Category: XCFeeds

a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Qy8LpbgYOag/TB2LexJY1pI/AAAAAAAAAV4/NHsnZfcq-7c/s1600/IMG_8995.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Qy8LpbgYOag/TB2LexJY1pI/AAAAAAAAAV4/NHsnZfcq-7c/s400/IMG_8995.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484693281912182418″ //abr /br /Nothing quite like kids celebrating school getting out for summer. I’d like to send out a special shout out to Mr. Gottschalk and all the kids in class for the great year.br /br /br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Qy8LpbgYOag/TB2LdkWVGMI/AAAAAAAAAVo/dkPcJnRUgGA/s1600/35792_133671709993307_122958434397968_305105_5338247_n.jpg”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 266px;” src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Qy8LpbgYOag/TB2LdkWVGMI/AAAAAAAAAVo/dkPcJnRUgGA/s400/35792_133671709993307_122958434397968_305105_5338247_n.jpg” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484693261296933058″ //abr /br /Now that’s school’s out, another education is in session. Summer Camp, skiing in Bend. Here I lead a train of highly motivated young rubes up the trails of Mt. Bachelor.br /br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Qy8LpbgYOag/TB2LeWuP1oI/AAAAAAAAAVw/AqjpblfgTZo/s1600/35792_133673309993147_122958434397968_305157_137314_n.jpg”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 266px;” src=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Qy8LpbgYOag/TB2LeWuP1oI/AAAAAAAAAVw/AqjpblfgTZo/s400/35792_133673309993147_122958434397968_305157_137314_n.jpg” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484693274819024514″ //abr /br /Lars Flora and I racing through the slalom course. We’re trying to mix skills challenges within the technique and endurance sessions. The snow’s still good, but now it’s going fast.div class=”blogger-post-footer”img width=’1′ height=’1′ src=’https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2691525267872963085-308467372780977074?l=in-the-arena-torin.blogspot.com’ alt=” //div

a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz5DKg6OgI/AAAAAAAAC_E/Vy5ggk2Uqjk/s1600/IMG_4654.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 216px;” src=”http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz5DKg6OgI/AAAAAAAAC_E/Vy5ggk2Uqjk/s400/IMG_4654.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484532278987733506″ //aIt was warm and breezy today for the group bike ride. We did a hilly loop from Londonderry, through Weston, Ludlow, Chester and back. Everyone has had a pretty big week so the pace was relaxed and the ride was just a nice easy OD. br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz4c2mBQ1I/AAAAAAAAC-0/KoXcXzKtN_c/s1600/IMG_4660.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 268px;” src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz4c2mBQ1I/AAAAAAAAC-0/KoXcXzKtN_c/s400/IMG_4660.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484531620805428050″ //aIf you want to enlarge any picture, just click on it.br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz4AkQOR-I/AAAAAAAAC-s/SqypGuToM-E/s1600/IMG_4663.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 340px;” src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz4AkQOR-I/AAAAAAAAC-s/SqypGuToM-E/s400/IMG_4663.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484531134845831138″ //abr /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz3dmEO_GI/AAAAAAAAC-k/206vv-C4-JM/s1600/IMG_4664.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 336px;” src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz3dmEO_GI/AAAAAAAAC-k/206vv-C4-JM/s400/IMG_4664.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484530534036995170″ //abr /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz3G9-7qFI/AAAAAAAAC-c/pSer_HEkQ3A/s1600/IMG_4665.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 285px;” src=”http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz3G9-7qFI/AAAAAAAAC-c/pSer_HEkQ3A/s400/IMG_4665.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484530145320216658″ //abr /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz2wITlA1I/AAAAAAAAC-U/m3ZKJdTaviw/s1600/IMG_4667.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 256px;” src=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz2wITlA1I/AAAAAAAAC-U/m3ZKJdTaviw/s400/IMG_4667.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484529752954176338″ //aRolling into Chester.br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz2bu_RSoI/AAAAAAAAC-M/u7K_r1svDDw/s1600/IMG_4668.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 357px;” src=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBz2bu_RSoI/AAAAAAAAC-M/u7K_r1svDDw/s400/IMG_4668.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484529402560727682″ //adiv class=”blogger-post-footer”img width=’1′ height=’1′ src=’https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/4680416899705879324-132100372469786731?l=smsxc.blogspot.com’ alt=” //div

object width=”400″ height=”336″param name=”movie” value=”http://www.youtube.com/v/Q6Al37OUJ2Erel=0egm=0showinfo=0fs=1″/paramparam name=”wmode” value=”transparent”/paramparam name=”allowFullScreen” value=”true”/paramembed src=”http://www.youtube.com/v/Q6Al37OUJ2Erel=0egm=0showinfo=0fs=1″ type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” width=”400″ height=”336″ allowFullScreen=”true” wmode=”transparent”/embed/objectbr/br/pEven not fit guys win occasionally. (viaPJ)/p

Here’s a recap of what’s been going on at StatisticalSkier this past week:

– A look at skiers who made the biggest jumps forward (or back) between the 2008-2009 and 2009-2010 seasons: here, here, here and here.

– A colorful way to visualize the head-to-head matchups between groups of skiers.

– A look back at the career of retiring Swedish skier Anna Olsson.

– Finally, you get to choose which pair of skiers I analyze next (see the poll on the right) as in Daehlie vs. Smirnov.  It’s a tight race so far…

div style=”text-align: left;”The past 9 days I have been training and hanging out in Park City, Utah for the National Training Group Camp. Earlier this spring 25 promising top U23 and Junior athletes were named to this group. This is a new addition to the US Ski Teams “Pipeline”, and so far it has been super fun and beneficial. 6 girls and 9 boys traveled up, down, or across the US to join the ten days of training with the US Ski Team coaches. It has been tons of fun but super hard work. Many of these athletes I have never gotten a chance to train with during the summer, I just meet head to head with them on the race trails, so it has been fun training along side them. The coaching has been great as well. We have gotten lots of feedback on technique, training, and just simply our goals in the sport.br //divdivbr //divdivdivbr //divdiva onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_l4L_01UOs1s/TBvJ8ZxRGcI/AAAAAAAAAUo/_Dgp3q4bZaM/s1600/ntg+11.jpg”img src=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_l4L_01UOs1s/TBvJ8ZxRGcI/AAAAAAAAAUo/_Dgp3q4bZaM/s320/ntg+11.jpg” border=”0″ alt=”” id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484199010800572866″ style=”display: block; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: auto; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: auto; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px; ” //a/divdiv style=”text-align: center;”span class=”Apple-style-span” style=”font-weight: bold;”Me, Sophie and Kate working on Double Pole/span/divdiv style=”text-align: center;”span class=”Apple-style-span” style=”font-weight: bold;”br //span/divdivIt has been great to train along with Andy Newell and Liz Stephen. Just raises the bar a bit during training. Not only have I been training alongside top nordy athletes, but also other big shots. Yesterday I was walking backwards on the treadmill (an activity that seems to have no stress on my knee) while watching Ted Ligety speed squat what looked like three times his body weight. I also got to watch Lindsey Vonn, an incredible alpine skier, bust out various weight training exercises. It’s funny how you make out these ski heroes to be these supernatural people- but then you train alongside or with them and they are normal humans. It sure has a way of firing you up!/divdivbr //divdiva onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_l4L_01UOs1s/TBvKIwfNtuI/AAAAAAAAAU4/PFdZWz2c_V0/s1600/So+Mir+6.jpg”img src=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_l4L_01UOs1s/TBvKIwfNtuI/AAAAAAAAAU4/PFdZWz2c_V0/s320/So+Mir+6.jpg” border=”0″ alt=”” id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484199223057299170″ style=”display: block; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: auto; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: auto; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 212px; height: 320px; ” //a/divdivdiv style=”text-align: center;”span class=”Apple-style-span” style=”font-weight: bold;”Me, Sophie Caldwell and Kate Dolan on an OD workout./span/divdiv style=”text-align: center;”span class=”Apple-style-span” style=”font-weight: bold;”br //span/divdivThe goal for this camp has been to “Improve our STRIKE rate”, so it has remained very focused the entire time. Most days we have hit the pavement or the trails at 8:30, training for a couple hours before returning home for some down time, and then heading out again for an afternoon workout. After getting some dinner in, we return to the “Center of Excellence” for a meeting focused on various aspects of being a ski racer. These meetings have included talks from top athletes like Andy Newell, US Ski team nutritionists, Video Review, Relaxation and Visualization, World Cup Video Reviews, and Pipeline talks. /divdivbr //divdiva onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_l4L_01UOs1s/TBvJm5VLTJI/AAAAAAAAAUg/YtK9r7kIfiY/s1600/ntg+10.jpg”img src=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_l4L_01UOs1s/TBvJm5VLTJI/AAAAAAAAAUg/YtK9r7kIfiY/s320/ntg+10.jpg” border=”0″ alt=”” id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484198641315564690″ style=”display: block; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: auto; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: auto; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 214px; ” //a/divdiv style=”text-align: center;”span class=”Apple-style-span” style=”font-weight: bold;”Working on striding with the coaches./span/divdiv style=”text-align: center;”span class=”Apple-style-span” style=”font-weight: bold;”br //span/divdivIn the ten days we have hit almost all angles of training. The camp started out with an uphill running time trail and then was followed four days later with a sprint race simulation. I have been struggling with knee issues so I had to replace all the running workouts with swimming. I used to be a racer during my younger years… but the long break has made me realize how hard of work it is. It is a great way to increase your upper body strength for sure! The rest of the workouts have either been distance, speed, strength or interval work. This morning I finally felt the fatigue catching up to me when we did a level three interval workout, 3x14mins around a loop in town. One more strength workout and then a distance workout in the morning before I head home to Washington for a couple of days./divdivbr //divdivbr //divdiva onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_l4L_01UOs1s/TBvKDcaYeiI/AAAAAAAAAUw/6MXLlX_VE1s/s1600/ntg2.jpg”img src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_l4L_01UOs1s/TBvKDcaYeiI/AAAAAAAAAUw/6MXLlX_VE1s/s320/ntg2.jpg” border=”0″ alt=”” id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484199131768977954″ style=”display: block; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: auto; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: auto; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 185px; ” //a/divdiv style=”text-align: center;”span class=”Apple-style-span” style=”font-weight: bold;”Sophie and I/span/divdiv style=”text-align: center;”span class=”Apple-style-span” style=”font-weight: bold;”br //span/divdivThe weather has greatly improved over the course of the camp. The first couple of days were rainy and cold, so we have gotten overly excited about the sun coming out these past couple of days. Yesterday, on our afternoon off, we decided to lie by the pool for no more than an hour and came home a little more sunburnt than expected. Turns out you get burned, even when its cold out 🙂 I am trying to soak up every last bit of sun and heat before I move up to Alaska next week./divdivbr //divdiva onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_l4L_01UOs1s/TBvJTFJzswI/AAAAAAAAAUY/CgX8hMANpb4/s1600/IMG_3790.JPG”img src=”http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_l4L_01UOs1s/TBvJTFJzswI/AAAAAAAAAUY/CgX8hMANpb4/s320/IMG_3790.JPG” border=”0″ alt=”” id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5484198300891722498″ style=”display: block; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: auto; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: auto; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 207px; ” //a/divdiv style=”text-align: center;”span class=”Apple-style-span” style=”font-weight: bold;”Sophie, me and Alexa resembling tomatoes./span/divdiv style=”text-align: center;”span class=”Apple-style-span” style=”font-weight: bold;”br //span/divdivAnother update will come as I get everything together for my drive up to AK next week. Until then…. keep the sun shining!/div/div/divdiv class=”blogger-post-footer”img width=’1′ height=’1′ src=’https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2018521813175454198-6617203125087307593?l=sadiebjornsen.blogspot.com’ alt=” //div

Nat Herz wrote an interesting article today on FasterSkier.com about different ski companies’ policies regarding sponsoring athletes who’ve been caught doping in the past.  I thought this post might make an interesting companion to Nat’s article.

This post is going to look at race results data for skiers who’ve been caught doping.  I need to be clear right up front that looking for statistical evidence of doping (at least, in their race results) is not going to be a very fruitful exercise.  I mean, you’re sure to find some stuff that looks suspicious, but you’re also going to find plenty of stuff that decidedly is not suspicious.  Skier’s race results are just too variable to be much use in this regard.  Some people make big jumps during the offseason because, they, you know, trained a lot!

But data is data, so let’s take a look anyway.  I tracked down all the “official” dopers in cross country skiing that I could find (and had race results for).  We’re going to look at their distance results from every race I have in three groups: skiers with too little data to be interesting at all, skiers with a ton of data but nothing really “suspicious” stands out, and skiers with somewhat “suspicious” occurrences.

First the skiers with very little data:

Meh.  Like I said, not much to see here.  I guess we could make fun of people for cheating and still not managing to break 50 FIS points, but I suppose dopers are people too.  Don’t want to hurt their feelings.

Here’s a considerably larger group of skiers, with many more races on record, where I can’t see anything particularly “suspicious” going on (click through for a larger version):

Some fast people, some slower people.  Obviously, I’m missing some of the data for several of the older skiers for the earlier parts of their careers.  Before you start going too far down the “oh, but look at how unusually consistent many of these skiers are” path, I could show you a dozen other skiers that look similar but are definitely not dopers (Kristen Skjeldal, for instance).  Still, I find Larissa Lazutina’s pathological reluctance to ski slower than 50 FIS points eery.

Ok, here’s the “fun” part:

I’ve highlighted the regions that seem at least sort of suspicious to me.  Muehlegg is an obvious case, of course.  Spain was very good to him.  Then we’ve got several Finns (I think I misspelled Saari’s name: Jauho?) all implicated in 2001.  For Harri Kirvesniemi, I really wish I had the data for his entire career, which was really, really long.  He seemed to be tailing off slowly during the 90′s and then suddenly got fast again.  The rest of them just became significantly faster in the space of one offseason.

Again, I will remind you that I could totally find examples of skiers recording big jumps over one offseason that aren’t doping.  Heck, I wrote two posts about it earlier this week.  And I could only find something somewhat suspicious in 6 of the 27 athletes I looked at.  Still, it’s interesting data to look at…

Next up in my series of skier retirements is the Swedish sprinter Anna Olsson (prior to marrying teammate Johan Olsson in 2008 she competed using her maiden name, Dahlberg).

Compared to the other skiers I’ve profiled, Olsson’s career was relatively short, stretching from 2001 to the present.  Also, as I’ve sort of given away in the intro, she was primarily a sprinter.  Olsson won the Gold medal in the team sprint event at the 2006 Turin Olympic Games.  Additionally, she reached the podium 13 times in World Cup races, all in individual sprint events.  This included two victories, once in 2006 and once near the end of this past season in 2010.

But since I’ve established a sort of pattern in these posts, let’s look at her distance results first:

Anna Olsson's (Dahlberg) distance results.

Notice the scale on the left hand side only goes down to 20 FIS points or so.  Like I mentioned above, Olsson was primarily a sprinter, but these distance results aren’t too shabby either.  As you can see, there’s a healthy mix of non-World Cup events here (CC= Continental Cup, FIS=General FIS race, NC= National Championships)

Olsson, as I mentioned, got married in 2008 and you’ll notice there aren’t any races for that season.  I’m not sure if she took a full year off or not.  She did do a few (but only a few) sprint races that season, so perhaps she had some issues with illness or injury, or maybe she just took some time off after getting married.  2004 was probably her best year for distance racing, though she did have a sub-20 point race in each of the past two seasons.  The three sub-20 points races you see here in 2003 and 2009 resulted in an 8th, 9th and 11th place finish (in that order, chronologically).  So while Olsson was probably a stronger sprinter (as we’ll see in a second) she wasn’t exactly a terrible distance skier.

Let’s see if there was a difference in her skating versus classic skiing:

Anna Olsson's (Dahlberg) distance results by technique.

The trend lines make the difference in favor of classic skiing look fairly slim, but it’s hard to ignore the large proportion of her best results in 2002-2004 that were classic races.  (Again, FC refers to pursuit races, where the athletes use both techniques in the course of a single race.)

Being a sprint specialist, we might expect Olsson to have a preference for shorter distance races.  Let’s see if the data support that…

Anna Olsson's (Dahlberg) distance results by race length.

I don’t see much of a pattern there, so I’d call this one Busted, as they say.  I mean, she didn’t exactly excel at 30k’s but I don’t think that’s enough of a different to see a preference for shorter races.

Ok, with her weaker side out of the way, let’s take a look at her strong suit, sprinting:

Anna Olsson's (Dahlberg) sprint results.

Now that’s a lot of top-five finishes (or better) over the course of 5-6 seasons.  Sadly, she never really put a good one together at the Olympics.  The closest she came was in her final season, finishing fourth this past year in Vancouver.  Still, that’s an impressive collection of results in World Cup sprint racing.

Can we see a technique preference in her sprint racing?

Anna Olsson's (Dahlberg) sprint results by technique. y-axis label should be Rank not FIS points.

That looks pretty even to me, at least over the course of her career.  She had a stretch from 2006-2008 where she seemed to have better luck skating, but then reversed that trend in 2009 and 2010.

This is just for fun, but I stumbled across it while double checking some stuff about Olsson on the web.  It’s a video of Olsson’s quarterfinal heat at the Vancouver pre-Olympic World Cup this past season.  Sadly, Olsson had a bit of a mishap (breaking a pole in a distance race is recoverable, but sprints are so short that it usually means you’re done).  The real fun, though, begins when a coach tries to get her a replacement pole.

Could have been worse, I suppose, he could have slid right into her.

Alright, that’s a wrap for Anna Olsson!  So long!

img src=”http://30.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l47msoajox1qzt3xbo1_500.jpg”/br/br/pSometimes…in the middle of June…it’s good to just plug the iron in, just to get a whiff of six months in the future./p

Now for the women who had rough seasons in 09-10.  Once again,  a quick reminder, we’re looking at changes in the average FIS points of a skier’s best five (distance) races between just these two seasons.

Below is the top ten table:

Ten biggest drop-offs in women’s distance events from 08-09 to 09-10.

Our winner, French skier Coraline Hugue had some promising seasons in 07-08 and 08-09, but then had some really terrible races in 09-10 it looks like.  Perusing her website, it appears she’s had some injury problems lately, so here’s hoping she can bounce back.

On the other hand, Tatjana Mannima (EST) appears to have had a series of increasingly bad seasons of late.  Many of the other skiers on this list are seasoned veterans who are presumably near (or in Sara Renner’s case, at) the end of their careers.  Kuitunen is a notable example here, going from dominating the World Cup in 08-09 (and earlier) to, well, not so dominating.  Rajdlova, Muranen, Kuenzel-Nystad and Renner are all verteran World Cup racers experiencing some measure of decline.  Renner, I believe, just retired.

The other skiers aren’t particularly new, rather I’d say they are all mostly mid-career, but heading in the wrong direction (at least lately).  Daria (does she prefer Dasha?) Gaiazova is a curious addition to this list.  Technically, she had more bad races in 09-10 than in the previous season, which shows up as a net loss for her, but if you look at all her races, her top result each season has been steadily improving.

You can pore over the details yourself in the graph below showing each racer’s results (click through for a larger version):

Note that since I dropped that very bizarre Tour de Ski 10k classic mass start race in the “most improved” post, I also omitted it here.  That is, I omitted it from this last graph; the “most unimproved” list was calculated including that race, it just didn’t end up helping any of these ladies much overall.

As before, there’s a fair bit of variation in how we can see a skier regressing from one season to the next.  Sometimes their best five races move backwards across the board (e.g. Hugue, Muranen), sometimes a skier has one or two good results but most of the rest of quite a bit slower.

img src=”http://27.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l45wxswdPx1qzt3xbo1_500.jpg”/br/br/

a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrNg_2ckKI/AAAAAAAAC-E/oK0vgd6WWng/s1600/IMG_4607.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrNg_2ckKI/AAAAAAAAC-E/oK0vgd6WWng/s400/IMG_4607.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5483921463056306338″ //aWe had our first skate intensity workout today and while there was a little rust, the group looked good. We started with some slalom and technique drills and then everyone did 2x4km of threshold intervals. We will do this workout 3-4 more times over the summer and we hope to see steady improvement.br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrMOPem5sI/AAAAAAAAC98/D-3mzdTaoFI/s1600/IMG_4609.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrMOPem5sI/AAAAAAAAC98/D-3mzdTaoFI/s400/IMG_4609.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5483920041322145474″ //abr /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrKtjH1RDI/AAAAAAAAC90/gwgBth40RBc/s1600/IMG_4610.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrKtjH1RDI/AAAAAAAAC90/gwgBth40RBc/s400/IMG_4610.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5483918380148016178″ //abr /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrIxLnYNRI/AAAAAAAAC9s/ae10HDn8DuI/s1600/IMG_4620.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrIxLnYNRI/AAAAAAAAC9s/ae10HDn8DuI/s400/IMG_4620.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5483916243534099730″ //aBridger working on some no pole skating.br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrGx9JeZjI/AAAAAAAAC9k/azMhYoKkd9U/s1600/IMG_4628.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrGx9JeZjI/AAAAAAAAC9k/azMhYoKkd9U/s400/IMG_4628.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5483914057807193650″ //aFritz crests the hill in his first 4 km interval.br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrEmQ9RLYI/AAAAAAAAC9c/2uuw-PDLL9k/s1600/IMG_4640.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 267px;” src=”http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrEmQ9RLYI/AAAAAAAAC9c/2uuw-PDLL9k/s400/IMG_4640.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5483911657943018882″ //aWe ended the workout with some leg speeds and then more technique drills.br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrD3Nex4DI/AAAAAAAAC9U/lvGrCXI9-IM/s1600/IMG_4647.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 219px;” src=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBrD3Nex4DI/AAAAAAAAC9U/lvGrCXI9-IM/s400/IMG_4647.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5483910849555980338″ //abr /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBpGjGONVZI/AAAAAAAAC9E/NqbqUcfwGzs/s1600/IMG_4653.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBpGjGONVZI/AAAAAAAAC9E/NqbqUcfwGzs/s400/IMG_4653.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5483773065056572818″ //aGotta love the Power Bars at the end of the workout!br /a onblur=”try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}” href=”http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBpCZOdEAFI/AAAAAAAAC88/ULUiIlx2RLw/s1600/IMG_4648.JPG”img style=”display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;” src=”http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_H2SCM3lmKm8/TBpCZOdEAFI/AAAAAAAAC88/ULUiIlx2RLw/s400/IMG_4648.JPG” border=”0″ alt=””id=”BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5483768497421156434″ //adiv class=”blogger-post-footer”img width=’1′ height=’1′ src=’https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/4680416899705879324-2706506516146200230?l=smsxc.blogspot.com’ alt=” //div