Category: XCFeeds

After the competitions ended and all the competitors headed for whiter pastures I bid farewell to Maine for a day along the Connecticut River. Before making my way to the state line towns of Lyme, New Hampshire and South Strattford, Vermont, I stopped off at the Washington Hotel in Bretton Woods to check out the scene by skis and get a little oxygen in the lungs.

Since my days studying a bit of economics at the University of Utah, I’ve been interested to one day check out the trails of Bretton Woods. Finally, the opportunity finally came. Way back in the summer of 1944 all forty-four of the Allied Nations came together for three weeks to hammer out how a system of monetary policies to help us from having more great wars. To schuss around on the 60 kilometers of immaculately buffed out trails, and at least get an idea of what its like to hop-nob with the elite – have you ever seen a hand-crafted mahogany clad ski locker room before? – made for an interesting diversion.

From Bretton Woods it was off to Bull Moose Acres. The farm sits three miles outside the classic, quaint New England town of Lyme, New Hampshire. After climbing for two miles up a meandering unlined country road, one reaches the former horse racing stables that now is home to the In The Arena world headquarters. I’ve heard awed rumblings about this place and its mission, but I still didn’t know what to expect. Whether it was the alpen glow of the early evening or the wild turkeys scurrying about, I knew I was headed someplace special as I made my way up the maple-lined drive.

To one side rests the Dartmouth SkiWay, along with 20,000 acres of protected wilderness. To the other, clear views run to the peaks of the White Mountains fifty miles away. For someone who might use the word claustrophobic as one way to describe the East, this came as a most welcome surprise.

Soon though it was time to say goodbye to Amory and David, to Thea and little Torin as well and head across the Connecticut for a family dinner in Vermont. Six years had past since the last time I was here. It makes one think how time and opportunity can both pass far too quickly if we’re not attuned to the world around us. If another six years must pass before I hit the the eastern backcountry with my cousins Casey and West and Jay, that many springs transpire before I tap another sugar maple tree, or that many classes of young athletes make their way through the ITA summer training&life camp experience before I return, well, it will be far too long.

Until then, I’m in the Alps of Switzerland, prepping for all the real races left before I call an end to this season. Until then, enjoy the days. I’ll do the same.

( this photo by Bettina G.)

After the competitions ended and all the competitors headed for whiter pastures I bid farewell to Maine for a day along the Connecticut River. Before making my way to the state line towns of Lyme, New Hampshire and South Strattford, Vermont, I stopped off at the Washington Hotel in Bretton Woods to check out the scene by skis and get a little oxygen in the lungs.

Since my days studying a bit of economics at the University of Utah, I’ve been interested to one day check out the trails of Bretton Woods. Finally, the opportunity finally came. Way back in the summer of 1944 all forty-four of the Allied Nations came together for three weeks to hammer out how a system of monetary policies to help us from having more great wars. To schuss around on the 60 kilometers of immaculately buffed out trails, and at least get an idea of what its like to hop-nob with the elite – have you ever seen a hand-crafted mahogany clad ski locker room before? – made for an interesting diversion.

From Bretton Woods it was off to Bull Moose Acres. The farm sits three miles outside the classic, quaint New England town of Lyme, New Hampshire. After climbing for two miles up a meandering unlined country road, one reaches the former horse racing stables that now is home to the In The Arena world headquarters. I’ve heard awed rumblings about this place and its mission, but I still didn’t know what to expect. Whether it was the alpen glow of the early evening or the wild turkeys scurrying about, I knew I was headed someplace special as I made my way up the maple-lined drive.

To one side rests the Dartmouth SkiWay, along with 20,000 acres of protected wilderness. To the other, clear views run to the peaks of the White Mountains fifty miles away. For someone who might use the word claustrophobic as one way to describe the East, this came as a most welcome surprise.

Soon though it was time to say goodbye to Amory and David, to Thea and little Torin as well and head across the Connecticut for a family dinner in Vermont. Six years had past since the last time I was here. It makes one think how time and opportunity can both pass far too quickly if we’re not attuned to the world around us. If another six years must pass before I hit the the eastern backcountry with my cousins Casey and West and Jay, that many springs transpire before I tap another sugar maple tree, or that many classes of young athletes make their way through the ITA summer training&life camp experience before I return, well, it will be far too long.

Until then, I’m in the Alps of Switzerland, prepping for all the real races left before I call an end to this season. Until then, enjoy the days. I’ll do the same.

( this photo by Bettina G.)

Even Magdelena Neuner has bad days, apparently.

Related posts:

1. <Race Snapshot: IBU World Cup 1 Women
2. <Race Snapshot: IBU WC 1 Women’s Sprint
3. <Race Snapshot: IBU WC 1 Men/Women’s Pursuit

I haven’t posted very much regarding domestic racing here in the US or Canada.  There are several reasons for this:

• Useful and meaningful performance measures are harder to come by.  FIS points start getting somewhat wishy-washy when you start having to assume that the penalty system is accurately capturing the strength of the field.  Not saying it’s terrible, but I’ve just been cautious about it, is all.
• Generally speaking, I have a lot less data on domestic racers.  I only really capture events that are FIS sanctioned, and that omits a large number of races here in the US/CAN with fast skiers.
• I know (or are friends of friends) with a some of these folks, and it feels weird sometimes talking about them “analytically”.

Still, I ought to pause for a bit after US Nationals and post something.  So here it goes.  Distance FIS point trends for a selection of top US men and women (excluding US Ski Team members):

There’s no grand conspiracy regarding who I chose to graph here.  I asked around for some suggestions about who might be interesting to look at, got a list of names too long to really tackle and narrowed it down based on who’s data seemed the most interesting to me.

A couple of observations:

• Lars Flora’s resurgence is fairly clear, but his graph also shows that he was trending slower for a solid 3-4 seasons.  So it’s not exactly like Flora was super fast, had one or two bad years, and has since recovered.  Also, he’s arguably skiing faster now than he was in 2003 or 2004.
• Most of the other guys here have shown results that more or less track their previous trajectories.
• Leif Zimmerman and Tad Elliott both have shown some excellent races and some not so good.  In Elliott’s case this is almost entirely a technique differential; in Zimmerman’s case, I think he just had some rough races.
• I included Jesse Diggins mostly to show how little I can say about younger skiers for whom I have almost no data.  I mean, she’s skiing super fast, but that’s not particularly newsworthy.
• Evelyn Dong and Kate Fitzgerald are both significantly faster than last season.  However, we should keep in mind that it’s much, much easier for women to jump from 135 FIS points to 80-90 FIS points than it is for someone like Holly Brooks to move from ~60 FIS points down to even 35-40 FIS points.  Obviously, that’s no knock on Dong or Fitzgerald, who’ve clearly made a jump this season.
• Holly Brooks has been skiing well, obviously, but to my eyes not dramatically faster than last year, relative to the domestic field.
• Caitlin Compton’s clearly had a bit of a rough start to the season with a few decent, but not great races, but also some pretty terrible ones as well.

I played with various ways of looking at domestic sprint racing, but eventually gave up.  From a data analysis perspective it’s just a mess.

A more detailed look at these skiers results against each other to come in a subsequent post.

Related posts:

1. <Dopers – Update
2. <A Look At Skier Speeds
3. <Triathlon Racing Strategy

A big week in Rumford Maine.  Four races and lots going on…everything that is but snow.  This is a short of what it was like.

Results http://www.chisholmskiclub.org/2011_us_nationals/results.htm

Fantastic day for Lowell Bailey!  Also a strong race from Canadian Brendan Green.

Related posts:

1. <Race Snapshot: IBU WC 1 Men/Women’s Pursuit
2. <Race Snapshot: IBU WC 2 Men’s Pursuit
3. <Race Snapshot: IBU WC 3 Distance Race