dahlmeier is the same odds (9) in the women's field as Bø/Fourcade are in the men's field, since the women's races have been extremely unpredictable this season (with Kuzmina being the dominant factor if there ever was one single dominant athlete), while the men's races have been very lopsided with either Bø or Fourcade winning everything. Ofcourse Germany's favourite status in the women's relay might have something to do with it, but IMO the Norwegian men are perhaps even heavier favourites in the men's relay.
 
Maybe a combination of Dahlmeier's tendency to deliver in the most important events, 5 golds last year, and a guesstimate that her form is on the rise? Agree that based on races this season it is a bit surprising.

Not sure what to expect in xc skiing really apart from Cologna & Kläbo being super, and Kalla to take the 10k skate, Pärmäkoski to medal in some individual race and bro-Niskanen to medal in the 50k.
 
Sep 25, 2009
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a reminder - cortina - dobbiaco is fully broadcast by the nrk and is on right now...what makes it more interesting this time is that ustiougov decided to enter. and he is racing quite activelyso far often staying in the front.

lot of fresh snow and as always the views are incredible...
 
Jan 9, 2018
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For those of you Cycling fans who also follow Winter (and other Summer :p) sports, you are invited to join Totallympics (totallympics.com), an international forum about Olympic Sports.

PyeongChang 2018 is just around the corner and Totallympics is also organizing some Prediction Contests, a just for fun game in which users have to pick winning teams/athletes and they gain points according to the real event results.

For those interested here is the section of the Prediction Contests: http://totallympics.com/index.php?/forum/19-totallympics-prediction-contests/

You can find the "Bet Contest", with 70 questions in which you have to pick YES/NO, and then some contests about single sports.

Enjoy! :)
 
Jun 30, 2014
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Re:

python said:
a reminder - cortina - dobbiaco is fully broadcast by the nrk and is on right now...what makes it more interesting this time is that ustiougov decided to enter. and he is racing quite activelyso far often staying in the front.

lot of fresh snow and as always the views are incredible...
Yes, it's a stunning race, but it's Toblach-Cortina. :D
Yesterday we got around 20cm of fresh snow.
Tomorrow I'll race the freestyle race that starts in Cortina (Fiames to be exact), my first xc skiing race since my childhood, so I'm a bit nervous about racing in a bigger bunch without crashing, breaking a pole.
 
Sep 25, 2009
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Re: Re:

Mayomaniac said:
python said:
a reminder - cortina - dobbiaco is fully broadcast by the nrk and is on right now...what makes it more interesting this time is that ustiougov decided to enter. and he is racing quite activelyso far often staying in the front.

lot of fresh snow and as always the views are incredible...
Yes, it's a stunning race, but it's Toblach-Cortina. :D
Yesterday we got around 20cm of fresh snow.
Tomorrow I'll race the freestyle race that starts in Cortina (Fiames to be exact), my first xc skiing race since my childhood, so I'm a bit nervous about racing in a bigger bunch without crashing, breaking a pole.
good luck !

i was watching 3 events at the one time (T-C men, women) and the junior world relay) and that's where my attention to detail suffered :)
 
Jun 30, 2014
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Thanks, let's hope that my knee throats will be ok, last weekend they started to hurt after a session of alpine skiing, but now I'm fine, so fingers crossed.
I've skied the same distance before, so that shouldn't be a huge problem, my big concern is the lack of experience whem it comes to skiing in a big bunch, so I want to take it easy on the start to stay out of the hectic fights for positions.
 

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