From the FasterSkier archive — posts syndicated from athletes’ and coaches’ own blogs between 2004 and 2012, kept online as published. Current coverage is at fasterskier.com.
The silver-medal winning Russian men’s relay team at the 2014 Olympics. Alexander Bessmertnykh, Maxim Vyegzhanin, and Alexander Legkov were disqualified for doping, but just had their bans overturned by the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) has overturned doping bans assigned to eight cross-country skiers based on investigations into manipulation of the anti-doping process at the 2014 Winter Olympics.
“In 28 cases, the evidence collected was found to be insufficient to establish that an anti-doping rule violation (ADRV) was committed by the athletes concerned,” CAS wrote in a press release. “With respect to these 28 athletes, the appeals are upheld, the sanctions annulled and their individual results achieved in Sochi 2014 are reinstated.”
The athletes whose results will be reinstated are:
50 k gold medalist and relay silver medalist Alexander Legkov
50 k silver medalist, team sprint and relay silver medalist Maxim Vylegzhanin, also fourth in the 30 k skiathlon
relay silver medalist Alexander Bessmertnykh, also seventh in the 15 k classic
Evgeny Belov, 19th in the 30 k skiathlon and 25th in the 15 k classic
team sprint silver medalist Nikita Kriukov, also 13th in the men’s sprint
Alexei Petukhov, eighth in the men’s sprint
Evgenia Shapovalova, 28th in the women’s sprint
Natalia Matveeva, 20th in the women’s sprint
The disqualifications of skiers Julia Ivanova, Yulia Tchekaleva, and Anastasia Dotsenko were upheld, although CAS held that instead of being banned from the Olympics for life, the three women were merely banned from the 2018 Games.
The cases of biathletes Olga Zaitseva, Olga Vilukhina, and Yana Romanova have not yet been handled.
The eight athletes whose disqualifications were overturned had not been invited to the 2018 Olympics, and many other Russian athletes who had not been convicted of doping offenses also did not meet the IOC’s requirements of proof of being clean either. Thus, it is doubtful whether the CAS appeals will affect the Olympic rosters.
CAS did not release any information about how the arbitration panel came to its decision.
“Although the operative part of the decision is issued, the principle of confidentiality of the procedure still applies,” Legkov’s lawyer, Christof Wieschemann, wrote in a statement emailed to the media. “I assume that all parties involved will respect this. The panel has to decide in its judgment what details of the proceedings becomes subject of the reasoning of the decision and therefore will also become public. We will wait for the reasoned decisions.”
The evidence in the McLaren report showed, for instance, that anti-doping sample bottles belonging to Legkov, Vylegzhanin, Shapovalova, and Petukhov, among others, showed marks consistent with having been tampered with. A sample belonging to Vylegzhanin also showed discrepancies in the reported specific gravity.
There was no explanation offered as to why this evidence is not valid in proving an anti-doping rule violation.
Likewise, CAS offered no explanation as to why this testimony was not sufficient to prove an anti-doping rule violation.
“Dr. Rodchenkov testified fully and credibly at CAS,” Rodchenkov’s lawyer, Jim Walden, wrote in a statement. “His truth has been verified by forensic evidence, other whistleblowers, and, more recently, recovery of the Moscow lab’s secret database, showing thousands of dirty tests that were covered up. The panel’s unfortunate decision provides a very small measure of punishment for some athletes but a complete ‘get out of jail free’ card for most. Thus, the CAS decision only emboldens cheaters, makes it harder for clean athletes to win, and provides yet another ill-gotten gain for the corrupt Russian doping system generally, and Putin specifically.”
The women’s podium for the first race of the 2017/2018 World Cup season, the Ruka classic sprint in Kuusamo, Finland, with (from right to left) American Sadie Bjornsen in second, Sweden’s Stina Nilsson in first, and Russia’s Yulia Belorukova in third. (Photo: U.S. Ski Team/Twitter)
On Friday in Kuusamo, Finland, the 2017/2018 Cross Country World Cup began with the first day of racing in what’s called the Ruka Triple — a three-day event featuring a 1.4-kilometer classic sprint, 10 and 15 k classic races on Day 2, and 10/15 k freestyle pursuits on Sunday.
For many, considering how multifaceted the U.S. Ski Team (USST) women are, and how five to six of them are podium threats, the biggest step up today was USST member Sadie Bjornsen’s leap onto the podium’s No. 2 spot.
“What an amazing and exciting way to start this new season,” Bjornsen wrote in a post-race email. “I have been feeling good for the past few weeks, but as always at the beginning of the season, you wonder where you are. Starting with the qualifier, I had great feelings. I love this course, because it is so tough all the way to the finish line, and you don’t have many places to recover throughout the course. I also love how steep the climb is, it is a grade that I have always enjoyed!”
For Bjornsen, who turned 28 on Tuesday, it was her first-career World Cup individual sprint podium. (On the World Cup, she’s placed third in a 5 k freestyle, second in a team sprint, and with the 4 x 5 k relay, second and third place twice. At last year’s World Championships, Bjornsen also teamed up with Jessie Diggins to finish third in the classic team sprint.)
On Friday, the Alaska Pacific University (APU) skier’s cylinders were firing from the moment she tipped the wand in the qualifier. Bjornsen qualified in fifth, sprinting around the course in 3:13.67 minutes. Sweden’s Ida Ingemarsdotter was the day’s fastest qualifier in 3:11:69 minutes, 1.98 seconds faster.
After her qualifier, Bjornsen continued to rise to the top, winning both her quarterfinal and semifinal. On a course with a steep but strideable final climb near the finish, she controlled each heat. She won her quarterfinal in 3:18.14 minutes over Russian runner-up Yulia Belorukova (+0.39) and Sweden’s Hanna Falk in third(+1.97).
“The general tone of the day was a fast start so that Sadie was in control in the front half of her heat,” U.S. Ski Team Women’s Coach Matt Whitcomb said on the phone. “In particular in the semifinal, she was able to have a fast start and shut the race down a little bit and pick it up when she was ready.”
Her ability to acquire the lead, command the pace, essentially set the first semifinal’s tone, allowed her to also keep other skiers in the turbulence of her wake by the slimmest of margins.
She won the semi in 3:20 flat. Again, Belorukova was second, this time just one-hundredth of a second back. Another Russian, Evgenia Shapovalova* was third (+0.39), and U.S. teammate Sophie Caldwell finished fourth (+0.50) in that semifinal.
Nilsson’s Moment
The final was where Bjornsen finally met her match in Swedish speedster Stina Nilsson.
Nilsson qualified 19th, 8.15 seconds behind her teammate Ingemarsdotter — nothing stunning by her standards, but a safe margin with which she could enter the heats and then take control like she’s been known to. She won the fifth quarterfinal with the fastest time of all the quarterfinal heats in 3:14.38.
Nilsson then dominated the second semifinal with a time of 3:17.61. That semi was nearly 2.5 seconds faster than Bjornsen’s winning semifinal time, and both lucky losers advanced from Nilsson’s heat. Those beneficiaries were Ingemarsdotter in third and Finland’s Krista Parmakoski in fourth.
Sweden’s Stina Nilsson lunges for first place as Sadie Bjornsen (USST) places second on Friday’s classic sprint on Day 1 of the 2017 Ruka Triple World Cup in Kuusamo, Finland. (Screenshot: Eurosport)
As much as Nilsson may have played a poker hand while qualifying, this much was clear: once into the knockout rounds, she’d leave nothing up for chance. Nilsson won the final in 3:17.62. Bjornsen placed second by 0.24 seconds. Russia’s Belorukova was third (+0.91), Ingemarsdotter fourth (+2.72), Norway’s Kathrine Rolsted Harsem fifth (+3.54), and Parmakoski sixth (+18.62).
The win marks Nilsson’s 19th career World Cup sprint podium and her 10th sprint victory. She won the classic sprint in Kuusamo last year and placed second there in 2015. She also finished last season in second in the 2016/2017 Sprint World Cup standings and fourth in the overall World Cup.
Friday’s classic sprint was a bit unusual from the get-go. The qualifier revealed a big void compared to recent seasons’ results. Only two Norwegians, Harsem and Anna Svendsen, skied into the top 30 and moved onto the rounds. Last season’s Sprint World Cup Overall champ, Maiken Caspersen Falla, missed qualifying by 0.32 seconds in 31st.
Whitcomb commented on the waxing struggles some skiers had out on course. He paraphrased a quote he heard from fellow American Anne Hart, who now races for the Stratton Mountain School (SMS) Elite Team, in 2010 to describe a common waxing puzzle.
“It’s always challenging on this course to find the right balance — as Annie Hart would say — the kick-to-glide ratio,” Whitcomb said. “But the kick-to-glide ratio is the key here in Ruka, and I think perhaps what happened with Norway. We will have to see what is said in the press by them and what we find out from our peers, I think they just went for more glide today, and some ended up struggling on the climbs. … It was noticeable. They had women that were herringboning up the entire final climb and most of the field was striding right up it. It’s a little bit of a trap — easy kicking snow and you are strong as a skier and a nation. It can be easy to perhaps try to go for speed. We have done it here before as well. Sometimes it works.”
On the right side of that kick-to-glide ratio was USST member Sophie Caldwell. She smoked the qualifier, placing third, 0.59 seconds behind Ingemarsdotter.
“The first race of the season is always a little funny because you don’t know what to expect,” Caldwell said on the phone. “But I have been doing good, smart training this year where I wasn’t pushing things too much and just doing what I knew worked, and I was feeling good going into it, but I have also never been able to have a great race in Kuusamo before. I think I’ve qualified twice, and both times I just sort of snuck into the top 30 in qualifying. But going into today I just sort of looked at it as a new day, and it was kind of a fun situation because there was no pressure, I have never done great here before.”
After her top-three qualifying result, Caldwell’s day way up north in Finland progressed smoothly. She chose Heat 2 in the quarterfinals, which turned out to be a quick heat and produced both lucky losers that would advance to the semis.
“I led out of the start and into the first downhill and then generally after that first downhill, places switch up a lot because there is a big draft, and so I think I got passed by a couple of people,” she said of her quarterfinal. “And then [Sweden’s Charlotte] Kalla sort of sent it from there, and I actually got in a little jumble at the low point of the course after dropping down the big hill. Maybe I was back in fourth or something, and then just tried to stay relaxed and ski well up that first hill. But she led it pretty much from that low point to the finish, I think, and she looked really good. After that heat I was like, ‘That’s proof right there that you don’t really need to be leading out of the start, because so much can change.’ ”
Kalla won the heat in 3:15.93, while Caldwell also automatically advanced to the semifinals in second (+0.70).
Caldwell skied in the first semifinal along with Bjornsen. Caldwell, of the SMS Elite Team in Vermont, let others lead out, understanding that an early burst of speed might not have a big payout.
“And at some point … it was funny because I was expecting Kalla to sort of hammer out from the start again and having it be another really fast, hard heat, but once we got to the bottom of the big hill I didn’t really see her again,” Caldwell recalled. “So it was just the two Russian women, Sades [Sadie] and me heading up the big hill. And I think Sadie and one of the Russians were a little ahead, and then we started filing behind them.”
After all the tactics and jousting, it came down to a lunge-fest at the line, and Caldwell just missed advancing. Caldwell placed fourth in a semi where the top-four places were separated by half a second. She was two spots away from advancing to the final and ended up eighth overall.
A third U.S. Ski Team member, Ida Sargent also began the season with a standout performance. Ruka has been kind to Sargent. Historically, she’s able to begin the season in Ruka with head-turning results. In 2014, Sargent she placed fifth in the Ruka classic sprint. In 2015, she placed seventh in the season-opening classic sprint. Last year she was 23rd, also in the classic sprint.
On Friday, Sargent qualified 22nd (+8.70).
“I was really nervous and excited for this race,” Sargent wrote in an email. “I really love this course and have been feeling great in training lately with a very solid prep period but the first race of the year can be a little nerve racking. Most other teams have already raced a couple weekends and this was our first time putting a bib on! The qualifier was solid for me but nothing special but I was psyched to get it over with and I felt a lot more relaxed going into the heats.”
Sargent skied in the third quarterfinal which included Swedes Anna Haag and Ingemarsdotter. On a day when skiers contended with snowfall and wind, keeping one’s line and maintaining speed in the fast tracks were paramount.
“The quarterfinal was playing out exactly as I was hoping for but then I ran into some bad luck in the finishing lanes with a track that was full of snow so I’m actually pretty disappointed with the result,” Sargent wrote. “ I felt like I had the skis and the body to do better today so I was bummed to be out after the quarters.”
Sargent explained she felt great in her quarterfinal and had the physical ability to keep pace. She maintained a reserved start, but soon moved into second place. On the final climb, she felt as if she could make a move.
“Ida [Ingemarsdotter] and I led over the top of that hill but then I was getting pushed to the outside on the final corner and then only had the far right track open into the finish because Ida was in the next one over,” she wrote. “Unfortunately everyone was skiing up the two middle tracks and since it was windy and snowing, the outside tracks were full of snow and super slow. I was having to plow my own track so I tried jumping in behind Ida hoping she would have a fast finish and I could get second behind her. But she wasn’t making much time and Anna Haag was coming up on the other inside track so I was totally trapped. I switched back to that outside lane hoping I could make up some time but it was a lot slower. It’s a huge bummer that there were really only two finishing tracks and just some serious bad luck to be in a different one. But I had great energy today and we had really good skis so I think its a good takeaway to be in a good place at the start of the season and there is lots of racing ahead!”
Sargent placed third in the heat, 0.65 seconds out of first and 0.43 seconds out of second place. She finished the day in 15th overall.
Rosie Brennan, a USST member known for her distance racing, finished 29th overall after qualifying in 26th. She skied in the fifth heat in which Nilsson set a blistering pace. Brennan placed sixth in her quarterfinal, 4.3 seconds behind Nilsson.
“My heat ended up being very fast, but also tight,” Breanna wrote in an email to FasterSkier. “My tactics are severely lacking as I have skied maybe 3 heats in the last three years so I was happy with my skiing, but not so happy with my group tactics. It certainly left me hungry for more opportunities to ski heats.”
Brennan went onto explain that she had developed her sprinting as part of her larger goal of performing at a high standard in tours.
“The biggest reason I wanted to work so hard on my sprinting this summer was for tours,” Brennan wrote. “I love tours, but I feel it is hard to be competitive if you can’t qualify for the heats so I’m thrilled to have done that for the first tour of the season. I am looking forward to getting some distance racing started.”
Outside the top 30 necessary to qualify for the heats were USST standouts Jessie Diggins and Kikkan Randall. Diggins skied to 34th overall (12.51 seconds behind Ingemarsdotter and 2.45 seconds out of qualifying), while Randall placed 36th (+13.92; +3.86). Other U.S. starters were Julia Kern (USST), who finished 57th, Liz Stephen (USST) in 70th and last season’s overall SuperTour winner Chelsea Holmes (APU) in 86th.
Whitcomb did comment that the team made use of its new waxing bus for the first time at a race on Friday. And although some skiers had dynamite skis, others may have had less-than-desirable race skis.
“It is the first race we have operated out of the truck,” Whitcomb said. “It was great. But I don’t think all the athletes had great skis. And that is more of a product that it is early season, techs working with athletes, us functioning as a team. It is just straight-up getting the wax up is hard to start with. In terms of the function of the truck, we had power all day, the place never filled with smoke. We had space, light was good, and we had athletes that had skis that were good enough to win races.”
Canada started three women, none of which qualified. Dahria Beatty (National U25 Team) placed 64th, Emily Nishikawa (World Cup Team) 74th, and Cendrine Browne (National U25 Team) 87th.
Heading into Day 2 of the Ruka Triple, Bjornsen leads the mini-tour standings by 2 seconds over Ingemarsdotter. Saturday holds a 10 k classic individual start for the women.
The women’s podium for the first race of the 2017/2018 World Cup season, the Ruka classic sprint in Kuusamo, Finland, with (from right to left) American Sadie Bjornsen in second, Sweden’s Stina Nilsson in first, and Russia’s Yulia Belorukova in third. (Photo: U.S. Ski Team/Twitter)
FIS Cross Country World Cup (Kuusamo, Finland): Classic sprints
In the first race of the 2017/2018 cross-country World Cup season, U.S. Ski Team (USST) member Sadie Bjornsen, who turned 28 on Tuesday, raced to the best result of her career, placing second to Sweden’s Stina Nilsson in Friday’s classic sprint in Kuusamo, Finland.
Last season, Bjornsen notched her first World Cup podium in third place in the 5-kilometer freestyle in Toblach, Italy, and teamed up with USST teammate Jessie Diggins to take third in the 2017World Championships classic team sprint. Friday’s 1.4-kilometer classic sprint — the first race of the Ruka Triple mini tour to kick of the 2017/2018 World Cup season — was Bjornsen’s first race of the season. She did not participate in any preseason International Ski Federation (FIS) races.
Bjornsen started out the day by clocking the fifth-fastest time in the qualifier, 1.98 seconds behind Sweden’s Ida Ingemarsdotter, who won the qualifier in 3:11.69 minutes. Bjornsen’s USST teammate Sophie Caldwell qualified third (+0.59) after another Swede, Hanna Falk in second (+0.19), and a total of four American women finished in the top 30 to qualify for the heats. Ida Sargent finished 22nd (+8.70) and Rosie Brennan was 26th (+9.51) to reach the quarterfinals.
There, Bjornsen won her quarterfinal by 0.39 seconds over Russia’s Yulia Belorukova. Caldwell also advanced to the semifinals by placing second in her quarterfinal, 0.7 seconds behind Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla in first.
Sargent finished third in her quarterfinal, 0.65 seconds behind the winner of that heat, Sweden’s Anna Haag. Brennan placed sixth in her quarterfinal, 4.3 seconds behind Sweden’s Nilsson in first. Neither Sargent nor Brennan advanced to the semifinals.
In the semifinals, Bjornsen again raced to first, and once again held off Belorukova — this time by just one-hundredth of a second. Caldwell followed in fourth in that semifinal, 0.5 seconds behind Bjornsen in first and 0.11 seconds behind Russia’s Evgenia Shapovalova in third (+0.39). Neither Caldwell nor Shapovalova advanced to the final.
In the final, Nilsson took the overall win in 3:17.62 and Bjornsen captured a career best in second place, 0.24 seconds out of first. Belorukova rounded out the podium in third (+0.91), while Ingemarsdotter placed fourth (+2.72), Norway’s Kathrine Rolsted Harsem was fifth (+3.54), and Finland’s Krista Parmakoski sixth (+18.62).
Overall, Caldwell placed eighth, Sargent 15th and Brennan 29th for the U.S. Diggins and Kikkan Randall missed out on qualifying in 34th and 36th, respectively. Julia Kern placed 57th, Liz Stephen 70th, and Chelsea Holmes 86th.
None of the Canadian women qualified, with Dahria Beatty in 64th, Emily Nishikawa in 74th and Cendrine Browne in 87th.
In the men’s 1.4 k classic sprint, Norway’s Johannes Høsflot Klæbo won out the day after winning the qualifier, quarterfinal and semifinal en route to another dominant performance in the final.
Klæbo started off by winning the qualifying round by 2.26 seconds in 2:46.53. Finland’s Anssi Pentsinen qualified second and another Finn, Ristomatti Hakola, qualified third (+2.35), ahead of Italy’s Federico Pellegrino in fourth (+2.66).
Cross Country Canada’s Alex Harvey was the top North American man in the qualifier, finishing 13th (+6.13), while Erik Bjornsen of the USST qualified in 26th (+8.71).
Both Harvey and Bjornsen finished fifth in their quarterfinals and did not reach the semifinals. Harvey ended up 21st on the day, after finishing 2.16 behind the winner of his heat, Finland’s Lauri Vuorinen. Bjornsen was 24th overall after finishing 5.12 seconds behind Klæbo, who won the first men’s quarterfinal.
Klæbo used the extra recovery time he had from racing an early quarterfinal to prime himself for another win in the semifinals, where he beat Sweden’s Calle Halfvarsson by 0.29 seconds. Another Norwegian, Pål Golberg, followed in third (+0.49), and Hakola placed fourth in that semi (+1.72). Both Golberg and Hakola had fast enough times to advance to the final, where they met Pellegrino — the winner of the second semifinal — and Norway’s Sondre Turvoll Fossli, who was second in the second semifinal (+0.1).
In the final, Klæbo once again won convincingly, this time by 1.35 seconds with a finishing time of 2:48.19. Golberg took second place and Halfvarsson reached the podium in third (+4.03), while Hakola placed fourth (+5.65), Pellegrino fifth (+8.87), and Fossli sixth (+17.31).
For the U.S., Andy Newell missed qualifying by 0.38 seconds in 34th and Simi Hamilton finished 60th. Scott Patterson was 84th, Paddy Caldwell was 103rd, and Noah Hoffman was 105th.
For Canada, Julien Locke, of the national U25 Team, finished 59th, Len Valjas was 63rd, Knute Johnsgaard 73rd, Devon Kershaw 74th, Graeme Killick 85th, and Jesse Cockney 95th. Last year’s NorAm winner Russell Kennedy did not start.
Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla racing to a win in her first race of the 2017/2018 season, the women’s 5 k freestyle in Gällivare, Sweden, on Friday. (Photo: Sporteventgallivare/Instagram)
Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla and Hanna Falk went 1-2 in Sweden’s season-opening International Ski Federation (FIS) race on Friday in Gällivare, with Kalla winning the women’s 5-kilometer freestyle by 8.8 seconds in 12:58.1 minutes. Falk, her teammate on the Swedish women’s team, placed second and Russia’s Yulia Belorukova took the third spot on the podium, 10.3 seconds out of first.
The host nation had three in the top four, with Ida Ingemarsdotter in fourth (+16.1). Switzerland’s Nathalie von Siebenthal finished fifth (+17.8), Russia’s Yulia Tchekaleva placed sixth (+23.4), and Russia’s Natalia Nepryaeva was seventh (+25.0).
Kikkan Randall of the U.S. Ski Team raced to eighth (+27.2), just ahead of Sweden’s Evelina Settlin in ninth (+32.0) and Russia’s Anna Nechaevskaya in 10th (+33.5). Japan’s Masako Ishida was just 0.3 seconds out of the top 10 in 11th.
In an email, Randall explained that she decided to venture to Europe earlier this year to get some racing in ahead of the World Cup.
“We also wanted a little extra time to let Breck adjust to the 10hr time change!” she wrote of her 1-year-old son, who will be traveling the World Cup circuit with Randall and her husband, Jeff Ellis, this winter.
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Most of the U.S. Ski Team arrived in Rovaniemi, Finland, on Thursday, Nov. 16 (with the exception of Andy Newell, who is racing this weekend in Beitostølen, Norway, with Noah Hoffman). The rest of her teammates planned to train at the Santasport Olympic training center in Rovaniemi until Nov. 21, when the entire team will meet up in Kuusamo (also known as Ruka), Finland — the site of next weekend’s World Cup opener.
“I’m happy with my start today,” Randall wrote of Friday’s race. “It took my a couple km’s to get going today but I felt like I was finding my rhythm in the 2nd half of the course. It’s my first hard session this week after the travel over so today was a good jolt! It was a competitive field and I was satisfied to be in the mix.”
Ninety-two women raced the Gällivare 5 k skate, compared to 56 women on Friday in Beitostølen (Norway’s FIS season-opener). Randall planned to race the 10 k classic on Saturday in Gällivare, then skip Sunday’s classic sprint.
“It’s great to be back around other World Cup skiers again and I’ve always liked Gällivare so it’s nice to be back here,” she wrote. “My former wax tech lives here and has been taking great care of us. … Looking forward to meeting up with the team in Ruka next week.”
With 46 Swedes and 23 Russians accounting for most of the women’s field, Canada’s Emily Nishikawa put herself in the mix in 26th, 54.9 seconds behind Kalla. Nishikawa’s Canadian World Cup teammate Dahria Beatty placed 56th (+1:38.3).
For Nishikawa, who’s known as a distance skier, the top-30 result was notable in that a 5 k falls somewhere between a sprint and a distance race.
“5km is such a hard distance, and it is over so fast, but it is a lot of fun,” Nishikawa wrote in an email. “I have been able to work on my sprinting a bit more this summer as I have been injury free, so I’m looking forward to seeing more speed in my racing this season.”
She planned to race all three days in Gällivare, including Sunday’s sprint.
“With these races, I am just hoping to fine tune my fitness and get some hard intensity in to feel sharp for the upcoming World Cup races,” added Nishikawa, who’s entering her fifth World Cup season as a leading member of the Canadian women’s World Cup Team. “Today’s race was a really hard effort and I am happy with how I skied today.”
In the men’s 10 k freestyle on Friday, another one of the Russians sanctioned by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Evgeniy Belov won in 23:08.5. He was 6.5 seconds faster than his Russian teammate Sergey Ustiugov, who placed second. Ustiugov is the defending Tour de Ski champion and Overall World Cup runner-up.
Switzerland’s Dario Cologna placed third, 7.6 seconds out of first, and Russia swept fourth through ninth, with Sweden’s Marcus Hellner following in 10th (+36.4). Out of the five actively competing skiers the IOC sanctioned earlier this month, all five raced on Friday in Gällivare, which was legal considering FIS had not ruled they can’t.
Four of those skiers are men. In addition to Belov, Maxim Vylegzhanin placed 14th (+43.2), Alexander Legkov followed in 15th (+45.9) and Alexey Petukhov finished 23rd (+56.7) out of 157 finishers on Friday.
Devon Kershaw (front) training with U.S. Ski Team sprinter Andy Newell in Sjusjøen, Norway, last week. (Photo: Noah Hoffman)
Ahead of them, Canada’s Devon Kershaw ended up 12th (+39.9), tying another Russian Artem Maltsev (who is not on the IOC-banned list) with identical times.
“My stance on the whole Russian fiasco is unchanged,” Kershaw wrote in an email, referring to a previous email he wrote to FasterSkier earlier this week when asked how he felt about the IOC-banned Russians competing in FIS events. “I find the entire thing both disturbing and hilarious. The fact that FIS is risking their credibility like this makes no sense to me. Apparently there will be an emergency meeting of sorts tomorrow about it (with FIS I’m assuming but I haven’t heard much about it) – so we’ll have to all wait and see what they come up with.
“As for seeing Belov win – I mean, that’s no surprise,” Kershaw continued. “He’s shown that he’s a force when he’s in form. But yeah, the fact that he and others have been recently banned for life by the IOC are winning races after that news came out just shows the Mickey Mouse club that our sport has become.”
As for his own race, Kershaw wrote that he felt great about it. The course suited him well without too much hard climbing. “… You kind of need to be pushing the whole way around. I really like courses like that,” he wrote.
The conditions, however, with about 10 to 15 centimeters of new snow from the early morning that continued into the race, made the course slower, which Kershaw found to be more challenging.
“But that is another reason why I am so satisfied with the effort today. Individual start skating in soft conditions? Not my favourite, so I’m happy how I was able to execute things,” he wrote. “For me to be in the mix in a 10km skate like that feels great. I had good energy all race and hit my technical goals for the race too, so I have to be satisfied.”
Kershaw and the rest of Canada’s Period 1 World Cup team arrived in Gällivare last Sunday. Over the last week, they’ve been testing equipment and getting into a race routine ahead of the World Cup opener, he explained.
“I changed various things with my training this year so it’s exciting to see how my body feels in the beginning of a new season,” Kershaw wrote. “… My goals are really to just be calm and execute well – which means going into the racing with no expectations other than to ski as technically well as possible while working on the whole pacing thing (which can be challenging at the beginning of the season when you don’t have that many races in the body). I’ll look to have another well executed race tomorrow and the results will be what they will be.”
Canada’s NorAm leader at the end of last season, Russell Kennedy (Team R.A.D.) was the next-best Canadian in 48th (+1:35.7), followed by Len Valjas (World Cup Team) in 49th (+1:37.0). Jack Carlyle (Alberta World Cup Academy) placed 67th (+2:07.2), Julien Locke (National U25 Team) was 72nd (+2:10.9), Graeme Killick (World Cup Team) 90th (+2:32.2), Brian McKeever (Para Nordic Team) 97th (+2:39.0), and Jess Cockney (World Cup Team) 119th (+3:10.7). Knute Johnsgaard (World Cup Team) did not start.
Racing continues in Gällivare this weekend with 10/15 k classic individual starts on Saturday followed by classic sprints on Sunday.
Russian team staff cheer on Maxim Vylegzhanin, the country’s anchor skier, in the 4 x 10 k relay at the 2014 Olympics in Sochi, Russia. Vylegzhanin has now become the second member of that silver-medal relay team to be disqualified for doping.
All four were identified in the McLaren Report, an independent investigation commissioned by the World Anti-Doping Agency to investigate reports from whistleblowers that Russia had systematically evaded the anti-doping process at the 2014 Olympics.
“The athletes have been disqualified for life from taking part in the Olympic Games,” Valbe said.
With Legkov’s disqualification, Russia had already lost a gold medal in the 50 k and a silver medal in the 4 x 10 k relay.
Vylegzhanin had finished second in the 50 k, but with him now disqualified as well, there could be a substantial medal re-allocation. Third-place Ilia Chernousov, also from Russia but not implicated the McLaren report, would stand to gain gold. Fourth-place Martin Johnsrud Sundby of Norway would take silver, and fifth-place Sergei Dolidovich of Belarus would earn bronze.
Vylegzhanin also won silver in the men’s team sprint with Nikita Kriukov. With that result invalidated, Sweden’s Emil Jönsson and Teodor Peterson will move from bronze to silver, and fourth-place Northug and Ola Vigen Hattestad would earn bronze.
Valbe said that the IOC Disciplinary Commission’s decision will be appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, so such medal reallocations are not yet finalized.
“It’s hard to choose words, but I’ll fight to the end — it’s a violation of all human rights,” Petukhov said, according to a translation.
Petukhov finished eighth in the skate sprint in Sochi; Shapovalova finished 28th. Ivanova was part of the sixth-place women’s relay and team sprint teams, both of which stand to be disqualified, and finished 17th in the 10 k classic and 30th in the 30 k skate.
The Canadian team of Perianne Jones and Dasha Gaiazova missed qualifying for team sprint finals as “lucky losers” by one spot. The Russian pair of Ivanova and Anastasia Dotsenko, however, did advance as lucky losers – meaning that if they had not been in the race, the Canadians would have been next in line for a spot in the finals.
Maxim Vylegzhanin competing in the 10 k classic in Falun, Sweden, in 2016. Vylegzhanin is provisionally suspended while the International Olympic Committee investigates possible doping infractions at the 2014 Olympics. (Photo: Fischer/NordicFocus)
In part of the media storm following the Court of Arbitration for Sport’s response to an appeal by six Russian cross-country skiers, Russian Ski Federation President Elena Valbe made a surprising assertion: that the athletes, who remain provisionally suspended by the International Ski Federation (FIS), are allowed to train with the national team.
This is not generally the case for athletes serving suspensions, but FIS Anti-Doping Coordinator Sarah Fussek confirmed the organization’s stance.
“You cannot really say it is a deviation [from the norm] because we have not had these [types of] facts on the table before,” she said in a phone interview on Friday. “This is a special case and it requires special handling.”
Are All Provisional Suspensions Created Equal?
FIS more often deals with cases which start with a positive drug test, or “adverse analytical finding”. A positive test results in a nearly-automatic suspension while the case proceeds – called a “mandatory provisional suspension”.
The cases of Alexander Legkov, Maxim Vylegzhanin, Alexey Petukhov, Julia Ivanova, and Evgenia Shapovalova arose via investigation started by journalists, continued by Richard McLaren on behalf of the World Anti-Doping Agency, and now being conducted by the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
“The investigation of the alleged anti-doping rule violations will be carried out by the IOC Disciplinary Commission, which has the results and case management authority for anti-doping at the Olympic Winter Games, whereby the provisional suspensions are imposed by FIS,” stated a FIS press release announcing the suspensions on Dec. 22, 2016.
In cases without a positive drug test, sports federations are allowed to implement an “optional provisional suspension”. This is what FIS put in place on the six Russian skiers, whose samples were allegedly tampered with at the 2014 Olympics.
Fussek said she awaited a written explanation from the FIS Anti-Doping Panel, which gave the recommendation to the athletes that they could train with their national team again. For privacy reasons and due to rules governing ongoing cases, FIS cannot not share documents which were provided to the athletes explaining such decisions.
However, Fussek understood that it was because of the optional nature of the provisional suspension that the athletes were being allowed to officially train again (all had been training on their own while serving their suspensions).
“As you know, we do not have an adverse analytical finding where a mandatory suspension would have been put in place,” Fussek said. “Presumably they have decided for that, because it was special circumstances… they would give them a special allowance to train. They have decided not to prohibit them to train in order to keep a balance between the provision of the suspension and the actual consequences. It is an ongoing case with special circumstances.”
Indeed, considerable time that has passed with no news or hearings from the IOC investigation. In the ruling from the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), the organization gave FIS until Oct. 31 to bring a formal case against the athletes, or else their suspensions will be lifted. At that point, they would have waited 10 months.
“The provisional suspension switches into a sanction in face of its duration and the ongoing investigations from which nobody knows how long they will last,” the lawyer for Legkov and Belov wrote in a press release. “The provisional suspension is no longer appropriate if the federation is not in the position to provide full proof that the athlete is guilty of an anti-doping rule violation within a reasonable time.”
FIS is in a strange position because it is waiting on the IOC commission and doesn’t necessarily have control over the time frame. But if allowing the athletes to train with the national team was FIS’s attempt to mitigate these special circumstances and the long wait, it does not appear to have a formal basis in anti-doping rules. There are no specific guidelines in the FIS Anti-Doping Rules or the World Anti-Doping Code specifying what is allowed of athletes under mandatory versus optional provisional suspensions, if indeed there is a difference.
Those rules only note the meaning of a provisional suspension more generally: “Provisional Suspension means the Athlete or other Person is barred temporarily from participating in any Competition or activity prior to the final decision at a hearing conducted under Article 8,” the 2016 FIS Anti-Doping Rules state at the top of page 61.
In prior rulings against the skiers, it was made clear that anything involving the national team was off-limits.
On Dec. 30, 2016, FIS denied an appeal by the skiers, who wanted to be reinstated in time for the Tour de Ski.
“As a result of the decision, all of the above mentioned athletes may not take part in any competitions or national team activities,” FIS wrote in their press release at the time.
And in a Jan. 25, 2017, press release confirming the decision to uphold the provisional suspensions of Alexander Legkov and Evgeny Belov, FIS again wrote, “as a result of the decisions, the above-mentioned athletes may not take part in any competitions or national team activities.”
So what constitutes “activities”? The 2017 International Standard for Testing and Investigations, published by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), defined “team activity” as “Sporting activities carried out by Athletes on a collective basis as part of a team (e.g., training, travelling, tactical sessions) or under the supervision of the team (e.g., treatment by a team doctor).”
However, that was in reference to whereabouts reporting, not to allowable activities under a suspension.
Unwittingly, A Trap?
The skiers may want to be wary of FIS’s allowance. One reason that an athlete’s treatment during a provisional suspension is important is because the time served in a provisional suspension is usually included in the period of their final suspension as well – credit for time served.
“If an Athlete or other Person voluntarily accepts a Provisional Suspension in writing from FIS and thereafter respects the Provisional Suspension, the Athlete or other Person shall receive a credit for such period of voluntary Provisional Suspension against any period of Ineligibility which may ultimately be imposed,” read the FIS Anti-Doping Rules (page 43).
And once an athlete is ineligible, they cannot participate in training or any other national team events.
“No Athlete or other Person who has been declared Ineligible may, during the period of Ineligibility, participate in any capacity in a Competition or activity (other than authorised anti-doping education or rehabilitation programs) authorised or organised by FIS or any National Ski Association or a club or other member organisation of FIS or any National Ski Association, or in Competitions authorised or organised by any professional league or any international or national level Event organisation or any elite or national-level sporting activity funded by a governmental agency,” the FIS Anti-Doping Rules state (page 44).
Below this rule, FIS goes out of its way to clarify even further what types of activities are not allowed during a period of ineligibility.
“For example… an Ineligible Athlete cannot participate in a training camp, exhibition or practice organised by his or her National Ski Association or a club which is a member of that National Ski Association or which is funded by a governmental agency… The term ‘activity’ also includes, for example, administrative activities, such as serving as an official, director, officer, employee, or volunteer of the organisation described in this Article. Ineligibility imposed in one sport shall also be recognised by other sports.”
Logically, time served under a provisional suspension should be counted in any final duration of ineligibility only if an athlete behaved the same way during their provisional suspension as they are required to during ineligibility.
The Russian skiers hope to be proven innocent, and act confident that they will be.
“The athletes will be free to participate in the competition season 2017/2018 and the World Cup 2017/2018 starting 24.11.2017 in Ruka if the ongoing investigations of Oswald Commission of IOC will not bring out new facts and new evidence beyond the facts published by Prof McLaren and if the athletes will not be definitely sanctioned based on such new facts,” Legkov and Belov’s lawyer wrote in their press release. “The defense has no reason to believe that the investigations will bring out such new facts.”
But if the skiers do face sanctions after their final hearings — it would no doubt devastate them if those suspensions started from the hearing date, not from Dec. 22, 2016, when they were very first provisionally suspended.
Russia’s Alexander Legkov leading into the ski exchange during the 50 k freestyle mass start at the 2014 Sochi Olympics. He went on to win gold. Legkov appeared this week in front of the Court of Arbitration for Sport to protest his provisional doping suspension by the International Ski Federation.
On Monday, Russian cross-country skiers appeared before the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) to protest their provisional suspension by the International Ski Federation (FIS).
“The hearings were held for five hours, during which we actively discussed all the legal and factual subtleties,” Christoph Wieschemann – the lawyer for Alexander Legkov and Evgeny Belov – told Russia’s TASS news agency, according to a translation. “I believe in the independence and impartiality of the judges. I’m not speaking of CAS as an institution, rather of the judges, who I consider to be highly qualified and fair. They asked many questions of me, and of the representative of FIS, and I believe that our position was more convincing. Therefore I believe in our success.”
Timeline and What’s Happened So Far
In late December, 2016, FIS suspended Legkov, Belov, Maxim Vylegzhanin, Alexei Petukhov, Julia Ivanova, and Evgenia Shapovalova. The suspensions were the result of details in the McLaren report, which indicated that the athletes’ anti-doping samples had been tampered with during the 2014 Olympics; based on this evidence, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) directed FIS to take action.
These manipulated sample vials were among 99 samples belonging to Russian skiers which were either identified by forensic experts as being tampered with, or which were discussed as being positive for prohibited substances in emails or other documents obtained by the investigators. FIS has yet to suspend any athletes for violations revealed in the McLaren report at non-Olympic events.
The provisional suspensions were just that – a temporary suspension while the cases were further investigated and until FIS convened a Doping Panel. The skiers immediately appealed to FIS, asking that they be allowed to continue competing while the case was investigated. A few days later, that appeal failed.
Next, the skiers appealed being suspended at all. On January 25, the FIS Doping Panel rejected the appeal and the skiers remained suspended.
The only avenue left for the skiers was to finally appeal their suspensions to CAS, a process which usually takes months. Ivanova has not appealed; the other five have (Vylegzhanin, Petukhov, and Shapovalova are represented by different lawyers than Belov and Vylegzhanin). As the arbitration drew on, they made an emergency appeal to CAS to try to gain entry to 2017 World Championships. Like when they initially appealed to FIS, they tried to argue that the evidence against them was weak and that they should be allowed to continue competing while the case was adjudicated. That appeal also failed.
On Monday, the Russians finally had their real hearing at CAS, an important step in the progress of the case. A decision can’t be expected for at least another month.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BUInQWSF_Qm/
In an Instagram post, Petukhov reported that Belov stayed at CAS for a remarkable 11 hours – through his own hearing with Legkov, and then also to listen in on the hearings for Petukhov, Vylegzhanin, and Shapovalova. “Our lawyers have worked perfectly,” he wrote, according to a translation.
The Arguments
The athletes maintain their innocence, and also question the process of the FIS/IOC investigation: in the months since December, their provisional suspensions have neither been lifted nor turned into a more final decision. It’s hard to tell whether there is progress on the cases.
They also question whether evidence of tampering is enough to result in a suspension. The samples did not test positive for any prohibited substances.
Investigations by the New York Times and other news outlets, besides the McLaren report, suggest that this is because the tampering was done to switch out “dirty” samples for clean ones – which would of course result in no positive tests. Although so-called “non-analytical positives”, where doping has been proven without a positive drug test, are becoming more and more common, the skiers assert that even if someone else had tampered with their samples it was not their fault and does not mean that they were in fact doping.
“We asked CAS representatives to issue the solution as soon as possible, even without a detailed explanation,” Christoph Wieschemann – the lawyer for Legkov and Belov – said in an interview with Russia’s Sport Express. “I hope this will speed up the process.During the hearings, we also emphasize that it is extremely important for athletes to get a decision as soon as possible.”
Wieschemann also pointed out that the evidence in Richard McLaren’s investigation on behalf of WADA – called the McLaren report – was never intended to single out individual athletes for suspension, rather “to collect evidence of the existence of a doping system within the country.” As such, Wieschemann insists that the evidence shouldn’t be used to suspend his clients.
McLaren has stated publicly that he was not tasked with assessing the guilt or innocence of individual athletes.
“Look at what is there and what the data is and make a decision on that basis and don’t turn it into what it isn’t – a doping results-management investigation of specific athletes,” McLaren said in an interview with The Guardian after the first part of his report dropped. “It never was that.”
But unlike Wieschemann, he doesn’t believe his evidence is lacking in any regard, just that this wasn’t necessarily its intended purpose. McLaren he insists that everything he documented was reliable.
“I wouldn’t put anything in the report that I didn’t have evidence of and wouldn’t meet the criminal standard in any court around the world,” he said in the same interview. “Nothing in there is an allegation. I wouldn’t have put it in if it didn’t meet that standard. To say that is all allegations and not proven and there is no evidence … there is evidence and I have it secured.”
Wieschemann disagrees. In a press release posted on his website regarding the skiers’ provisional suspensions, he asserts that the information in the McLaren report cannot be verified and is in fact wrong.
Then there’s this: “Furthermore, two samples have been taken from Alexander LEGKOV in Sochi which have been tested negative and for which no forensic proof on marks and scratches is available. In conclusion, that means – according to present knowledge – LEGKOV has been tested negative twice in Sochi without any indication of tampering.”
However, one of Legkov’s samples from Sochi did show such indications of tampering.
Furthermore, the report included emails between sports officials discussing how they “rescued” Legkov from a positive test for budesonide, a banned glucocorticosteroid, at national championships later that season.
Wieschemann counters that such evidence is irrelevant, because it did not occur at the Olympics and the current arbitration proceedings are based on suspensions initiated from the IOC recommendations.
“I think we are all positive,” Wieschemann said of the team’s attitude going into the CAS hearing. “The main thing is that we believe each other, and I’m absolutely sure that the guys were sincere in their conversations with me.They never used dope, including at the Olympic Games in Sochi… we can say with confidence that on that day, Alexander [Legkov] was clean.All the facts mentioned in McLaren’s report are beyond the control of the athlete.”
Alexander Legkov of Russia celebrates his Tour de Ski victory atop the Alpe Cermis in January, 2013. Legkov cannot compete in this year’s Tour de Ski because he is suspended for possible doping violations. (Photo: Fiemme2013)
The International Ski Federation (FIS) has denied an appeal by six Russian cross-country skiers suspended under the suspicion of doping.
FIS and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) are investigating the six athletes because bottles used to store their urine samples from the 2014 Olympics in Sochi, Russia, bore signs of tampering. FIS suspended the skiers while the investigation takes place.
The athletes had appealed this suspension because many planned to compete in the Tour de Ski, starting on Saturday.
“After receiving written submissions from the athletes and the response from FIS, the FIS Doping Panel made the unanimous decision today to uphold the provisional suspensions of the Russian Cross Country athletes, Evgeniy Belov, Julia Ivanova, Alexander Legkov, Evgenia Shapovalova, Alexey Petukhov and Maxim Vylegzhanin,” FIS wrote in a statement emailed to the press. “The reasons for the Panel’s decision will be communicated directly to the athletes in due course. As a result of the decision, all of the above mentioned athletes may not take part in any competitions or national team activities.”
This was also the first time that FIS publicly named the six skiers.
FIS Secretary General Sarah Lewis told FasterSkier last week that one other athlete may be suspended.
“There is only one additional non-Games time case and this is presently being processed,” she wrote in an email. “The timeline is the next week if possible.”
FIS did not tell the athletes what part of the World Anti-Doping Code they were suspected of violating.
The suspensions were based on the McLaren report’s findings that sample bottles had been opened and closed after sample collection. Wieschemann notes that in some other cases, the samples were positive for banned substances, or even belonged to a different person than the athlete who was supposedly being tested. This was not true for either Legkov or Belov. Evidence showed only that the bottles had been opened or tampered with. Wieschemann argues that this does not necessarily mean that the samples were not “clean”.
According to Wieschemann, neither Legkov nor Belov were on the “Duchess” list. That was a list of athletes who were provided banned performance-enhancing drugs by the Russian government and then protected from anti-doping measures.
The statement also notes that Legkov and Belov were often previously tested by outside anti-doping agencies in Europe.
“There is neither a positive sample from either of the athletes, nor any other indication that they could have taken banned substances… Such a connection is also not provided in the McLaren Report,” the statement says, according to a translation. “In fact, both athletes also gave blood samples in Sochi, which were negative.McLaren does not provide any information about swapping blood samples.This is a sure sign that both athletes were not drugged at the time of the Olympic Games.”
Complicit in Tampering or Not?
FIS wrote in their statement that “the reasons for the Panel’s decision will be communicated directly to the athletes in due course.” The rationale was not described to the media.
However, there are several reasons that FIS may want to keep the athletes suspended while they finish their investigation.
Article 2.5 of the World Anti-Doping Code prohibits “Tampering or Attempted Tampering with any part of Doping Control: Conduct which subverts the doping Control process but which would not otherwise be included in the definition of Prohibited Methods. Tampering shall include, without limitation, intentionally interfering or attempting to interfere with a doping Control official, providing fraudulent information to an anti-doping organization or intimidating or attempting to intimidate a potential witness.”
A footnote clarifies that “for example, this Article would prohibit altering identification numbers on a Doping Control form during Testing, breaking the B bottle at the time of B Sample analysis, or altering a Sample by the addition of a foreign substance.”
Sports organizations must decide the appropriate action for cases where a sample was tampered with by someone other than an athlete.
According to emails in the McLaren report, anti-doping officials opened sample bottles in order to replace “dirty” urine with “clean” urine. That means that the athletes must have been complicit in providing the “clean” urine sample in the first place. Yet it’s also very possible that some sample bottles were either opened by mistake or tampered with in a different way, without the knowledge or complicity of the athlete.
FIS may have evidence that they have not disclosed. The federation may also simply want more time to determine whether the athletes were complicit in sample manipulation.
Other Reasons the Appeal May Have Failed
Legkov and Belov do appear in planning documents for Sochi released as part of the McLaren report evidence packet. At the very least, that means that the government anti-doping officials carefully noted and tracked their participation at the Games.
Regarding the clean blood samples, this may not be sufficient evidence that athletes had not taken performance-enhancing drugs. Urine and blood samples detect different substances over different periods of time.
“A blood sample does not replace a urine test, because it concerns primarily different substances and different methods,” the Finnish Center for Integrity in Sports, SUEK, writes on its website.
Urine contains substances excreted from the body, while blood contains those integrated into the body. Testing agencies may not even test for all of the same substances in the two different types of samples. For example, human growth hormone is tested in blood, but not in urine; steroids are easier to detect in urine than in blood.
Furthermore, the IOC may not have even fully tested the samples collected at the Olympics.
“The initial tests take place in the lab located in the Olympic city,” NBC wrote of Olympic testing procedures. “Because of the huge number of samples and tests that need to be conducted in a short period of time, not every sample is tested for every drug. Experts take educated guesses on which set of athletes are more likely to use certain drugs and run the according tests.”
Finally, Wieschemann’s statement concludes that “Alexander Legkov and Evgeny Belov have at no time used prohibited means or applied forbidden methods.”
Budesonide is a corticosteroid sometimes used in asthma medication. In September, Secretary General of the Russian Ski Federation Georgiy Mnatsakanov told Norways’ NRK broadcaster that both Legkov and Ilia Chernousov used asthma medication despite the fact that they have no diagnosis of asthma.
Email released as part of the McLaren report show that Legkov did not have a Therapeutic Use Exemption for such medication.
Maiken Caspersen Falla of Norway (center) won the World Cup sprint in Stockholm, Sweden, on Thursday, ahead of teammate Ingvild Flugstad Oestberg (left) and Sweden’s Stina Nillson (right). (Photo: Fischer/NordicFocus)
Thursday’s women’s 1.2 k classic sprint in Stockholm was a royal affair.
The World Cup, with all its high-tech wax and made-for-television city-style sprints, made its home for a day in the heart of the Swedish capital. The roughly U-shaped sprint course, which featured a straightaway that double backed on itself after a tight and deteriorating 180-degree corner, embraced the historic Stockholm Castle- official residence of the Swedish Royal Family.
Yet, when she finally toed the line, Norway’s Maiken Caspersen Falla was the day’s sprinting queen. After setting the standard as the first qualifier in 3:10.31, she won the final in a speedy 3:09.38.
“My self-confidence is very high in classic sprinting, but I never go into it and think I’ll win,” Falla told Norwegian daily VG. “Today I felt good.”
Teammate Ingvild Flugstad Østberg skied to second, a full 3.39 seconds back, while Sweden’s Stina Nilsson salvaged a host nation podium in third (+4.37). Sweden also secured fourth and fifth overall, with Hanna Falk (+5.22) and Jennie Öberg (+6.26). Russia’s Evgenia Shapovalova was the lone non-scandinavian in the final, skiing to sixth, 12.7 seconds behind Falla.
“She has a violent speed at the end,” Østberg told Norwegian broadcaster NRK of her winning teammate. “We others are not there.It is simply another league, but I’m satisfied with another second place.”
American Sophie Caldwell, currently sixth in the Sprint World Cup standings, was the best placed North American, finishing 11th. Her teammate Jessie Diggins skied to 15th on the day.
From the beginning, it was a tight qualifier. Only a single second separated first from eighth. And only 1.61 seconds back in ninth was the first North American qualifier, Caldwell. Diggins qualified 21st (+5.13). U.S. skiers Sadie Bjornsen in 37th (+8.32), Ida Sargent in 49th (+12.6), Jennie Bender in 56th (+18.5), and Caitlin Patterson in 58th (+20.77) were locked out of the heats, along with the lone Canadian, Andrea Dupont of Rocky Mountain Racers, who finished 52nd (+16.71).
Maiken Caspersen Falla (NOR) crosses the line in first in Stockholm, Sweden. (Photo: Fischer/NordicFocus)
Queen for a day
Falla, the Stockholm Castle’s sprint queen, finished the day with a flurry of 1’s on the result sheet. Qualifying first, first in her quarterfinal, first in her semifinal, and first overall, Falla never allowed the tactics of others or the deteriorating soft course to stymie her efforts.
Østberg won the first semifinal in 3:11.45. That pace, although not blistering for the day, produced the two lucky losers advancing to the finals, Falk and Shapovalova.
Falla’s semifinal, out of which only she and Nilsson advanced, ran even slower. Falla stopped the watch in 3:12.68.
That time was not indicative of Falla’s reserves. Come finals, Falla had enough spare energy to dominate — she would beat that time by 3.3 seconds.
Moments after the gun, it was three skiers across for the first one hundred meters — Öberg, Østberg, and Falla. Those three set the pace, still three across striding up the first hill. Down that hill, Falla began to pull away slightly, as the group entered the 180-degre turn. Falla led out while Østberg settled into the back three or four spots, looking momentarily gassed.
Up and over a bridge, while Østberg moved forward, is when Falla made it her race.
Coming off that hill, and into the long uphill striding drag to the finish, Falla skied like a sprint champion, crossing the line uncontested- although she still stretched for the line at the finish, as if to make an exclamation point. Østberg came in second, Nilson in third.
With the win, Falla won her fourth consecutive classic sprint and her fourth World Cup classic sprint of the past five. Not only did she steal Sweden’s show with the win, she supplanted Nilsson for the top spot in the Overall World Cup sprint standings.
And the drama didn’t end there: to snag second, Østberg slotted in ahead of Nilsson in the classic tracks, a move that some on the Swedish team felt was obstruction. The team filed a protest to have the Norwegian relegated, but it was denied.
“I will not be bitter, but I think that the rules should be the same for everyone,” Nilsson told VG. “But I’m not going to get hung up on this.I’m happy with my race.”
Consistent? Nilsson was sore because in the previous World Cup sprint, in Drammen, Norway, she was relegated off the podium for obstructing Finland’s Krista Parmakoski. The move was similar to the one Østberg made on Thursday.
“Actually, I think it’s what happens in the sprint,” Nilsson’s teammate Öberg told VG. “But Stina Nilsson was disqualified in the previous race, and it was almost the same incident.And now I think it is a bit strange to apply it for one individual and not for another individual.”
Despite Falla’s comfortable win, it remains a tight race for the sprint overall. Falla is in first with 480 points, Østberg in second with 476, and Nilsson now in third with 474. Norway’s Heidi Weng, who sat out Thursday’s sprint, sits fourth overall, with 252 points.
With the six points separating first through third for the overall, the sprint crystal globe won’t be decided well into the Ski Tour Canada.
In a post-race interview with FIS, Falla spoke of her sprint authority.
“I’m always really nervous and just kept trying to do my best- I’m always telling myself, always do my best,” she said. ” Today, I didn’t feel that my power was so good as in Drammen, I was just thinking and focusing on technique and try to do like big movements, I really had a good focus on the technique. And I think that’s what’s important today with all the soft conditions.”
“I can say that this is the first time that I have felt some fatigue from previous racing,” she told FIS. “The 30 km was tough last weekend and I think I felt it in the finals. I am happy for Maiken. She was better than I was today and I can’t believe that it’s another podium for me this season.”
Nilsson, who before this race was leading the Overall World Cup sprint standings, acknowledged Norway’s strength.
“It was great to race in front of the home crowd. I tried as hard as I could but Maiken and Ingvild were stronger, but I am happy with how it went today to be on the podium again,” Nilsson said according to the FIS press release.
If Nilsson remains in the overall hunt, in the 19 years since the inception of the sprint World Cup, she could be the first Swedish women to win the sprint crystal globe.
Sophie Caldwell strides to 11th overall in the FIS world cup cross-country, individual sprint, Stockholm (SWE). (Photo: Fischer/NordicFocus)
Peaks and Valleys for the U.S.
Caldwell led the U.S. results.
In an email, she wrote the Stockholm sprint course was a brute. “The course was extremely difficult not necessarily because of the terrain, but because of the lack of recovery. I liked that the hills were a little steeper and the flats were a little flatter than the course in Drammen. That played more to my strengths. Because of the slow conditions, you basically had to work all the downhills and there was very little time to recover.”
Her 11th overall included a win in her quarterfinal heat, further evidence that she is emerging as a top sprinter in any race. “My strategy in the quarter was to hop in behind someone fast and to try to conserve some energy for the final stretch. I think it worked out quite well, but it was a really hard effort.”
That first place quarterfinal effort sapped her. “I was definitely feeling a little tired in the semi,” Caldwell wrote.
“I chose to go with skis that kicked really well and I think that worked well in my quarter before I got tired, but in my semi it was a quick pace from the beginning and maybe my skis were gliding a little slower and kicking a little better than others, but I didn’t have the energy to stay with the fastest people on the flats and downs.” In the closing half-kilometer of her semifinal, won outright by Østberg, Caldwell faded — she finished sixth (+9.93).
Caldwell plans on racing this Saturday’s 5 k classic in Falun, then a skate sprint in Lahti, Finland on February 20th. After that, it’s a flight back Stateside for Ski Tour Canada prep. During all that time, while Caldwell focuses on what she can control, the FIS score keepers will be updating the tally for the sprint overall standings. “I try not to pay too much attention to the standings,” Caldwell wrote. “I feel like the best thing you can do is go out and race your hardest each week and getting hung up on things like points or rankings can only take away from that. I’ll be where I’ll be at the end of the season, but I’m more focused on each race as a new day than an overall ranking. Before this season, I sat down with Matt to write out some goals. I suggested top ten in the sprint standings at the end of the year and he said “how about top 5?”. I don’t know if I’ll end up in the top five at the end of the year or not, but knowing that I’ve been flirting with being in the top 5 at any point during the season is something that I will be proud of.”
Diggins, placing 15th, was also a qualifier. She remains happy with her improving classic skiing.
“I was psyched to qualify, especially as classic sprinting is traditionally my worst event and I’ve been working so hard to improve my technique and power,” Diggins wrote in an email. “I went for kick over glide today which was a gamble and the double poling was nuts as the tracks were falling apart- it made for an exciting day! … It’s always a good day at work when you get to race around a royal palace…can’t ever overlook how cool it is to be here!”
Bjornsen, who skied to 37th, felt her day could have been improved upon, but she remains forward thinking as her consistent season progresses.
“I have been struggling with my classic skis a lot this year, and today I tried a new approach,” Bjornsen explained in an email. “Unfortunately it didn’t work out, and I wasn’t able to get my brain to commit to the change. Sprint racing leaves no room for error, so I was on the wrong side of the error today.”
After the Stockholm sprints, Bjornsen sits 14th in the Overall World Cup.
“Fortunately, we have many races in the year, and so it is never effective to spend too much time focusing on a dip,” she wrote. “I know I classic ski in the top ten, and I know I know how to kick a classic ski. The two most important things to remember looking forward to what is coming next!”
Ida Sargent’s is a name usually in the points on classic sprints days. Having planned to start last Sunday’s Holmenkollen 30 k classic, she pulled out due to illness. In Stockholm, where she finished 49th, she was still recovering.
“Today was very frustrating for me and I was definitely hoping for more,” Sargent emailed. “I love racing in Stockholm and it’s my favorite city sprint but I unfortunately didn’t put one together today. I got sick last week and today was the first day back to training for me so I felt asleep during the qualifier. Normally I’m toeing the line of blowing up in the qualifier but today after not having done any intensity in over a week, I couldn’t get going and couldn’t find my normal pop. I also did not do a good job testing my skis today and struggled on the last uphill. I wanted to have fast skis with so much double poling in the course but I felt like I was spinning my wheels and running in place on the last uphill. Our techs did a great job with skis but I need to improve my ability to test my skis in the stressful situations of the city sprints. It was still a fun atmosphere and I’m looking forward to getting in some more training and racing this weekend to feel like my normal self again!”
Placing 58th, Caitlin Patterson explained in an email that she came away Stockholm with a learning objective. “I felt fairly good physically and had a good warm up, but during the race I allowed myself to get bogged down in the deep slush and I know I lost time on many of the transitions. It wasn’t my best of races but certainly there are many things I can learn from evaluating my own performance as well as watching the top athletes cruising around the course, making that slush look far more ski-able than it felt.”
Bumped up to the World Cup, Patterson steamrolls ahead in venues effusing both rarefied old world ski culture and the modern world’s quick urban tempo. “It’s hard to even describe it, such a juxtaposition of chaos with the structured format of a ski race, all with a spectacular old-city backdrop,” Patterson wrote of her time in Stockholm.
Racing continues on Saturday in Falun, Sweden with a women’s 5 k and a men’s 10 k classic.
Justyna Kowalczyk (POL) sprints for the finish in Drammen, Norway, to both win the race and secure the overall World Cup crystal globe. Photo: Fischer/Nordic Focus.
There has been no stopping Justyna Kowalczyk (POL) on classic skis lately. In Drammen, Norway, on Wednesday she continued the momentum from her distance win in Lahti and charged to victory yet again, this time in a 1.3 k city sprint. Save for a challenge from Heidi Weng (NOR) in the final round, the Polish star blew the competition away all day, and in the process secured the overall World Cup crystal globe for the 2012-2013 season and for the fourth time in her career.
“It is my first victory in Drammen,” Kowalczyk told the FIS interviewer at the finish. “I felt strong and could enjoy the race when I had secured the Overall World Cup.”
Weng finished second, 0.9 seconds behind Kowalczyk, and compatriot Invild Flugstad Østberg took third (+2.0).
Kowalczyk in qualifying. Photo: Fischer/Nordic Focus.
After qualifying third behind Mona-Lisa Malvalehto (FIN) and Katja Visnar (SLO), Kowalczyk proceeded to stomp to three consecutive wins throughout the heats, leaving no room for doubt as to who the best sprinter on the course was. Marit Bjørgen (NOR), the recently-crowned World Champion, was notably absent due to illness, leaving the door wide open for Kowalcyk to win her quarterfinal by an gaping 1.62 seconds and her semifinal by 0.2 seconds after gapping the field early on.
If Kowalczyk felt the weight of the crystal globe on her shoulders, she didn’t show it.
“I was calm about the competition [for] the overall World Cup,” Kowalczk said on her website. “Today, so much beyond the statistics in this regard for me has changed. Of course, it’s nice, but that day I concentrated mainly on the [race].”
Her surges off the front of the pack in the first two rounds clearly projected Kowalczk’s expected strategy for the final, where she faced the two young Norwegians, Weng and Østberg, along with Evgenia Shapovalova (RUS), Kikkan Randall (USA) and Malvalehto (FIN). Such a field was not one to be trifled with, as Shapovalova had nearly caught Kowalczyk in the final meters of their semifinal, Malvalehto had looked strong all day and Randall was a newly-minted World Cup sprint champion.
It was with some surprise, then, to see Weng take the initiative to make the only attempt to hang onto Kowalczyk when the latter made her predictable blitz to the front. Kowalczyk looked back a few times as the pair drew away from the field, and each time Weng was right behind her.
The women behind them expected the move, and believed Drammen’s winding course and sharp corners would bring them back to the leaders before the finishing straight.
“I knew Kowalczyk would set a fast pace and I knew I could tuck in and conserve energy early,” Randall said. “That final stretch is so crucial every time.”
But the American wasn’t quite aggressive enough to be in a position to contend in that final stretch. Randall got stuck towards the back at the end as Weng and Kowalczk duked it out for gold. It was only in the last few meters, as they drew up to the awkwardly-situated finish line at the top of a short climb, that Kowalczyk was able to bury her challenger. Weng visibly struggled to stride fast enough as Kowalczyk kept double-poling, and when Kowalczyk finally broke into a confident stride she put 0.9 seconds on Weng before they both made an uphill lunge.
Østberg took third, 2.0 seconds back, Shapovalova was fourth (+4.5), Randall finished fifth (+4.7) and Malvalehto fell to sixth (+8.8).
After fighting hard to advance in her previous rounds, Weng said she simply ran out of energy at the conclusion of Drammen’s challenging course.
“I knew there is uphill in the finish and I believed I could be strong in a classic sprint here,” Weng said. “I thought I could beat Justyna but I was very tired in the end, but I am happy for second place.”
In front of an enthusiastic Norweigan crowd, Weng noted that two Norwegians on the podium was especially rewarding.
“Very gratifying that both the Norwegian in the finals ended on the podium,” she told the NRK.
The result is a new personal-best in sprinting for the 21-year-old and only her second career podium on the World Cup in a sprint event.
Østberg was equally happy with third place as it was her first individual World Cup podium ever and brought some satisfaction after a disappointing World Championships, where she failed to advance past the quarterfinals.
“It feels great to be on the World Cup podium for the first time in my career, especially here in Norway,” Østberg said. “The crowds were phenomenal. It is a great revenge for me after the World Championships.”
The last time Marit Bjørgen (NOR) lost an individual World Cup race in November? That would be 2008, at the beginning of a disappointing 2009 season. So there was little surprise when the Norwegian star once again crossed the line in first, chalking up her third consecutive Ruka Triple sprint victory.
Cold temperatures, and the usual challenging course in Kuusamo, Finland did little to deter Bjørgen, who used her superior fitness to ski away from Evgenia Shapovalova (RUS) on the last climb of the race and cruise uncontested across the line.
Bjørgen brings it home in a race last season.
Shapavalova and teammate Anastasia Dotsenko led the final heat early, setting the pace on the first climb. Bjørgen started conservatively before working into position on that hill.
She tailed Shapavalova, and the two started pulling away on the long flat before the big ascent to the stadium. The Russian fought gamely to match Bjørgen when the later attacked, but the effort was in vain.
Still, Shapavalova had to be pleased with her first World Cup podium appearance since 2007. And with Dotsenko staying clear of Finland’s Anne Kylloenen, Russia ended up with two in the top three.
Kylloenen set a fast pace early, closely followed by Slovenian Katja Visnar and teammate Krista Lahteenmaki.
She couldn’t handle the pace when the Russians took over, however, and when Visnar tripped on a small rise, blocking Lahteenmaki in the process, the race became a three-way affair.
Bjørgen overcame near elimination in the quarterfinals, where she finished third and advanced as a lucky loser. After the race she said that a poor tactical decision and sub-optimum skis were the issue.
She changed both for the semis and didn’t look back on her way to the win.
“I have not trained sprints that much this year,” Bjørgen said after the race. “I have been working hard on my technique on steep uphills…It is good to see I am competitive in the sprints.”
Dotesenko earned just her second World Cup podium, matching her place in last year’s Moscow city sprint.
Like many of the sprint specialists, the pair left immediately after the race to begin travel to Canada for the Quebec sprints.
That leaves Bjørgen with a solid lead in the overall mini-tour standings. Chief rival Justyna Kowalczyk (POL) failed to advance out of the semis, and placed 7th. She goes into day two 17.6 seconds down on Bjørgen.
Charlotte Kalla (SWE) a potential contender for the mini-tour podium did not race due to mild illness on the Swedish team according to Langd.se.
The potential podium threats include Lahteenmaki, an excellent all-rounder, who sits in 6th, 16.1 seconds out and Kikkan Randall 32 seconds down in 10th.
Racing continues on Saturday with a 5k individual freestyle.
– Therese Johaug (NOR) continues to show improved sprinting, qualifying for the heats and placing 24th. Despite being a minute off the pace in the overall, she could easily get back in contention.
– Seven different nations cracked the top-12.
– Norway and Finland both qualified six skiers for the heats, with Russia advancing five.
– That 2009 season where Bjørgen struggled? She failed to win a medal at the World Championships and basically shut down soon after. She also imploded in the final climb of the Tour de Ski. Since then she has twice finished 2nd in the overall World Cup, won once, racked up 11 Championship medals and seemingly endless World Cup victories.
![](http://fasterskier.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/2017/11/DPZnas6XUAA_oP5.jpg-large.jpeg")
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![](http://fasterskier.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/2017/11/kalla.jpg")
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![11.02.2016, Stockholm, Sweden (SWE): Ingvild Flugstad Oestberg (NOR), Maiken Caspersen Falla (NOR), Stina Nilsson (SWE), (l-r) - FIS world cup cross-country, individual sprint, Stockholm (SWE). (Photo: Fischer/NordicFocus)](http://fasterskier.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/2016/02/Group160211mf141-e1455224079957.jpg")
![11.02.2016, Stockholm, Sweden (SWE): Maiken Caspersen Falla (NOR) - crosses the line in first -- FIS world cup cross-country, individual sprint, Stockholm (SWE). (Photo: Fischer/NordicFocus)](http://fasterskier.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/2016/02/Falla160211mf144-e1455224345649.jpg")
![11.02.2016, Stockholm, Sweden (SWE): Sophie Caldwell (USA) - FIS world cup cross-country, individual sprint, Stockholm (SWE). where she finished 11th. (Photo: Fischer/NordicFocus)](http://fasterskier.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/2016/02/Caldwell160211mf023.jpg")
![Justyna Kowalczyk (POL) sprints for the finish in Drammen, Norway, to both win the race and secure the overall World Cup crystal globe. Photo: Fischer/Nordic Focus.](http://fasterskier.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/2013/03/Kowalczyk-win.jpeg")
![Kowalczyk in qualifying. Photo: Fischer/Nordic Focus.](http://fasterskier.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/2013/03/Kowalczyk-qualifier-Drammen.jpeg")
![The women's Drammen podium: 1. Justyna Kowalczyk (POL), 2. Heidi Weng (NOR), 3. Invind Flugstad Østberg (NOR). Photo: Fischer/Nordic Focus.](http://fasterskier.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/2013/03/womens-podium.jpeg")
![](http://fasterskier.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/2012/01/women-marit-1-web.jpg" "Bjørgen brings it home.")