Category: XCFeeds

After a three hour van drive, three plane rides, two nights and a lot of lost sleep, Colin and I finally made it to Vermont yesterday. Traveling during the holidays is always a gamble, but I was hopeful we wouldn’t run into any weather or mechanical delays…unfortunately, that did not happen. Needless to say, it is nice to finally be here and unlike the people in front of us who were trying to fly to London and couldn’t get a flight until December 31st, we were only delayed one day and will be able to enjoy Christmas with family.

The racing season kicked off for me in the last two weeks. The first weekend we raced in Silver Star British Columbia. I have now been there a handful of times and it never gets old! There is always an abundant amount of snow, good ski conditions, and the beauty of being able to step out of the front door to ski. The first race began with a classic sprint. I felt a bit slow off the line but was able to post a decent time to qualify in the middle of the pack with a 13th place finish. Going into my quarterfinal, I felt good and strong. I put myself in a good position but was not able to sustain my pace up the final hill loosing a place. I ended up 13th overall.

The next day was a 10/15k skate. We woke up to a foot of soft, new snow. These conditions are some of the toughest to race in. The snow was so soft that the groomers were not able to pack it down before the race began. Instead it made for a very slow long race. While I felt a bit bogged down with all the snow I reminded myself that everyone was battling the same conditions and feelings. It was not my best result, but I hung int here and ended up 13th.

A couple days later we made our way to Rossland, B.C. about a 3 hour drive. We arrived to quite the opposite of what we found in Silver Star…icey and glazed ski trails. They did a good job of grooming and mixing up the snow to make it skiable. Friday marked the start of a three day mini tour with a skate sprint race. It was a very fast course! I qualified 13th. I was skiing a great quarterfinal round, positioning myself in second place to advance to the semis, when on the last hairpin turn, a girl crashed in front of me and I was unable to get around her without getting tangled up. Bummer! During the time of the tangle-up, the other skiers got around us and our day of racing was cut short.

With the unfortunate sequence of events the previous day, I was psyched and ready to ski fast the next day in the 5k skate. I went out fast and tried to maintain a high tempo and speed the entire race…5k is a short race! I received some good splits along the way but knew that there were some fast skiers behind me. I ended up 9th… a result I was satisfied with (at least I didn’t end up 13th like several of the previous races!)

The final day of the tour ended with a 10k pursuit classic race. This means that our combined times from the previous two days were added up to determine our start time for the classic race. I began 1:30 minutes behind the first starter. I bolted out of the start and caught the racer in front of me within the first 1/2 kilometer. At about 2.5 kilometers, I was feeling a bit heavy and bogged down…maybe I was a bit too excited at the start and started too fast? A pack of skiers from behind caught up to me and I tired to hang. I hung for a couple kilometers until a couple of them took off and I as left skiing with one other girl. We skied the entire second lap together. I began to feel a bit better toward the end, so I tired to gap the skier in the last 1/2 kilometer, but was unable to drop her. It came down to a sprint in the last 100 meters. Unfortunately, I did not have the strength in my arms to beat her in the double pole sprint…guess what place I ended up? Yep, 13th! Maybe if I knew I was racing for 12th place I could have mustered up the strength to not get 13th.

Hopefully, I have put all the 13th place finishes of the year behind me! I am spending Christmas in Vermont before I head to Rumford, Maine for US Nationals late next week. Getting psyched and ready…all for now!

I hope you have a very Merry Christmas!

After a three hour van drive, three plane rides, two nights and a lot of lost sleep, Colin and I finally made it to Vermont yesterday. Traveling during the holidays is always a gamble, but I was hopeful we wouldn’t run into any weather or mechanical delays…unfortunately, that did not happen. Needless to say, it is nice to finally be here and unlike the people in front of us who were trying to fly to London and couldn’t get a flight until December 31st, we were only delayed one day and will be able to enjoy Christmas with family.

The racing season kicked off for me in the last two weeks. The first weekend we raced in Silver Star British Columbia. I have now been there a handful of times and it never gets old! There is always an abundant amount of snow, good ski conditions, and the beauty of being able to step out of the front door to ski. The first race began with a classic sprint. I felt a bit slow off the line but was able to post a decent time to qualify in the middle of the pack with a 13th place finish. Going into my quarterfinal, I felt good and strong. I put myself in a good position but was not able to sustain my pace up the final hill loosing a place. I ended up 13th overall.

The next day was a 10/15k skate. We woke up to a foot of soft, new snow. These conditions are some of the toughest to race in. The snow was so soft that the groomers were not able to pack it down before the race began. Instead it made for a very slow long race. While I felt a bit bogged down with all the snow I reminded myself that everyone was battling the same conditions and feelings. It was not my best result, but I hung int here and ended up 13th.

A couple days later we made our way to Rossland, B.C. about a 3 hour drive. We arrived to quite the opposite of what we found in Silver Star…icey and glazed ski trails. They did a good job of grooming and mixing up the snow to make it skiable. Friday marked the start of a three day mini tour with a skate sprint race. It was a very fast course! I qualified 13th. I was skiing a great quarterfinal round, positioning myself in second place to advance to the semis, when on the last hairpin turn, a girl crashed in front of me and I was unable to get around her without getting tangled up. Bummer! During the time of the tangle-up, the other skiers got around us and our day of racing was cut short.

With the unfortunate sequence of events the previous day, I was psyched and ready to ski fast the next day in the 5k skate. I went out fast and tried to maintain a high tempo and speed the entire race…5k is a short race! I received some good splits along the way but knew that there were some fast skiers behind me. I ended up 9th… a result I was satisfied with (at least I didn’t end up 13th like several of the previous races!)

The final day of the tour ended with a 10k pursuit classic race. This means that our combined times from the previous two days were added up to determine our start time for the classic race. I began 1:30 minutes behind the first starter. I bolted out of the start and caught the racer in front of me within the first 1/2 kilometer. At about 2.5 kilometers, I was feeling a bit heavy and bogged down…maybe I was a bit too excited at the start and started too fast? A pack of skiers from behind caught up to me and I tired to hang. I hung for a couple kilometers until a couple of them took off and I as left skiing with one other girl. We skied the entire second lap together. I began to feel a bit better toward the end, so I tired to gap the skier in the last 1/2 kilometer, but was unable to drop her. It came down to a sprint in the last 100 meters. Unfortunately, I did not have the strength in my arms to beat her in the double pole sprint…guess what place I ended up? Yep, 13th! Maybe if I knew I was racing for 12th place I could have mustered up the strength to not get 13th.

Hopefully, I have put all the 13th place finishes of the year behind me! I am spending Christmas in Vermont before I head to Rumford, Maine for US Nationals late next week. Getting psyched and ready…all for now!

I hope you have a very Merry Christmas!

Picking up from my post yesterday, we’ll move on to Kris Freeman:

Freeman told FasterSkier that blood sugar issues weren’t a problem, but that he simply didn’t have a great race on Saturday.  Well, it’s quite clear from this percent-back difference plot what happens when he does have blood sugar problems, as he did last season (this graph only includes mass start and pursuit races, which is why there’s only that one bad Olympic race for Freeman last season).

But if you move back earlier in his career, I don’t think this race looks all that bad in comparison.  Of course, it may be bad from the perspective of how fit he is right now, but compared to how he’s fared in these sorts of races in the past, I’d actually call that one fairly solid.  And of course, he’s always been a bit more of a threat in the 15k events.

How about the Canadians?  First up, Devon Kershaw:

Now, Kershaw was 13th in this race and his FIS points were only slightly better than what’s typical for him, so I don’t think the FIS points are too misleading in this case.  In mass start or pursuit races, Kershaw has basically been right in the middle of this particular group of 30-40 skiers (his median has been hugging that 0 line pretty closely).  I’d call that about what we’d expect from him in this type of race, on average.

Ivan Babikov had a bit of a rough start to the season that may have been related to his travel schedule (I’m just speculating here, based on how I’d feel flying back and forth to Europe just in time for WC races) but this is the first real mass start race so far this season:

And again, I’d say that his 16th place on Saturday was a good sign in the sense that that’s just about what we expect from Babikov, on average.  Although if he’s going to pop a good race, it’ll be in a freestyle event to be sure.

As for Alex Harvey:

His raw FIS points suggested a slightly above average race, and this suggests something closer to average, or a bit below.

In general, this is basically what I’d expect from these four guys: consistently between 10th-25th, but they’ll really have to put everything together to push up above that.

Related posts:

1. <Gällivare Recap: North Americans
2. <Kuusamo WC Recap: North Americans
3. <Davos Recap: Distance – North Americans

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Saturday was the first long mass start race of the World Cup season in La Clusaz, France, and along with mass start races come difficulties in measuring performance in a sensible manner.  The women’s field didn’t help matters by having the top three ski away from the field.

So you end up with some odd stuff, like Elizabeth Stephen and Morgan Arritola have seemingly some of the better races of their careers (18th, 19th) with FIS points near 100, which would only just barely put them in the top ten in last weekend’s Nor-Am race in Canada.  As I’ve pointed out before, over the course of a season or an entire career, these sorts of things tend to even out and not be such a problem.  But in situations like this, where we’re looking at a single race and we want to know what it means, it’s a problem.

One way we can get around this is by comparing a skier directly to the other skiers in this particular race, using a percent-back difference plot looking only at mass start and pursuit races.  The fact that the entire field’s FIS points may be inflated (or deflated) artificially won’t matter, since we’ll only be looking at the relative differences between a particular skier and the field.  Sometimes we get a different answer, sometimes not.  As an example, let’s look at a handfull of skiers who appeared to have particularly good or bad days on Saturday.

First up, Curdin Perl (SUI):

Compare this with how his race looks in my snapshot graph.  In that version, Perl had a career race, as the black bar represents the middle 50% of his results over the past several years.  While the percent-back difference plot above suggests a good race, it doesn’t look mind-blowingly good.  The difference in percent-back between Perl and the other top 40 skiers or so is modestly better than last season.

Another skier who seemed to have an unusually good race was Sweden’s Daniel Rickardsson (who also, I believe, is also more known for his classic skiing, but I haven’t checked that):

Once again, compared to how he fared against these specific skiers overall last season, this represents a good, but not surprisingly good race for Rickardsson.  However, the further back in time you move the comparison, the more impressive the race looks.  Saturday’s results was significantly better than 2008-2009 and dramatically better than anything he did in 2007-2008.

Next, let’s look at some women who seemed to have particularly bad races, starting with Riitta-Liisa Roponen:

Weren’t expecting that, were you?  That was actually a fairly strong race for Roponen, I think, despite what you might assume just by glancing at the FIS points.  Sure, Björgen and two others skied away from her more than she’d like (several blue dots up near 5%) but compared to the rest of the field, she did fairly well.  Evidence, perhaps, that Roponen didn’t ski badly, but that the top three women happened to ski exceptionally well.

Another good example of this sort of phenomena comes with Therese Johaug:

This seems like an average to slightly below average race for Johaug when comparing her to the entire field.

My point, as always, isn’t that there is necessarily a “right” answer about whether someone had a good/bad race.  If all you really care about is how far behind the winner you are, then FIS points will give you the right answer.  But it’s possible to have a good race and still be a long way behind the leader because ultimately you’re racing against everyone, not just the person who ends up winning.  So the more ways we have to look at a result the less likely we are to miss something important or interesting.

Related posts:

1. <How I Learned to Start Worrying and Hate the F-Factor (Part 1)
2. <How I Learned To Start Worrying and Hate the F-Factor (Part 2)
3. <Davos Recap: Distance

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The December world cups drew to a close yesterday with the Mixed Relay in Pokljuka, Slovenia. I raced in the third slot while Sarah Studebaker led off, followed by Annelies Cook, and Leif Nordgren anchoring. It was a great day for the entire team on the range. We used only five extra rounds between the four of us which amounted to the best team shooting of the day for any of the nations. The mixed relay capped off a three-week stint of world cups that took us from Ostersund, Sweden to Hochfilzen, Austria and finally to Pokljuka, Slovenia.

Ostersund was a good start for me although my ski-speed is still a little slower than I would like. I managed to squeek into the top 40 in the Sprint, shooting clean and placing 38th. Although it was a nice start to the season, I was pretty excited to get out of the frigid temps and head for the sunshine of Austria. The sunshine only lasted for a couple of days at the beginning of the week in Hochfilzen. After that, we had three days of back-to-back racing in blizzard conditions. By the end of the weekend, about a meter of snow had fallen on the Austrian ski town. I was happy with this world cup despite the less-than-ideal conditions. I raced to 55th in the Sprint race and moved up to 39th in the Pursuit the following day. My ski speed improved and I headed for Slovenia with a couple more world cup points.

The Pokljuka world cup is one of my favorite race series because of the town we stay in. Bled, Slovenia is a tiny little city, set in the Slovenian mountains. It has a majestic lake, bustling downtown, great pizzarias, and a castle on a bluff overlooking the town. Many of the venues we go to are located in remote hard-to-reach areas. In such cases, you generally spend your time either at the hotel or at the venue and nowhere else. Bled is nicer in that you can get your mind off of biathlon for and hour or two and head downtown for a coffee, or take a recovery jog around the lake.

I was satisfied with the final week of racing in Slovenia although I didn’t make it into the world cup points again. As I see it, there were two highlights of the week for me. The first was that I improved my ski speed by around three minutes in the 20km when compared to the previous 20km Individual in Ostersund. Although I had 5 misses and just missed out on a top-40 finish, it was encouraging to be back in the mix on the ski course. Also, we had a great mixed relay which I mentioned in the opening paragraph. All in all, I feel good about the way the first three world cups have gone and I’m looking forward to a little down time before we start back up again in January at World Cup #4 in Oberhof, Germany.

For now, I’m spending a few days in Siegsdorf, Germany (just a few kilometers from Ruhpolding). I slept in today and went for a nice afternoon ski tour with Christian Sieler (See photos above), Toni Lang, and Katrin Hitzer. It was nice to see different side of Ruhpolding, not just the biathlon stadium.

From here, I will travel to Obertilliach, Austria on December 24th and train there until heading to Oberhof on January 2nd.

Happy Holidays to everyone!

-Lowell

< <

The December world cups drew to a close yesterday with the Mixed Relay in Pokljuka, Slovenia. I raced in the third slot while Sarah Studebaker led off, followed by Annelies Cook, and Leif Nordgren anchoring. It was a great day for the entire team on the range. We used only five extra rounds between the four of us which amounted to the best team shooting of the day for any of the nations. The mixed relay capped off a three-week stint of world cups that took us from Ostersund, Sweden to Hochfilzen, Austria and finally to Pokljuka, Slovenia.

Ostersund was a good start for me although my ski-speed is still a little slower than I would like. I managed to squeek into the top 40 in the Sprint, shooting clean and placing 38th. Although it was a nice start to the season, I was pretty excited to get out of the frigid temps and head for the sunshine of Austria. The sunshine only lasted for a couple of days at the beginning of the week in Hochfilzen. After that, we had three days of back-to-back racing in blizzard conditions. By the end of the weekend, about a meter of snow had fallen on the Austrian ski town. I was happy with this world cup despite the less-than-ideal conditions. I raced to 55th in the Sprint race and moved up to 39th in the Pursuit the following day. My ski speed improved and I headed for Slovenia with a couple more world cup points.

The Pokljuka world cup is one of my favorite race series because of the town we stay in. Bled, Slovenia is a tiny little city, set in the Slovenian mountains. It has a majestic lake, bustling downtown, great pizzarias, and a castle on a bluff overlooking the town. Many of the venues we go to are located in remote hard-to-reach areas. In such cases, you generally spend your time either at the hotel or at the venue and nowhere else. Bled is nicer in that you can get your mind off of biathlon for and hour or two and head downtown for a coffee, or take a recovery jog around the lake.

I was satisfied with the final week of racing in Slovenia although I didn’t make it into the world cup points again. As I see it, there were two highlights of the week for me. The first was that I improved my ski speed by around three minutes in the 20km when compared to the previous 20km Individual in Ostersund. Although I had 5 misses and just missed out on a top-40 finish, it was encouraging to be back in the mix on the ski course. Also, we had a great mixed relay which I mentioned in the opening paragraph. All in all, I feel good about the way the first three world cups have gone and I’m looking forward to a little down time before we start back up again in January at World Cup #4 in Oberhof, Germany.

For now, I’m spending a few days in Siegsdorf, Germany (just a few kilometers from Ruhpolding). I slept in today and went for a nice afternoon ski tour with Christian Sieler (See photos above), Toni Lang, and Katrin Hitzer. It was nice to see different side of Ruhpolding, not just the biathlon stadium.

From here, I will travel to Obertilliach, Austria on December 24th and train there until heading to Oberhof on January 2nd.

Happy Holidays to everyone!

-Lowell

< <

The December world cups drew to a close yesterday with the Mixed Relay in Pokljuka, Slovenia. I raced in the third slot while Sarah Studebaker led off, followed by Annelies Cook, and Leif Nordgren anchoring. It was a great day for the entire team on the range. We used only five extra rounds between the four of us which amounted to the best team shooting of the day for any of the nations. The mixed relay capped off a three-week stint of world cups that took us from Ostersund, Sweden to Hochfilzen, Austria and finally to Pokljuka, Slovenia.

Ostersund was a good start for me although my ski-speed is still a little slower than I would like. I managed to squeek into the top 40 in the Sprint, shooting clean and placing 38th. Although it was a nice start to the season, I was pretty excited to get out of the frigid temps and head for the sunshine of Austria. The sunshine only lasted for a couple of days at the beginning of the week in Hochfilzen. After that, we had three days of back-to-back racing in blizzard conditions. By the end of the weekend, about a meter of snow had fallen on the Austrian ski town. I was happy with this world cup despite the less-than-ideal conditions. I raced to 55th in the Sprint race and moved up to 39th in the Pursuit the following day. My ski speed improved and I headed for Slovenia with a couple more world cup points.

The Pokljuka world cup is one of my favorite race series because of the town we stay in. Bled, Slovenia is a tiny little city, set in the Slovenian mountains. It has a majestic lake, bustling downtown, great pizzarias, and a castle on a bluff overlooking the town. Many of the venues we go to are located in remote hard-to-reach areas. In such cases, you generally spend your time either at the hotel or at the venue and nowhere else. Bled is nicer in that you can get your mind off of biathlon for and hour or two and head downtown for a coffee, or take a recovery jog around the lake.

I was satisfied with the final week of racing in Slovenia although I didn’t make it into the world cup points again. As I see it, there were two highlights of the week for me. The first was that I improved my ski speed by around three minutes in the 20km when compared to the previous 20km Individual in Ostersund. Although I had 5 misses and just missed out on a top-40 finish, it was encouraging to be back in the mix on the ski course. Also, we had a great mixed relay which I mentioned in the opening paragraph. All in all, I feel good about the way the first three world cups have gone and I’m looking forward to a little down time before we start back up again in January at World Cup #4 in Oberhof, Germany.

For now, I’m spending a few days in Siegsdorf, Germany (just a few kilometers from Ruhpolding). I slept in today and went for a nice afternoon ski tour with Christian Sieler (See photos above), Toni Lang, and Katrin Hitzer. It was nice to see different side of Ruhpolding, not just the biathlon stadium.

From here, I will travel to Obertilliach, Austria on December 24th and train there until heading to Oberhof on January 2nd.

Happy Holidays to everyone!

-Lowell

< <

The December world cups drew to a close yesterday with the Mixed Relay in Pokljuka, Slovenia. I raced in the third slot while Sarah Studebaker led off, followed by Annelies Cook, and Leif Nordgren anchoring. It was a great day for the entire team on the range. We used only five extra rounds between the four of us which amounted to the best team shooting of the day for any of the nations. The mixed relay capped off a three-week stint of world cups that took us from Ostersund, Sweden to Hochfilzen, Austria and finally to Pokljuka, Slovenia.

Ostersund was a good start for me although my ski-speed is still a little slower than I would like. I managed to squeek into the top 40 in the Sprint, shooting clean and placing 38th. Although it was a nice start to the season, I was pretty excited to get out of the frigid temps and head for the sunshine of Austria. The sunshine only lasted for a couple of days at the beginning of the week in Hochfilzen. After that, we had three days of back-to-back racing in blizzard conditions. By the end of the weekend, about a meter of snow had fallen on the Austrian ski town. I was happy with this world cup despite the less-than-ideal conditions. I raced to 55th in the Sprint race and moved up to 39th in the Pursuit the following day. My ski speed improved and I headed for Slovenia with a couple more world cup points.

The Pokljuka world cup is one of my favorite race series because of the town we stay in. Bled, Slovenia is a tiny little city, set in the Slovenian mountains. It has a majestic lake, bustling downtown, great pizzarias, and a castle on a bluff overlooking the town. Many of the venues we go to are located in remote hard-to-reach areas. In such cases, you generally spend your time either at the hotel or at the venue and nowhere else. Bled is nicer in that you can get your mind off of biathlon for and hour or two and head downtown for a coffee, or take a recovery jog around the lake.

I was satisfied with the final week of racing in Slovenia although I didn’t make it into the world cup points again. As I see it, there were two highlights of the week for me. The first was that I improved my ski speed by around three minutes in the 20km when compared to the previous 20km Individual in Ostersund. Although I had 5 misses and just missed out on a top-40 finish, it was encouraging to be back in the mix on the ski course. Also, we had a great mixed relay which I mentioned in the opening paragraph. All in all, I feel good about the way the first three world cups have gone and I’m looking forward to a little down time before we start back up again in January at World Cup #4 in Oberhof, Germany.

For now, I’m spending a few days in Siegsdorf, Germany (just a few kilometers from Ruhpolding). I slept in today and went for a nice afternoon ski tour with Christian Sieler (See photos above), Toni Lang, and Katrin Hitzer. It was nice to see different side of Ruhpolding, not just the biathlon stadium.

From here, I will travel to Obertilliach, Austria on December 24th and train there until heading to Oberhof on January 2nd.

Happy Holidays to everyone!

-Lowell

div class=”separator” style=”clear: both; text-align: left;”/divdiv class=”MsoNormal”iCaution “Flying” Children/ispan style=”font-style: normal;” is my favorite sign at Coleraine, MN’s Mt. Itasca ski center. On Saturday a ski jumping meet coincided with our Sprint race, and in addition to some more kids boarding on the adjacent alpine hill it was an ideal winter scene. Plus, the sight of little kids jumping mere meters on the “small” jump was priceless. I unfortunately didn’t get any photos of those tykes because it took me longer than normal at our post-race doping control and I missed it by the time I filled my cup./span/divdiv class=”MsoNormal”br //divbr /div class=”separator” style=”clear: both; text-align: center;”